How capabilities in operations can influence green production:exploring the issues

This research presents case material of companies within the UK that are attempting to be “Green” in their operations processes. We assess their aspirations by plotting capabilities through their supply networks under five key headings: Strategy; Production planning and procurement; In-house production; Logistics; and Human resource management within operations. We build upon the work of Azzone and Noci, 1998 and Azzone et al., 1997 and we present insights into companies whose commitment to Green Production ranges from “the company tries to delay the adoption of green programs” through to the company adopts a “radical approach to environmental issues.” In doing so we see how operations capabilities in a range of parameters can play a central and pivotal role in achieving some of the aspirations of Green Production within companies.

Corporate environmental and climate change disclosures:empirical evidence from Bangladesh

Purpose-In this article, we examine the nature and the extent of corporate environmental and climate change disclosures in Bangladesh. Design/methodology/ approach-For this purpose, we have undertaken a content analysis of annual reports related to the year 2008 and websites of the 100 largest companies (according to market capitalization) listed on the Dhaka Stock Exchange. We have used 24 content analysis categories to capture the relevant disclosures related to climate change and other environmental issues. Findings-Key findings of our analysis suggest that the level of environmental and climate change disclosures is very low in Bangladesh. Although 91% of companies made disclosures in at least one category, most companies disclosed information only on the ''energy usage'' category, which is a mandatory requirement. Even fewer companies made disclosures in the specific areas of climate change. No disclosure was made in the significant categories such as GHG emissions. The second most popular category related to climate change was adaptation measures. Among the other environmental disclosures, a significant finding is that only 5% of (website 6%) companies disclosed that they had an effluent treatment plant. Closer examination of the nature of disclosures suggests that most of the disclosures are positive and descriptive in nature. Originality/value-As far as we are aware, this is the first study of its kind in Bangladesh which systematically examines corporate climate change disclosures as a particular focus of research. Copyright © 2010 by Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

Green@CU:an environmental game for residential accommodation

The importance of using games for supporting behavioural and attitudinal change has been explored in the literature, most recently the games for change movement has promulgated the use of games for supporting altruistic changes that have a positive impact upon the environment. This paper presents a Serious Game designed for University students and its main aim is to educate them about environmental issues. In particular, the focus lies in the importance of saving energy. A user study with 42 participants assessed the feeling of presence of the whole virtual learning experience.

Business strategy and the environment in a traditional manufacturing sector

This research is concerned with the relationship between business strategy and the environment within traditional sectors. It has sought to learn more about the strategic environmental attitudes of SMEs compared with large companies operating under the same market conditions. The sector studied is the ceramics industry (including tableware & ornamental-ware, sanitary ware & tiles, bricks, industrial & advanced ceramics and refractories) in the UK and France. Unlike the automotive, oil, chemical, steel or metal processing sectors, this industry is one of the few industrial sectors which has rarely been considered. The information on this sector was gathered by interviewing people responsible for environmental issues. The actual programme of valid interviews represents approximately a quarter of the UK and French ceramics industry which is large enough to enable a quantitative analysis and significant and non-biased conclusions. As a whole, all companies surveyed agreed that the ceramics activity impacts on the environment, and that they are increasingly affected both by environmental legislation, and by various non-legislative pressures. Approaches to the environmental agenda differ significantly among large and small companies. Smaller companies feel particularly pressed both by the financial costs and management time required to meet complex and changing legislation. The results of this survey also suggest that the ceramics industry sees environmental issues in terms of increased costs rather than new business opportunities. This is due principally to fears of import substitution from countries with lower environmental standards. Finally, replies indicate that generally there is a low level of awareness of the current legislative framework, suggesting a need to shift from a regulatory approach to a more self-regulated approach which encourages companies to be more proactive

Rekindling community spirit and identity:the role of ecoprotestors

One of the features of current society is that of protest against environmental issues and this paper considers protest against road building and the ecoprotest movement. In doing so it considers both the local inhabitants and new age travellers who are involved in such protest to show that not only does ecoprotest, as a form of protest, raise the profile of environmental issues within public discourse but also opens up space for such discourse. Of greater significance is the effect which the ecoprotest, movement has upon a local sense of identity and community. Indeed the travellers themselves, through their action and engagement, demonstrate that the key determinant of community identity is grounded in self-belief and shared aspirations rather than in an externally imposed definition or in any economic imperatives. This paper shows that the migration of this sense of self-belief into mainstream society serves to demonstrate that community spirit and identity are extant in modern society but need a catalyst for their re-emergence. In doing so the role of ecoprotest points towards a possible mechanism for the re-emergence of an active and participatory sense of community identity within society as a whole.

Integrated approach to project feasibility analysis:a case study

Feasibility studies of industrial projects consist of multiple analyses carried out sequentially. This is time consuming and each analysis screens out alternatives based solely on the merits of that analysis. In cross-country petroleum pipeline project selection, market analysis determines throughput requirement and supply and demand points. Technical analysis identifies technological options and alternatives for pipe-line routes. Economic and financial analysis derive the least-cost option. The impact assessment addresses environmental issues. The impact assessment often suggests alternative sites, routes, technologies, and/or implementation methodology, necessitating revision of technical and financial analysis. This report suggests an integrated approach to feasibility analysis presented as a case application of a cross-country petroleum pipeline project in India.

Urban ecosystems – tapping the human resource

In order to take an interest in environmental issues, people need an idea of what ‘the environment’ is, and to have access to something worth caring about. In the UK, around 90% of us already live in towns or cities, and by 2030, around 60% of the world’s population will live in urban areas. But without a vocal set of ‘owners’, public land such as parks and allotments can easily be lost. The majority of the UK's ‘natural’ areas have historically been created, managed or modified by humans. and we should appreciate urban habitats just as much as pristine reserves for the ecosystem services they provide. In particular, scruffy and overlooked brownfield sites can be amazing refugia for insect and plant species which can no longer persist in a countryside dominated by industrialised agriculture.

Linkages between ecocentric values and action in expert discourse: the case of genetically modified food in the UK

Attitudes towards the environment can be manifest in two broad categories, namely anthropocentric and ecocentric. The former regards nature as of value only insofar as it is useful to humanity, whereas the latter assigns intrinsic value to natural entities. Industrial society can be characterised as being dominated by anthropocentrism, which leads to the assumption that a majority of people hold anthropocentric values. However, research shows the most widely held values are ecocentric, which implies that many people's actions are at variance with their values. Furthermore, policy relating to environmental issues is predominantly anthropocentric, which implies it is failing to take account of the values of the majority. Research among experts involved in policy formulation has shown that their values, often ecocentric, are excluded from the policy process. The genetic modification of food can be categorised as anthropocentric, which implies that the technique is in conflict with widely held ecocentric values. This thesis examines data collected from interviews with individuals who have an influence on the debate surrounding the introduction of genetically modified foods, and can be considered 'experts'. Each interviewee is categorised according to whether their values and actions are ecocentric or anthropocentric, and the linkages between the two and the arguments used to justify their positions are explored. Particular emphasis is placed on interviewees who have ecocentric values but act professionally in an anthropocentric way. Finally, common themes are drawn out, and the features the arguments used by the interviewees have in common are outlined.

Going green: prospects for SME's to attain ISO 14001 and the challenges they face in the process

This research aimed to identify any common factors that have enabled and/or motivated SMEs to successfully implement ISO 14001 whilst the majority have not. It also identified what challenges and barriers SMEs face in doing so and how some have overcome these. The existing literature suggests that the majority of SMEs perceive their environmental impacts to be proportional to their size; have a poor understanding of environmental issues; have a poor awareness of environmental regulations; do that have the necessary expertise or leadership to address environmental issues and that SMEs with an environmental management system such as ISO 14001 are very much the minority. The main factors that influenced whether an SME had implemented ISO 14001 were: competitive advantage, regulatory compliance, supply chain pressures, leadership, expertise, resources and external support. This research used qualitative analysis of interviews with managers and directors from 8 SMEs with ISO 14001 and 4 without. All of the SMEs were based in the West Midlands or Staffordshire. Interviews were also conducted with 3 organisations offering support to businesses on environmental issues and with 1 large business who was engaging their suppliers (which included SMEs within this sample) on environmental issues. The research found that there were four main factors that enabled or motivated the SMEs to implement ISO 14001, these were: leadership, supply chain pressures, external support and SMEs' history and experience of accredited management systems. The main challenges that these business had to overcome and that prevented the other SMEs from achieving ISO 14001 were: achieving regulatory compliance, perceived financial cost, lack of perceived competitive advantage, access to relevant and affordable support and for those SMEs without ISO 14001 there was very little perceived external pressure or need for them to do so.

Plant oils as fuels for compression ignition engines: a technical review and life-cycle analysis

As an alternative fuel for compression ignition engines, plant oils are in principle renewable and carbon-neutral. However, their use raises technical, economic and environmental issues. A comprehensive and up-to-date technical review of using both edible and non-edible plant oils (either pure or as blends with fossil diesel) in CI engines, based on comparisons with standard diesel fuel, has been carried out. The properties of several plant oils, and the results of engine tests using them, are reviewed based on the literature. Findings regarding engine performance, exhaust emissions and engine durability are collated. The causes of technical problems arising from the use of various oils are discussed, as are the modifications to oil and engine employed to alleviate these problems. The review shows that a number of plant oils can be used satisfactorily in CI engines, without transesterification, by preheating the oil and/or modifying the engine parameters and the maintenance schedule. As regards life-cycle energy and greenhouse gas emission analyses, these reveal considerable advantages of raw plant oils over fossil diesel and biodiesel. Typical results show that the life-cycle output-to-input energy ratio of raw plant oil is around 6 times higher than fossil diesel. Depending on either primary energy or fossil energy requirements, the life-cycle energy ratio of raw plant oil is in the range of 2–6 times higher than corresponding biodiesel. Moreover, raw plant oil has the highest potential of reducing life-cycle GHG emissions as compared to biodiesel and fossil diesel.

Corporate responsibility reporting of biodiversity in the supply chain

Industrial development, accompanying human population growth, has had a major role in creating the situation where bio-diverse materials and services essential for sustaining business are under threat. A major contributory factor to biodiversity decline comes from the cumulative impacts of extended supply chain business operations. However, within Corporate Responsibility (CR) reporting impacts on biodiversity due to supply chain operations have not traditionally been given equal weighting with other environmental issues. This paper investigates the extent of CR reporting in managing and publicising company biodiversity supply chain issues by reviewing a cross-sector sample of publicly available CR reports. The report contents were examined for suggestions of industrial sectorial trends in the level of biodiversity consideration. The reporting of environmental management system use within company supply chain management is assessed in the samples and is considered as a mechanism for responsible supplier partnership working.

Green technologies in the automotive industry

In most of the discussions about environmental issues and policies, transportation is highlighted as one of the main sources of pollutant emissions and energy consumption. The attention given to the automotive industry is understandable in this context due to its size, expansion, presence in our daily lives, and of course its environmental impact. If we scrutinize the “greenness” of car manufacturers we will find issues of concern from the raw material use, production processes, use, and end-of-life of vehicles. The main issues for production are high consumption of energy, raw materials, water and the waste stream, which contains the four substances of concern (cadmium, lead, hexavalent chromium, mercury). In respect of carbon emissions and energy use the use of cars is the main phase of its life-cycle due to the combination of internal combustion engines with fossil fuels. The most recent pressure is aimed at the end-of-life vehicles (ELV). In addition to the pollution from vehicle use, traffic jams and car accidents continue to be part of the downside of a car culture. Landfills sites are becoming scarce and the contamination of soil and aquifers completes the picture.

Intermediate pyrolysis studies of aquatic biomass and potential applications in the BtVB-process

Aquatic biomass is seen as one of the major feedstocks to overcome difficulties associated with 1st generation biofuels, such as competition with food production, change of land use and further environmental issues. Although, this finding is widely accepted only little work has been carried out to investigate thermo-chemical conversion of algal specimen to produce biofuels, power and heat. This work aims at contributing fundamental knowledge for thermo-chemical processing of aquatic biomass via intermediate pyrolysis. Therefore, it was necessary to install and commission an analytical pyrolysis apparatus which facilitates intermediate pyrolysis process conditions as well as subsequent separation and detection of pyrolysates (Py- GC/MS). In addition, a methodology was established to analyse aquatic biomass under intermediate conditions by Thermo-Gravimetric Analysis (TGA). Several microalgae (e.g. Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, Chlorella vulgaris) and macroalgae specimen (e.g. Fucus vesiculosus) from main algal divisions and various natural habitats (fresh and saline water, temperate and polar climates) were chosen and their thermal degradation under intermediate pyrolysis conditions was studied. In addition, it was of interest to examine the contribution of biochemical constituents of algal biomass onto the chemical compounds contained in pyrolysates. Therefore, lipid and protein fractions were extracted from microalgae biomass and analysed separately. Furthermore, investigations of residual algal materials obtained by extraction of high valuable compounds (e.g. lipids, proteins, enzymes) were included to evaluate their potential for intermediate pyrolysis processing. On basis of these thermal degradation studies, possible applications of algal biomass and from there derived materials in the Bio-thermal Valorisation of Biomass-process (BtVB-process) are presented. It was of interest to evaluate the combination of the production of high valuable products and bioenergy generation derived by micro- and macro algal biomass.

Sustainable agricultural production:an investigation in Brazilian semi-arid livestock farms

This paper investigates the environmental sustainability and competitiveness perceptions of small farmers in a region in northern Brazil. The main data collection instruments included a survey questionnaire and an analysis of the region's strategic plan. In total, ninety-nine goat and sheep breeding farmers were surveyed. Data analysis methods included descriptive statistics, cluster analysis, and chi-squared tests. The main results relate to the impact of education, land size, and location on the farmers' perceptions of competitiveness and environmental issues. Farmers with longer periods of education have higher perception scores about business competitiveness and environmental sustainability than those with less formal education. Farmers who are working larger land areas also have higher scores than those with smaller farms. Lastly, location can yield factors that impact on farmers' perceptions. In our study, farmers located in Angicos and Lajes had higher perception scores than Pedro Avelino and Afonso Bezerra, despite the geographical proximity of these municipalities. On the other hand, three other profile variables did not impact on farmers' perceptions, namely: family income, dairy production volume, and associative condition. The authors believe the results and insights can be extended to livestock farming in other developing countries and contribute generally to fostering effective sustainable development policies, mainly in the agribusiness sector. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The emergence of integrated private reporting

Purpose - This paper aims to provide evidence to suggest that private social and environmental reporting (i.e. one-on-one meetings between institutional investors and investees on social and environmental issues) is beginning to merge with private financial reporting and that, as a result, integrated private reporting is emerging. Design/methodology/approach - In this paper, 19 FTSE100 companies and 20 UK institutional investors were interviewed to discover trends in private integrated reporting and to gauge whether private reporting is genuinely becoming integrated. The emergence of integrated private reporting through the lens of institutional logics was interpreted. The emergence of integrated private reporting as a merging of two hitherto separate and possibly rival institutional logics was framed. Findings - It was found that specialist socially responsible investment managers are starting to attend private financial reporting meetings, while mainstream fund managers are starting to attend private meetings on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues. Further, senior company directors are becoming increasingly conversant with ESG issues. Research limitations/implications - The findings were interpreted as two possible scenarios: there is a genuine hybridisation occurring in the UK institutional investment such that integrated private reporting is emerging or the financial logic is absorbing and effectively neutralising the responsible investment logic. Practical implications - These findings provide evidence of emergent integrated private reporting which are useful to both the corporate and institutional investment communities as they plan their engagement meetings. Originality/value - No study has hitherto examined private social and environmental reporting through interview research from the perspective of emergent integrated private reporting. This is the first paper to discuss integrated reporting in the private reporting context.