Environmental Performance Standards Research Articles

Certified B Corps: An Examination of a Standard Based Approach to Stakeholder Governance

In 2015, B Corp certification was launched in the UK. Since then, over 1,200 companies have adopted certified B Corps status. Most certified B Corps in the UK are small and medium-sized, with SMEs accounting for 99.9% of businesses in the UK. The B Corp movement seeks to change the economic system from a shareholder capitalism to a stakeholder economy. Certified B Corps adopt a stakeholder-driven mode towards ‘high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability and transparency.’ The article explores the growth of the B Corp movement, issues around its standards, certification process, including the legal requirement, transparency, and governance. It examines the effectiveness of this standard-based approach for stakeholder governance. It argues that the certified B Corp creates an avenue for stakeholder governance. However, to fully realise the shift towards stakeholder governance, there is a need for greater work towards achieving accountability for all key stakeholders identified as shareholders, workers, community, environment, and customers.

Green Supply Chain Performance Analysis of Cowhide Crackers Industry

Cowhide crackers Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) process beef skin crackers as a home-based business. However, their supply chain faces challenges due to unstructured activities. Waste management, particularly cowhide and used water disposal, is inefficient. Research aims to evaluate performance indicators, measure green supply chain performance, and assess supply chain maturity. The methods employed include Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP), Green Supply Chain Operation Reference (GSCOR), and Process Maturity Model (PMM). Results indicate a green supply chain management score of 58.901, with an average performance level influencing a maturity model value of 3.95. This places supply chain performance in the “managed and measurable” category. Three indicators, including recyclable percentage, cycle time, and environmental performance standards, have values below 50, necessitating improvement proposals. The research highlights areas for enhancement to enhance efficiency and sustainability in the cowhide crackers SMEs’ supply chain, crucial for long-term success and environmental responsibility.

THE EU GREEN PUBLIC ROCUREMENT AS A POLICY TOOL TO IMPLEMENT THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY

The transition to a circular economy is essential for environmental sustainability and serves as a strategic approach for achieving long-term economic stability, social equity, and resilience. Green public procurement (GPP) is closely intertwined with the concept of the circular economy, and both play a pivotal role in influencing sustainable development. The EU provides guidelines for GPP that align with circular economy principles, encouraging public authorities to opt for products and services with lower environmental impacts and higher resource efficiency. GPP establishes high environmental performance standards, reduces waste, enhances resource efficiency, and promotes the reuse and recycling of materials. The implementation of GPP offers benefits for the environment, economic growth, and social well-being, but challenges such as consistent application, market readiness, and higher initial costs persist. The research indicates that GPP can make a significant contribution to sustainability objectives and emphasizes the necessity of supportive policies to promote broader adoption of GPP practices. By aligning policy initiatives with sustainable procurement practices, the EU member states aim to foster a more robust, resource-efficient, and environmentally conscious economy. Such a comprehensive approach not only addresses environmental issues but also fuels economic and social progress.

Rethinking Cultural Heritage in the International Finance Corporation Performance Standards

AbstractIn 2006, the World Bank's private sector lending arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), introduced eight Environmental and Social Performance Standards (PSs) to define IFC clients’ responsibilities for managing their environmental and social risks, including those related to cultural heritage. Since their introduction, the PSs have evolved into a de facto global standard that other development banks and many private sector banks, insurers, and development proponents have voluntarily adopted to help manage their own risk exposure. Although the widespread adoption of such policies can be viewed positively as a reflection of good governance, the PSs were never designed with this purpose in mind. This article traces the development of cultural heritage policy within the World Bank Group, then critically examines the IFC PSs as they relate to cultural heritage, drawing attention to the elements in need of revision to better reflect internationally recognized good practice for the management of cultural heritage. Equally important, we recommend the development and implementation of a bespoke cultural heritage framework for the private sector.

Green Human Resource Management in Supporting Environmentally Friendly Behavior

This article aims to describe Green human resource management (GHRM) as an effort to support environmentally friendly behaviour. GHRM must be explained conceptually so that green human resource management practices can be well understood. This article was prepared using the library study method. Performance management in the management environment provides a challenge in measuring environmental performance standards in various corporate units and obtaining useful data for managers about environmental performance. Green performance appraisal includes themes such as environmental responsibility, environmental incidents and knowledge of environmental policies and issues, as the issues involved in environmental performance appraisal relate to the requirement for managers to be held accountable for environmental performance. Green performance appraisal is a process in which employees are stimulated to enhance professional skills in environmental issues, which helps to achieve environmental performance goals and objectives in a better way. The green reward system plays an important role in motivating people and helping to identify their significant performance towards environmental stewardship.

Role of green intellectual capital and top management commitment in organizational environmental performance and reputation: Moderating role of pro-environmental behavior

Several studies have postulated unique strategies and models to counter climate change challenges and achieve sustainable development goals. However, rare scholarships have focused on the green aspect of intellectual capital by integrating pro-environmental behavior for firms' environmental performance. The current study postulates that green intellectual capital and top management commitment strengthen organizational capabilities to adhere to environmental performance standards and ensure that their operations are causing the least harm to nature. Such achievements cultivate a favorable reputation for businesses in the market, enabling the firm to dominate others. The findings also suggest that pro-environmental behavior is a catalyst and bolsters the strength of the relationship between green intellectual capital, top-management commitment, and firm environmental performance. Stakeholders in environmental policy and management can benefit from this study's findings by understanding how they can add value to their businesses. It adds to the body of knowledge by explaining why and how companies should coordinate their green resources with the proper infrastructure for maximum efficiency. It is accomplished by embedding resource-based and social cognition theories within management accounting and intellectual capital settings.

Smile Together meets highest standards of social and environmental performance

Smile Together meets highest standards of social and environmental performance

Impact of Energy Consumption, Economic Growth, and FDI through Environmental Kuznets Curve: Perspective from Belt and Road Initiative and Pakistan

A significant corridor under the “Belt and Road Initiative” is announced by the government of China for numerous transport and energy projects. China focuses greatly on the sustainability of these projects, in accordance with Green Investment Principles. For this, environmental, social, governance, and technological considerations are taken into account. This paper offers a novel assessment of the impact of green sustainability under BRI and the current emission scenario in Pakistan. The question that needs to be addressed here is whether the projects under Belt and Road Initiative are as environment friendly as they claim. In the first phase of this study, we review theories establishing evidence based on existing literature to determine the influence of Belt and Road on economic development. In the next phase, we use Environment Kuznets Curve and apply estimates from Johansson’s Cointegration Test to quantify the present environmental scenario of Pakistan and probable environmental risk portrayed by the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). This paper helps in determining the relationship between carbon emission and three major variables including energy consumption, economic growth, and foreign direct investment (FDI). Cointegration analysis is applied on time series data comprising of a 40 years’ period from 1979 to 2019. The paper finds that (i) the belt and road corridors could substantially improve trade, foreign investment, and living conditions for citizens in participating countries; (ii) moreover, this study confirms the presence of one cointegrated equation suggesting the presence of a long term relationship between the CO2 and independent variables and a short run association running from EnC to CO2. The study also proposes a Green BRI Model which formulates a body that devises environmental performance standards, reviews procedures, and ensures that they get implemented on all CPEC projects. The Belt and Road Initiative increases emissions among participating countries. China and corridor economies need to adopt strict policy reforms that increase transparency, expand trade, improve debt sustainability, and mitigate environmental, social, and corruption risks.

Linking Perceived Greenwashing with Brand Credibility: An Empirical Evidence from Pakistan

Undoubtedly, the rise in eco-friendly or sustainable products has gained immense attention across all disciplines due to its most promising contributions to the environment. However, it has also initiated the greenwashing phenomena by which companies deliberately communicate the ecological or green attributes of their offerings. Drawing on attribution theory, this study aims to fill a gap in knowledge by examining the relationships between perceived greenwashing and brand credibility. Convenience sampling methodology was employed to collect the data from 422 Pakistani consumers. Data were gathered via self-administered questionnaire and analyzed using AMOS, and SPSS respectively. The results revealed that perceived greenwashing is negatively related to brand credibility. The present study provides novel insights by unfolding the negative relationship between perceived greenwashing and brand credibility, especially in Pakistan’s context. The study findings imply that decreasing greenwashing practices can decrease consumers’ perception of greenwashing and thus, the brand credibility can be improved. Moreover, the study findings highlight the risks that perceived greenwashing carries for the business companies; the companies’ pretentious claims can harm the credibility of a greenwashed brand can ultimately put their survival at threat and harm their long-term success. In addition, the study findings suggest that policymakers should avoid communicating deceptive environmental benefits of their offerings, rather they should focus on finding possible ways to comply with environmental performance standards so that their brand credibility can be enhanced. The current study contributes to greenwashing literature by exploring how perceived greenwashing influences brand credibility. In closing, the theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed in detail.

Response strategies used to mitigate the effect of extreme weather on rural and remote housing in Australia

In the extreme climates of Australia, rural and remote locations have special site and dwelling requirements and therefore special design solutions. This can include construction constraints, bushfire risk, resource efficiency, comfort and respect for the surrounding environment and heritage. Existing regulations targeted at extreme weather impacts such as bushfire, flood, cyclones, and heatwaves often impact the design and material choices for rural and remote housing due to their exposed locations, including housing proposed for rebuild following damage resulting from an extreme weather event. These regulations also lead to increased costs and uncertainty about the suitability of rural land for construction, making it challenging for rebuilding communities in affected areas. Such well-intentioned regulations also create limitations on innovation through experimental / bespoke building design, such as; 1) novel solutions to extreme weather mitigation and resistance 2) material choices for construction; and 3) achievement of operational and embodied energy reductions.Experimental buildings provide significant innovation benefits to industry as is often seen in the development of sustainable and high-performance buildings. This research examines the academic and industry knowledge of current design regulations for extreme weather events and implications for experimental and innovative design, highlighting the challenges for buildings to achieve increasing standards of environmental performance whilst ensuring resilience in the face of increasing extreme weather events, with a specific focus on rural communities. Case study analysis is used to provide an understanding of the focus and strategies used by different groups in different locations to address the impacts of extreme weather.

Green Zone Planning for City Sustainability

: The importance of research has emerged by focusing on sustainable green zone planning to solve the problem of degradation through sustainable strategies, to make green areas determine buildings, not the other way around using GIS, by working on a hypothesis (green areas planning according to an appropriate strategy can sustain cities). The principle of urban planning, urban sustainability, sustainable planning and sustainable cities, as well as urban sustainability and many strategies that support green zone planning and rely on a number of factors for sustainable cities, have been addressed. The research was based on how to plan green areas sustainably, what constraints the planners face in the Dora area south of Baghdad, and the reasons for their deterioration in the urban environment, and after analysing and comparing the changes that occurred over three periods of time (2004 and 2009 and 2019) for 10 residential stores to assess the state of the green areas during that period and how they changed, what problems led to the reduction of areas, increased areas built at their expense, compared to the standards of urban and rural housing in Iraq and the basic plan of the company Paul Servis in 1971, Sustainable planning thus creates a balance in the environment, economy and social values so that these new places meet the work and life needs of the local population and their interests, as one of the indicators of sustainable cities environmental, social and economic, measured by the availability of green and preserved areas relative to population density and coverage, which are one of the most important components of the blocs of urban areas to continue the quality of urban life and environmental and social sustainability, and the ratio of green areas to areas built in a sample of the shop Housing in the study area is very few in most stores and is not in line with international standards, so the current standards need to be adjusted and increased from what they are now, as well as laws in general need to be updated because they are in their current state to achieve the sustainability of green areas in the study area. The most important proposals and solutions that address the problems of green areas (developing a specific strategy, developing some laws on the protection of green areas and setting environmental performance standards for green areas). The research recommended the need to review the planning standard for the individual’s share of green spaces as it does not correspond to the increase in population density, and to guide the pursuit of sustainable strategies within the plans prepared by the long-term municipal departments supporting green areas and work to support environmental performance within municipal circles by presenting the award for outstanding environmental performance on conservation capacity and increasing green spaces, urging a focus on the sustainability of Iraqi cities as they suffer from increased desertification and dredging of green areas and current climate change.

Methane Emission Controls: Toward More Effective Regulation

In the United States, emissions to the air from the oil and natural gas sector are regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency New Source Performance Standards (NSPS). Unfortunately, the pace of emission reductions has been slow. In 2016, the Obama administration pledged to reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas sector by 40-45% by 2025, representing a compound annual decline rate of roughly 6%. However, the rate of methane emissions has changed slowly since the promulgation of natural gas emission control rules in 2012 and 2016, resulting in a compound annual decline rate of about 0.3%. This disappointing outcome is mainly the result of a narrow scope of regulation that has not confronted the realities of oilfield operations. Devised at a time when the technology for the measurement of natural gas emissions was relatively immature, performance-based regulations could not be implemented effectively. Therefore, NSPS regulations are either prescriptive or, if performance-based, lack means of verifying performance. Amendments promulgated in 2020 did little to change this situation. Thus merely reverting to the status quo ante, either by use of the Congressional Review Act or by conventional regulatory processes, will do little to improve the industry's environmental performance. Instead of proposing patchwork amendments to the current rules, which are outdated and ineffective, EPA should entirely rethink natural gas emission control. This paper analyzes why the rules were constructed as they were, examines the data that highlights the inadequacies of present regulations, explores the new technologies that have improved the prospects for effective regulation, and proposes a new, more efficient and effective regulatory regime.

Do financial penalties for environmental violations facilitate improvements in corporate environmental performance? An empirical investigation

AbstractEnvironmental regulations play an essential role in managing firm behavior and providing a reference point for the minimum standards of corporate environmental performance, yet certain firms fail to ensure their environmental performance meets these standards. This research focuses on public firms that the US government has penalized for violating environmental regulations and investigates whether these firms subsequently improved their environmental performance. Surprisingly, neither the receipt of a penalty for an environmental violation nor the imposition of a greater penalty was associated with improvements in environmental performance. Instead, a penalty for environmental violation predicted further, albeit mild, deterioration in environmental performance. While the existing literature has established that financial penalties deter most firms from committing environmental violations, this research contributes to this literature by revealing that these penalties fail to motivate firms that have violated environmental regulations to improve their environmental performance.

IFC Environmental & Social Performance Standards: Soft Law Project & Company Financing Partnerships towards Good Environmental Governance, Business Sustainability and Sustainable Development in Developing Countries

This study is an outcome of a previous work by the author captioned ‘Sustainable Development: A Soft Law Concept Transforming SD-Oriented Initiatives of the UN System into Hard Law Instruments in UN Member-states and Promoting Partnerships around the Globe’. The previous work establishes that there are numerous examples of SD-oriented partnership mechanisms associated with business sustainability, environmental protection, good public sector governance (good governance: GG) and sustainable development (SD), of which the Sustainability Framework of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) is one. The aim of this study is to examine how the IFC’s environmental and social (E&S) performance standards, as key aspects of the corporation’s sustainability framework, are being implemented as soft law mechanisms in developing countries (also called developing markets) and emerging economies (also known as emerging markets), where the IFC is engaged in financing, managing developmental projects and corporate financing in various ways. The sustainability framework and its component E&S standards are international benchmarked standards that have the potential to boost business sustainability and overall SD in developing markets and economies in transition. The study arrives at the finding that the IFC’s sustainability framework and the E&S standards ingrained in it are engineering the E&S performances of IFC clients engaged in IFC project and corporate financing schemes in developing countries and emerging economies, as well as contributing to business sustainability. These standards are also boosting environmental protection, good environmental governance, corporate social responsibility, social responsibility of host governments and generating SD-oriented partnerships, such as Private Sector Partnerships and Public-Private Sector Partnerships, which contribute to betterment of the welfare of citizens, generic human wellbeing and environmentally-sound and socio-economically equitable growth, prosperity and SD in developing countries. This is particularly so in developing countries where domestic environmental laws, corporate responsibility systems and government social responsibility fall short of the stipulations of the IFC’s sustainability framework and its component E&S performance standards. Keywords: International Finance Corporation (IFC); Sustainability Framework; Project Financing; Corporate Financing; Developing Countries; Emerging Markets; Environmental and Social Performance (E&S) Standards; Sustainability Framework; Soft Law; Business Sustainability; Sustainable Development; Good Environmental Governance (GEG); Government Social Responsibility (GSR); Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR); SD-oriented Partnerships; Private Sector Partnerships; Public-Private Sector Partnerships (PPSPs); Impact-benefits; Human Wellbeing. DOI: 10.7176/IAGS/81-07 Publication date: April 30 th 2020

Understanding the mechanism through which adoption of green construction site practices impacts economic performance

This paper examines the process through which a construction project’s implementation of green practices in its site processes influences its economic performance by meeting environmental performance standards. The uniqueness of this study stems from its focus on practices carried out on the construction sites, and the consideration of project economic performance as against corporate level performance. A conceptual model is proposed and tested using a sample of 168 construction projects completed by class A contractors in Nigeria. The data were analysed through the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) technique. Results obtained showed that the model satisfied all the criteria for both the measurement model and structural model for formative constructs. The study results indicate that environmental performance only partially mediates the relationship between green construction site practices and economic performance. The results imply that, it is not in all occasions that a project meeting environmental performance standard will result in the construction project been economically profitable, as adopting green construction site practices could lead to economic performance without necessarily performing environmentally. It is recommended that contractors should exhibit some level of flexibility while adopting green practices on site in order to achieve a balance between green practices, environmental performance and economic performance.

High-Rate Solid-Liquid Separation Coupled With Nitrogen and Phosphorous Treatment of Swine Manure: Effect on Ammonia Emission

A new treatment system was developed to meet multiple environmental performance standards including to substantially reduce ammonia emissions. It was tested full-scale for 2-years in a 5,145-head finishing swine farm with two anaerobic lagoons. The system combined high-rate solid-liquid separation with nitrogen and phosphorus removal processes. Both vertical radial plum mapping (VRPM) and floating static chamber techniques were used to measure NH3 emission fluxes from anaerobic storage lagoons and the total farm-level NH3 emission rates. The VRPM used an open-path tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy (TDL) and the flux chamber used a photoacoustic gas analyzer to accurately measure NH3 concentration. After the treatment system started, one of the two lagoons became inactive without receiving anymore flushed manure. The ammonia emission flux from the other lagoon with the treated effluent decreased from 43.9 to 6.8 kg-N ha-1 d-1 1.5 years after implementation of the new treatment system. The NH3 emission flux from the inactive lagoon also decreased similarly because the already stored old manure of the lagoon prior to inactivation was diluted with rainfalls and lost some NH3 via volatilization. The total farm-level NH3 emission rates decreased from 1.72 g s-1 to below detection level of the VRPM technique. Using the minimum detection level of the TDL with R2 > 90% (i.e., 8.1 8.1 µL L-1-m), the total farm-level NH3 emission rates in the second year were less than 0.04 – 0.15 g s-1. These results suggested that the impact of the new treatment system on NH3 emission reduction was equivalent to closing conventional swine lagoons while actively growing 5,145 pigs with minimal ammonia emissions from the farm.

On an innovative approach for microclimate enhancement and retrofit of historic buildings and artworks preservation by means of innovative thin envelope materials

Abstract Energy efficiency and environmental sustainability in building has become a key issue since the built environment is nowadays responsible for more than 30% of the total carbon emissions. While new building design and construction reached massive improvements toward net zero energy and high environmental performance standards, existing and historical buildings are still too much energy needy, with a relatively low indoor comfort conditions for both occupants and artworks preserved inside, especially within heritage buildings. Such high architectural value buildings correspond to almost one third of the Italian building stock and they typically need to be re-functionalized for hosting residential, office, or institutional uses, i.e. museums and exhibition areas. In this view, the present research aims at developing a replicable method for assessing and enhancing indoor comfort in historical buildings frequently characterized by too high relative humidity and thermal losses through the envelope. More in details, an innovative envelope material for indoor application, i.e. hygro-adsorbing plaster, has been tested in an ancient Italian castle and its effect has been assessed by means of coupled monitoring and calibrated dynamic simulation. The experimental campaign shows an increase of the Performance Index (PI) in terms of relative humidity acceptable range from 16.1 to 33.3% by applying the new thin plaster. Moreover, the results show that dedicated HVAC systems may support the action of passive strategies for preserving artworks and indoor comfort levels, but at the same time, such passive low-invasive strategies represent a mandatory first step toward energy efficiency, functional, and comfortable cultural heritage architectures.

Does dynamic federalism yield compatible policies? A study of the designs of federal and state vehicle policies

Governance systems that allow jurisdictions housed at different levels to develop policies pertaining to common issues can foster the development of innovative and contextually appropriate solutions. Sometimes, however, the policies that emerge from different levels of government with overlapping policy jurisdiction can offer mixed, even contradictory, messages to policy targets. In such cases, the potential to achieve goals that are common among different policies may be compromised. This potentiality prompts questions about the extent to which policies developed at different levels of government relating to the same issue are mutually reinforcing, or compatible. In this paper, we investigate compatibility among a set of federal and state vehicle environmental performance standards in terms of policy goals, instruments, and incentives. The study entails a descriptive, qualitative analysis of federal fuel economy and vehicle greenhouse gas standards, and policies contained in California’s Advanced Clear Car Program.

‘How corporate social responsibility can be integrated into corporate sustainability: a theoretical review of their relationships’

ABSTRACTThe notion that corporations are expected to have social and environmental performance standards and practices while meeting their financial and legal obligations is commonly referred to as corporate social responsibility (CSR) or corporate sustainability (CS). Previous studies have discussed whether the two terms are converging or should be used as stand-alone concepts. After reviewing the trends in development of CSR and CS, and the various viewpoints on the relationships between the two, we propose a relationship model to better understand how CSR can be integrated into CS as either a transitional stage or ultimate goal for a corporation. This study aims to provide researchers and practitioners with further insights on the adoption of CSR and CS. The model is intended to provide a plausible view of the relationships between CSR and CS to help to lessen the confusion and ease the communication both between and within these fields.

Drug chemical makers brace as China cracks down

When Xi Jinping came to power in China in 2013, the ambitious new general secretary claimed he would usher in an era of stricter enforcement of pollution control. Along with his highly publicized agenda to root out corruption, Xi declared that Chinese industry would be brought into line with global standards of environmental performance, significantly reducing smog and water pollution in and near major cities. Not that China is lacking in environmental regulations. Pursuing necessary improvements is largely a matter of enforcing laws that have long been on the books but only capriciously enforced by local, regional, and national authorities. A major push to root out polluters more systematically began last year. Government inspectors fanned out through industrial areas, closing plants, fining companies, and in some cases jailing plant operators for air and water pollution. It is widely reported that operations at nearly 40% of Chinese factories in 30 industrial