Industrial Sustainability

Aiming for a sustainable future

Think about this for a minute:

• Corporations represent over 50% of the world's largest economic entities. There are whole countries with a GDP less than Wal-Mart's annual corporate revenue. What role will business executives, industry leaders and researchers play in reaching sustainability?
  
  
• Canada's economy is largely dependent on our natural resources. How are we going to deal with our food, forestry and manufacturing industries so that we don’t devastate our resources?
  
  
• Existing industrial systems depend on the take, make, waste principle that results in millions of tonnes of waste every year. Is there a better way to produce the things we want?
  

Industrial sustainability research at SRES develops strategies based on the needs of industry, society and the environment that allow industries to deliver goods and services sustainably.

You could be a changemaker

Conducting research in industrial sustainability at SRES will give you the insights and skills you need to effect real change from within organizations and to influence government policy and regulatory regimes.

Here are just a few examples of the many industrial sustainability projects you could be involved in:

• promoting the business case for sustainability
• improving waste management practices on mink farms
• supporting sustainable industrial development through industrial ecology
  
• assessing alternative aquaculture technologies
• applying industrial symbiosis to the manufacturing and agro-industrial sectors
  

Find out what our researchers are working on:

	Michelle Adams Dr. Adams focuses her research on the technologies and strategies that can drive sustainability within business and the industrial sector. As a professional engineer, she has worked in the trenches with industry and has a unique perspective on what it takes to drive them towards more sustainable practices.
	Peter Tyedmers Dr. Tyedmers' industrial sustainability work focuses on tracking the material and energy inputs to our production systems. He is a leader in the use of life cycle assessment to improve the sustainability of industrial activities.
	Peter Duinker Dr. Duinker is a specialist in the sustainability of forest-based industries.  He recently led a nation-wide initiative using scenario analysis to examine the long-term sustainability of Canada’s forest sector.
	Tony Walker Dr. Walker has spent many years studying the negative impacts of unsustainable industries. Widespread environmental pollution arising from historical industrial development has provided research opportunities that not only mitigates legacy contamination, but has also provided solutions for future industrial sustainability.