This thesis develops suitable approaches to conduct environment-related research in organisations, as well as systematic means for understanding the emergent phenomenon of ecological modernisation in industrialised societies. The study is organised in two distinct parts: While Part I deals with environment-related theories and practices in (and around) modern organisations, Part II situates such theories and practices in an analysis of the context of the European automobile industry. The research problem is defined through several stages. The research questions driving Part I are premised on the exploratory nature of the study, developed in an unfolding interplay between the review of the literature, the collection of secondary and (exploratory) primary data, and the analysis and interpretation of the data. As the initial question is answered by reviewing the literature and interpreting the primary and secondary data, another question arises from the process, which then requires further research. Part II of the study departs from a proposition based on ecological modernisation theory, that pro-active environmental practices in corporations are part of a broader emergent sociological phenomenon, typical of modern industrialised societies. It analyses a specific socio-technical context that, hypothetically, is undergoing such process - that of the European automobile industry. Hence, the development of Part II aims at answering the following principal research question: Why is the European automobile industry undergoing ecological modernisation? Analytically, the concept of automobile field is proposed to establish a link between the product (automobile) and the context embedding its systems of production and consumption (field). The exploratory character of the study implied that the most adequate research procedures were of a qualitative nature. A combination of grounded theory and reflexive methodology is used to orientate the overall research process, which introduces a novel approach for the triangulation of qualitative data. Together, the chapters forming Part II of the thesis answer the principal research question. The fundamental technologies of the current technological regime of the automobile, as well as the economic and environmental implications of this regime are analysed. Then, an analysis of selected pilot programs to develop and commercialise electric vehicles, as well as schemes for the management of end-of-life vehicles in the Western European context is developed. Through the interplay between data collection and analysis, the thesis designs an analytical framework, built upon contingent factors, as well as circuits of political ecology, that foster or inhibit ecological modernisation in the automobile field. The study showed that the auto industry has developed incremental technological innovations and practices that resemble the pre-requisites for ecological modernisation. Radical innovations, however, are more likely to be initiated by outsiders. The concepts inherited from the past and reproduced in the present practice of car design explains such a situation as one that imposes a specific set of technologies on car manufacturing that require high levels of investment in systems of production. Such design paradigm not only imposes high break-even points for most car models; they also result in vehicles with extremely low environmental performance and entail serious limitations for increasing recycling rates of non-metallic parts. The characteristics of ecological modernisation in the European automobile industry are used to evaluate whether this phenomenon is conducive to sustainable industrial development. As an implication of this analysis, the concluding chapter presents suggestions for the enhancement of ecological modernisation theory. Fallibility is proposed as both a source of reflection about the appropriation of knowledge and a principle that can be used for the definition of eco-modernising strategies and actions. The acceptance of fallibility as an immanent characteristic of human action is critical for the approximation of the countervailing theories of ecological modernisation and risk society. Finally, if ecological modernisation is expected to facilitate sustainable industrial development, radical technological innovations may be necessary. Such radicalism in technology may need, however, an incremental institutional reform of modern societies. Together, radical technological innovations and incremental institutional reform constitute the concept of radical reformism, which is suggested for enhancement of the ecological modernisation theory, as well as for the development of its normative programmes.

Pacific business sustainability in New Zealand is important for the economic and social wellbeing of the Pacific Island people who have chosen New Zealand as their home. As with many ethnic minorities businesses overseas, Pacific businesses struggle to survive in a foreign commercial environment that is often not aligned to the value systems and customs of their country of origin. This study seeks to determine the key financial and entrepreneurial drivers of business sustainability for Tongan businesses as a specific group within the Pacific Island business sector. The study takes an ethnic specific view of business sustainability drawing on the experiences of twenty Tongan businesses, three Pacific business consultants and the wider Tongan community. The data was captured in a series of talanoa sessions (a traditional and preferred form of communication based on face to face discussion) carried out in 2006 and 2007. Throughout the study, attention was given to Tongan protocols, cultural nuances and sensitivities to ensure the context in which these Tongan businesses operate was captured. The study concludes by making several contributions to the literature. The first includes the contribution to methodology through to use of talanoa in a business context. The second is the contribution to embeddedness theory through the analysis of specific Tongan business experiences and lastly the empirical contribution to the Pacific Island business literature. The findings have been analysed from a number of perspectives including; financial accounting, business finance, management accounting and business related challenges. The empirical findings highlight that differences in culture and traditional Tongan protocols influence business practice. The impact of Tongan culture on business sustainability is both complementary and inimical. Tongan business sustainability in New Zealand is therefore a product of business practices that incorporate embedded Tongan culture and the western commercial paradigms within which they operate.

Premature failure or abandonment of water or sanitation interventions in developing communities is a common phenomenon and one which is preventing potential benefits from being fully realised. While the causes of project failure are complex and varied, the literature addressing project failure implicates poor planning in many unsustained small-scale projects. In particular, a number of authors criticise planning that fails to include consideration of key sustainability areas. This thesis explores the relationship between planning for rural water and sanitation development projects and their sustainability using both ??depth?? of information gathered through a case study in rural Philippines and ??breadth?? of information gathered from key informants representing a range of regions and organisational types. Key informant interviews show the case study findings to be generally transferable between regions. Both methods illustrate the need for interpersonal relationships of trust and unity, commitment and integrity in project personnel, significant time spent in data-gathering and consensus development, creative modes of communication, ongoing contact and detailed long-term financial planning. A critical evaluation of 17 prominent, existing planning frameworks for rural water supply and sanitation projects is presented with respect to key attributes of good planning practice as identified during the case study and interviews. The evaluation reveals both strengths and inadequacies in current planning frameworks, illuminating possible causes of persistent poor planning. Finally, methods are identified by which planning processes can be improved so as to reduce the incidence of early water and sanitation project failure. An existing decision framework, the Water Services Association of Australia (WSAA) Sustainability Framework, was trialled during the Philippines Case Study. The new Planning Framework for Rural Water and Sanitation was developed as a result of the trial, the case study and the interviews. The new framework employs the primary sustainability criteria in the decision process in the form of constraints developed using participatory processes, thereby defining a safe space within which the beneficiaries may have freedom and confidence to select their desired technical solutions. Other key elements of good planning practice are incorporated, including those typically omitted by existing frameworks in the rural water and sanitation development sector.

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / Developing an approach that delivers improved environmental performance for metal cycles is the aim of this thesis. Integral to the sustainable use of metals is the need to reduce environmental impacts associated with the mining, refining and recycling activities that supply metal to the economy. Currently, the links between the location and duration of these activities, their resultant impacts and the responsible parties are poorly characterised. Consequently, the changes to technology infrastructure and material flow patterns that are required to achieve sustainable metal cycles remain unclear to both industry and government actors. To address this problem, a holistic two-part methodology is developed. Firstly, a reference schema is developed to address the complexity of structuring analyses of the material chain at different geographical and time scales. The schema identifies actors and system variables at each scale of analysis and guides the level of information detail and performance indicators to be used in material chain characterisation. Material chain characterisation involves modelling material and energy flows for current activities as a series of connected nodes and linking these flows to resultant environmental impacts. The approach identifies the material chain activity responsible for each environmental impact and makes trade-offs between impacts explicit. Sensitivity analysis of the models identifies the key variables that enhance performance. The influence of actors over these variables is assessed to target areas for improvement. This first part of the methodology is illustrated using case studies that assess the current performance of copper material chain configurations at different geographical scales within the reference schema. The analysis of global material and energy flows indicates that the majority of environmental burden in the copper material chain is attributable to primary refining of metal from ore. Modelling of the dominant primary refining technologies using region-specific information for ore grade, technology mix and energy mix reveals that the total environmental impact differs by factors of 2–10 between world regions. The study of refined copper imports to Europe from various regions outside of Europe reveals that lower global warming impacts are achieved at the expense of increased local impacts from the producing regions. Overall, only limited improvements are possible without investing in new technology infrastructure. Evaluation of an innovative copper refining technology finds that collaboration with clean energy suppliers reduces global warming impacts more than changing process design parameters. To better assess the local impacts that are directly controllable by the technology operator, a new indicator incorporating the stability of solid waste is developed. In the second part of the methodology, the link established between actors, their control over key system variables and resultant impacts is used to design preferred future configurations for the material chain. Dynamic models are developed to evaluate transition paths towards preferred futures for individual and collaborative action by industry in the context of externally changing variables (for example, increasing demand for copper and declining available ore grades). Both new copper technology infrastructure and new material flow patterns are assessed in transitions toward preferred futures for a case study of the United States. The improvements resulting from the introduction of new primary refining technology by individual actors are negated by increasing impacts from declining copper ore grades over time. Achieving a combined reduction in local and global environmental impacts requires collaboration between industry actors to immediately increase the recycling of secondary scrap. Significantly, this methodology links actor decisions with their impacts across scales to prompt accountability for current performance and guide useful collaborations between actors. The methodology then delivers a comprehensive assessment of the scale and timing of required interventions to achieve more sustainable metal cycles.

Sustainability responds to crises of ecology and human development and the relationships between them. Sustainability cannot be adequately described using disciplinary categories arising from the modern dichotomy between nature and culture. Sustainability research requires a methodology that reflects the reality of its subject. This thesis presents material semiotics as a methodology for sustainability research. Material semiotics refers to the work of actor-network theorists and latter developments of alternate spatial metaphors for material relationality. Actor-network theory is a methodology that describes human and non-human actors in the same terms. It follows actor through networks of material relationships that they constitute and are constituted by, depicting heterogeneous objects without recourse to prior categories of nature or culture. The description of material relationships in fluid and regional, as well as network, spaces expands the descriptive power of material semiotics to include Others and to better represent complexity. The Oil Mallee Project is a case study of sustainability in the Western Australian wheatbelt. Indigenous eucalypts, oil mallees, are planted on land that was cleared for agriculture. The above ground biomass can be processed for eucalyptus oil, electricity and activated carbon, and the rights to carbon stored in the extensive mallee roots, or in unharvested trees, can be sold. The Project responds to a number of sustainability issues, including ozone depletion, land degradation, climate change and rural decline. This thesis follows the actors that comprise the Oil Mallee Project to describe its complexity, multiplicity and sustainability. Qualitative interviews with actors in the Project and the wheatbelt provided the primary data, which is supported by documentary material. Three contingent phases can be identified in the history of the Oil Mallee Project – eucalyptus oil industry, dryland salinity management, and greenhouse response. The Project has persisted because it is simultaneously a regional, network and fluid object. Mallees grow well in the tough conditions of the wheatbelt. Mallees can be integrated with existing networks of industrial agriculture. The Project has achieved contingent stability in policy documents and the networks of scientific research. The fluidity of the Project has enabled it to change shape and identity in response to threats and opportunities, and as relationships break and form, without complete disruption. Specific humans have been central heroes in different phases of the Project. The mallees themselves are the only actors that have been consistently central to the identity of the Project. Sustainability requires knowledge of the relationships between humans and non-humans that constitute the multiple crises of ecology and human development. Sustainability is the re-ordering of those relationships in ways that make possible ecological integrity and human fulfilment. Material semiotics is a methodology for knowing sustainability in ways that reveal the possibilities for such re-orderings.

In Bangladesh, as elsewhere in the world, energy both commercial and noncommercial, serves as a major vehicle for development. In the last three decades, lopsided development efforts, without proper concern for the environment and productivity level of natural resources have created significant problems for development sustainability in Bangladesh. The energy sector faces deep crisis in meeting increasing energy demands for development of agriculture, industry, transportation and other sectors of economy. The country is heavily dependent on import of commercial fossil fuel energy, petroleum, petroleum products and coal. Such dependency makes Bangladesh economy more vulnerable to external price shocks in the international energy market. Non-commercial energy plays a dominant role in overall energy consumption in Bangladesh. Use of non commercial energy constitutes about two-thirds of the country’s total energy balance and is almost entirely supplied from the already overstressed biomass resources of the country. The population size and the vast majority living in rural areas have created immense pressure on the country’s biomass resources resulting in massive deforestation, decline of soil fertility and reduced productivity of agriculture. Desperate access to resources, particularly in rural areas is also causing uneven development of the rural population in Bangladesh. The development of the energy sector is a time bound issue and demands proper and timely attention. For Bangladesh, substitution of current biomass energy use with iv sustainable energy sources and their effective management is therefore critically important to sustain its overall development. There is ample scope for introducing energy efficient technologies and energy conservation measures in commercial and non-commercial energy use in Bangladesh. Effective and realistic energy planning and policy formulation is therefore crucially important for sustainable development in Bangladesh. The thesis explores the possibility of introducing an alternate approach to rural energy development through a series of case studies on selected technologies viz. biogas and improved efficiency cook stoves technology projects in the public sector and Grameen Shakti’s renewable energy programme in the private sector. Application of village energy supply system based on renewable energy technologies utilising abundantly available renewable resources of the country and already well in place technologies such as solar PV, bio digesters and energy storage batteries will be trailed within a framework that works with the participation of the (rural/village) community in running and managing energy supply in the villages. Introduction of a community based energy supply system Rural Energy Cooperative (REC) has been examined as a model for rural energy development, targeting economic, environmental and community development at the same time, which forms together the necessary foundation for sustainable development in (rural) Bangladesh, as well as in other parts of the developing world.

Diss. Uppsala : Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet, 2005.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Oregon, 2008. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 109-111). Also available online.

Thesis (M.S. in Operations Research)--Naval Postgraduate School, September 2008. / Thesis Advisor(s): Carlyle, W. Matthew. "September 2008." AD-A488 887. Includes bibliographical references (p. 47-48). Also available via the World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph.D)--Management, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2010. / Committee Co-Chair: Singhal, Vinod; Committee Co-Chair: Subramanian, Ravi; Committee Member: Hora, Manpreet; Committee Member: Thomas, Valerie; Committee Member: Toktay, Beril. Part of the SMARTech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Collection.