Sustainability

Sustainability is the ability to continue a defined behaviour indefinitely. For more practical detail
the behaviour you wish to continue indefinitely must be defined. For example:

• Environmental sustainability is the ability to maintain rates of renewable resource harvest,

pollution creation, and non-renewable resource depletion that can be continued
indefinitely.

• Economic sustainability is the ability to support a defined level of economic production

indefinitely.
• Social sustainability is the ability of a social system, such as a country, to function at a
defined level of social well-being indefinitely.

These form the goal of The Three Pillars of Sustainability.

Sustainability may include:

• Addressing environmental and resource sustainability initiatives, such as environmental

management systems, action plans, green office programs, surveys and audits

• Applying the waste management hierarchy in the workplace

• Complying with regulations and corporate social responsibility considerations for

sustainability to enhance the organisation’s standing in business and community
environments

• Determining organisation’s most appropriate waste treatment, including waste to landfill,

recycling, re-use, recoverable resources and wastewater treatment

• Implementing ecological footprint

• Implementing environmental management systems, e.g. ISO 14001:2015 Environmental

management systems life cycle analyses

• Implementing government initiatives, e.g. Australian government’s Greenhouse Challenge

Plus

• Improving resource and energy efficiency

• Initiating and maintaining appropriate organisational procedures for operational energy

consumption