Abstract
Since 2017, the State Office for Nature, Environment and Consumer Protection of North Rhine-Westphalia (LANUV) has established an operational environmental and sustainability management and set specific objectives to reach operational carbon neutrality. In this context, central questions aim at the availability of financial and human resources, the competition with other duties as well as the necessary involvement of the staff. Based on the practical example of LANUV, this article presents concrete activities, e.g., in context of mobility or human resources, as well as the challenges connected to them. While single measures do have a positive impact, a structural approach, like the set-up of an environmental management system (e.g., EMAS—Eco-Management and Audit Scheme), is found to be more effective. In addition, success factors are identified such as distinct structures and responsibilities, a capable person in charge of the process, and commitment on the management level, as well as challenges like the lack of governmental objectives and obligations or limited human and financial resources. This article follows the idea of a case report in a transdisciplinary manner, presenting ideas for enhancement and shedding a light on a possible spread of sustainability endeavors to other national institutions.
Highlights
The concept for sustainability management in the LANUV is especially oriented towards the EMAS elements and takes into account the requirements of International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 26000, as the aforementioned aspects regarding continuous improvement show
Since the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has harmonized its management norms by means of the High Level Structure (HLC), an integrated management system can be built from several systems, e.g., by adding an environmental management system according to EMAS or ISO 14001 to the quality management
The demand to integrate more sustainability and climate protection into official structures and actions exists at all political levels in Germany
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. The federal government in Germany fostered this central role by public funding for implementation of climate protection strategies [10] Despite these initiatives, only few activities have been carried out so far in administrations of the state of NRW, promoting sustainable development or even, in the best case, developing a systematic sustainability management. Transparency, and participation shall strongly be taken into account They are of the opinion that “further development of state institutions in the sense of a systematic, sustainability-oriented administrative reform program with organizational structural, procedural, cultural, and instrumental approaches is to date hardly noticeable” [26] This article presents the activities establishing an operational sustainability management in one German state institution, the State Office for Nature, Environment, and Consumer Protection NRW (LANUV) It was carried out within the project “Sustainable. By shedding a light on the practical perspective, the report intends to add key elements to the scientific discussion about an operational sustainability management within a public administration on the state level
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