** What is sustainability?
===================
It's more than environmentalism. It's about living and working in ways that don't jeopardize the future of our social, economic and natural resources. In business, sustainability means managing human and natural capital with the same vigor we apply to the management of financial capital. It means widening the scope of our awareness so we can understand fully the "true cost" of every choice we make.

** Why is striving for sustainability so important?
================================================
Here's the problem in a nutshell. Industrialism developed in a different world from the one we live in today: fewer people, less material well-being, plentiful natural resources. What emerged was a highly productive, take-make-waste system that assumed infinite resources and infinite sinks for industrial wastes. Industry moves mines, extracts, shovels, burns, wastes, pumps and disposes of four million pounds of material in order to provide one average, middle-class American family their needs for a year. Today, the rate of material throughput is endangering our prosperity, not enhancing it.  At Interface, we recognize that we are part of the problem. We are analyzing all of our material flows to begin to address the task at hand. 

** What's the solution?
=================
We're not sure, but we have some ideas. We believe that there's a cure for resource waste that is profitable, creative and practical.  We must create a company that addresses the needs of society and the environment by developing a system of industrial production that decreases our costs and dramatically reduces the burdens placed upon living systems. This also makes precious resources available for the billions of people who need more. What we call the next industrial revolution is a momentous shift in how we see the world, how we operate within it, what systems will prevail and which will not. At Interface, we are completely reimagining and redesigning everything we do, including the way we define our business. Our vision is to lead the way to the next industrial revolution by becoming the first sustainable corporation, and eventually a restorative enterprise. It's an extraordinarily ambitious endeavor; a mountain to climb that is higher than Everest. 

Interview with Ray Anderson: Moving Towards A Sustainable Enterprise! Ray Anderson, Chairman and CEO of Interface Carpets
Part 1 | Part 2

"Sustainable Enterprise" Links

• Sustainable Enterprise
• EcoSense Forum
• PletSUS (Practices Leading Toward Sustainability) discussion Forum
• The Natural Step
• Natural Logic
• Sustainable Development on Campus
• Get Engaged: Smart Growth Guide; Ontario Smart Growth
• Ontario's vision for fostering and managing growth
• Ottawa Smart Growth Summit: June 14th to June 18th, 2001
• Canadian Pollution Prevention Information Clearinghouse - Success stories
• Sustainability: A Choice to Consider

 

	Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise:  Ray Anderson Mr. Anderson has taken an important step forward in leading Interface Corporation towards becoming ecologically neutral. By that phrase, ecologically neutral, I mean taking nothing  from and adding nothing to the environment. This concept has become a popular one in Europe beginning in Sweden, in the form of The Natural Step, but has been much more slowly adopted in the United States. Those who are interested in understanding the processes by which a company can pursue improved environmental performance will find many helpful examples in Mid-Course Correction.
	Who's Counting? Marilyn Waring on Sex, Lies & Global Economics (VHS):  Home | Institutional: National Film Board of Canada With irony and intelligence Marilyn Waring demystifies the language of economics by defining it as a value system in which all goods and activities are related only to their monetary value and monetary exchange with the result that unpaid work, usually done by women, is unrecognized and activities that may be environmentally and socially hazardous are regarded as productive. She maps out an alternative economic vision based on the idea of time as the one thing we all have to exchange. Shot in Canada, New Zealand, New York City, the Persian Gulf and the Philippines this film is an entertaining primer for anyone who suffers from what Waring calls "economics anxiety." .
	You Can't Eat GNP: Economics as Though Ecology Mattered: Eric A. Davidson As Davidson explains, the system of neoclassical economics, which governs our economy, assigns value to goods depending on the level at which they're produced and consumed. For example, marketed consumer products like bread hold high value, while bread's main ingredient, flour, holds less. Flour in its unprocessed form, wheat, holds even less value, and the soil from which wheat is grown holds the least worth of all. This triangle has become an exact inversion of the ecologist's pyramid, however, in which soil--which supports the entire ecological system, from plants to herbivores to carnivores--is viewed as the pyramid's stabilizing resource. Davidson argues these opposing models must be integrated in order to preserve the ecological system that sustains our economic system.
	Beyond Growth : The Economics of Sustainable Development: Herman E. Daly ... If you're beginning to feel that the phrase "sustainable development" might be going down the semantic doublespeak path where being fired from your job is now dubbed "occupationally challenged," then Daly is the economist for you. The innovative scholar and World Bank rabble rouser argues that the catchword of environmentalists and international financiers is being used by both to further their own ends. Sustainable development, as conceived by Daly, becomes a radical proposition of economy as part of the ecosystem, requiring that we give up an ideal of economic growth and reevaluate basic ideas about economic theory, poverty, trade, and population.
	For the Common Good : Redirecting the Economy Toward Community, the Environment, and a Sustainable Future: Herman E. Daly, John B., Jr. Cobb (Contributor), Clifford W. Cobb (Designer) ... Daly (economist, the World Bank) and Cobb (philosophy, Claremont Graduate School) expose the outmoded abstractions of mainstream economic theory. They conclude, in particular, that economic growth--the prevailing yardstick for measuring economic success--is no longer an appropriate goal as energy consumption, overpopulation, and pollution increase. Instead, they propose a new measure for the economy--the Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare.
	Planning the New Suburbia : Flexibility by Design:  Avi Freidman An architect and planner, Friedman suggests new methods of design and regulation that would enable urban planners to conceive and inhabitants to adapt suburban communities and homes to their evolving needs, as a result of changing family size, an aging population, or new working conditions.
	Ripples from the Zambezi: Passion, Entrepreneurship, and the Rebirth of Local Economies: Ernesto Sirolli Ernesto Sirolli is a man of many extraordinary but simple ideas. Sirolli says our society should give up its pushy and paranoid pursuit of trying to motivate people to work, especially young people. Instead, we should let them discover what really grabs them, and then be available with the best possible knowledge. - Permaculture International Journal
	Planning for Seven Generations: Guideposts for a Sustainable Future:  Mike Nickerson
	The Ecology of Commerce: A Declaration of Sustainability: Paul Hawken ...Paul Hawken, the entrepreneur behind the Smith & Hawken gardening supplies empire, is no ordinary capitalist. Drawing as much on Baba Ram Dass and Vaclav Havel as he does on Peter Drucker and WalMart for his case studies, Hawken is on a one-man crusade to reform our economic system by demanding that First World businesses reduce their consumption of energy and resources by 80 percent in the next 50 years. As if that weren't enough, Hawken argues that business goals should be redefined to embrace such fuzzy categories as whether the work is aesthetically pleasing and the employees are having fun; this applies to corporate giants and mom-and-pop operations alike. He proposes a culture of business in which the real world, the natural world, is allowed to flourish as well, and in which the planet's needs are addressed. Wall Street may not be ready for Hawken's provocative brand of environmental awareness, but this fine book is full of captivating ideas.
	The Natural Step for Business : Wealth, Ecology and the Evolutionary Corporation:  Brian Nattrass, Mary Altomare ... a terrific book in that it not only lucidly explains the framework of the Natural Step but also gives some excellent practical examples of major corporations starting down the path towards sustainability. This will give them a great competitive edge. With examples like the Natural Step model being applied by the likes of IKEA and Interface one can remain optimistic in the face of the torrent of negatives about the degenerating nature of the world environment. I hope that this book will encourgae others to look into what the Natural Step has to offer...
	Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature: Janine M. Benyus ... Forget the notion that technology improves upon nature. Benyus introduces us to pioneering engineers making technological breakthroughs by uncovering and copying nature's hidden marvels. These engineers are devising solar fuel cells as efficient as plants, fibers as tough as abalone shell, and computers as sophisticated as the brain. For Benyus, though, a technology that mirrors nature does more than enlarge human powers and gratify human ambitions. Such a technology teaches us how to live in...
	Simplicity: The New Competitive Advantage: Bill Jensen ...Calling someone simple used to be an insult. The so-called simple life really meant "poverty." Then, in 1981, Duane Elgin wrote Voluntary Simplicity and attached a new notion to the word - a happier, less-harried existence free of cell phones, fax machines, Range Rovers and T1 lines. Disciples of Elgin-style simplicity set off in pursuit of a feel-good life full of respect for the Earth and other creatures, with organic radicchio on the side.

 

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