Motivations of Program Partners for Environmental Sustainability and Persistence of Benefits
Publication: Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice
Volume 141, Issue 2
Abstract
It is becoming more common for sustainability-related engineering classes to engage in various forms of service and project learning activities that provide assistance to partners. However, few efforts have examined the relationship between the types of partners and the motivations for implementation of the sustainability recommendations to provide a larger context to students. The partners in pollution prevention program at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln completed an analysis of past partners and found that those in the manufacturing sector were more likely to provide direct financial savings justifications for pollution prevention and sustainability implementation, whereas the public institutions and other businesses were more likely to also cite social factors. An analysis of implemented recommendations found that there was a wide variation in implementation rates and the frequency with which benefits persisted beyond one year for different categories of implemented recommendations. For example, preventative maintenance recommendations had the highest rate of implementation and persistence of benefits, whereas off-site recycling recommendations had a relatively low rate of benefit persistence.
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Acknowledgments
The P3 program has been funded by grants from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality, and individual businesses. The opinions expressed are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the funding agencies. The authors express special thanks to Bob Walters for his assistance in finalizing this manuscript.
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Information & Authors
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Published In
Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice
Volume 141 • Issue 2 • April 2015
Copyright
© 2014 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Dec 19, 2013
Accepted: Jun 12, 2014
Published online: Jul 15, 2014
Discussion open until: Dec 15, 2014
Published in print: Apr 1, 2015
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