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Herbicides are groundwater pollutants found where intensive agricultural practices are performed. This is the case in Northern Italy: atrazine, symazine, bentazone, molinate, and others were found in many aquifers over the last five years. Presents the first results of a series of pilot plant tests using low ozone doses (prior to GAC adsorption) to reduce oxidation by‐products formation. Tests were carried out utilizing a transportable emergency plant used by the Civil Protection Agency, based on ozone oxidation and GAC adsorption. Herbicides influent concentrations were up to 1.8 μg/l and ozone doses between 0.4 and 1.7 mg/l. Tested molecules displayed different behaviour but, with the exception of bentazone, contact time seemed to be the basic parameter for the removal of these compounds, some of which appeared to be quite resistant to ozone oxidation at these concentrations.

Multinational enterprises (MNEs) own and control technological resources and capabilities that make them critical actors in accelerating the transition toward net zero. Even beyond the energy sector, stakeholders are putting increasing pressure on MNEs to reduce the carbon intensity of their operations, that is, to improve their carbon performance. While there is unambiguous evidence that national climate policy is a critical catalyst for long-term carbon performance improvements, there is limited research on how MNEs’ carbon strategies react to climate policies. This chapter reviews the concepts, drivers, and strategies connected to carbon performance in the broader sustainability and management literature to clarify potential complementarities to international business (IB). The authors then highlight how MNEs will face increasing institutional complexity along two dimensions: (1) the structural diversity of institutional environments and (2) institutional dynamism, primarily reflected by public policy. The proposed conceptual framework maps these two dimensions to national and subnational levels, and the authors present two data sources that allow the quantitative analysis of country differences in the diversity and dynamism of national climate policy. The authors conclude that there are ample opportunities for IB researchers to explore MNEs’ strategic reactions to climate policy and to inform policymakers about the consequences of national climate policy in the global economy.

In recent years, international bodies and public opinion have recommended that governments adopt social responsibility practices to inform and be accountable to citizens about their sustainability actions in environmental, social and economic fields (Galera et al., 2014) and restore citizens' confidence in public authorities (Crane et al., 2008; Shepherd et al., 2010). This chapter reviews the literature on measuring and reporting sustainable performance in the public sector. Analyzing 35 studies published in a period of 10 years (from 2012 to 2021), we address two specific research questions: How and to what extent have public organizations changed to integrate sustainability reporting (SR) systems? What are the enabling organizational factors in adopting SR in public organizations?

The concepts of sustainable development (SD) and management systems (MS) are finding increasing acceptance in a variety of fields, including academy, politics, and non‐governmental organizations. These concepts are also being used by the general population. This paper aims to describe the perception of different experts by discussing the usefulness of sustainability management systems (SMS) as holistic systems that might integrate environmental, social, and economic elements.

This research was framed by the general systems theory and its nature is totally qualitative and exploratory in order to understand the significant attributes that affect or benefit a management system to reach sustainability. A total of 14 interviews were conducted with several experts around the world. Some are professional persons in sustainability issues in general, and some in environmental, health and safety (EHS) issues in particular.

The results shows that, although there is a continuous debate on the sustainability approach, several core elements can be addressed for sustainability management systems (SMS). For instance, 71.4 percent of the interviewees agreed that management systems are useful for sustainable development, or at least potentially useful, and 42.9 percent of the experts declared that having a clear understanding of the long‐term economic benefits for the company is an important incentive for their implementation.

Interviews were conducted with a limited number of experts and there was no field verification of claims. Therefore, conclusions derived from these sources depend on the veracity of the information provided by participants. Expert bias may also have an impact on the outcomes of this research.

The findings provide management systems' practitioners with key elements when sustainability management systems are being created, maintained and evaluated.

The findings are not results from general concepts, but rather elicited from empirical data from fourteen sustainability, and health and safety experts around the world.

The purpose of this paper is to debate how companies may better become a sustainable learning organization by offering the most used and insightful concepts of sustainability.

Through literature review, learning organization and sustainability perspectives are explored and compared.

Learning sustainability experiences around the world have provided tools and mechanics to companies to enhance economic growth without affecting environment and communities.

The paper explains points of convergence and divergence between learning organization and sustainability approaches and provides insightful remarks from literature.

This paper develops a contingency based model to understand how green technologies and green manufacturing performance measures evolve with the green manufacturing maturity levels of the firms.

A conceptual research model is developed by synthesizing extant literature. An illustrative case study of a paint manufacturing company is conducted, analyzing its five key green initiatives, which it has undertaken to demonstrate the research model. The primary means of data collection was interviews and document analysis.

It was observed that for all the five green initiatives, the choice of green technologies and the use of green manufacturing performance measures corroborate with the proposed research model. Further, the initial green manufacturing effort was motivated to comply with regulations, which subsequently shifted to gain strategic advantage, such as cost reduction and visibility.

The proposed model was applied only to an Indian paint manufacturing company with their five key green initiatives, which potentially limits the generalizability of the findings to other industries and/or geographies.

The findings would aid practitioners in understanding both selection of green technology and the use of green manufacturing performance measures, based on a firm's maturity stage.

This study conducts a much-needed research on the evolution of green technology alternatives and green manufacturing performance measures for firms according to the four-stage maturity model derived from the natural resourced-based view.

The purpose of this paper is to present a case report involving environmental performance analysis of a small Brazilian business from the foundry industry.

An environmental performance indicator was developed (I_epa) which is calculated taking into consideration the weighting of potential environmental impacts of each residue/sub product generated, the relative spatial dispersion which each residue/sub product can reach, and the adequacy evaluation of final allocation accomplished by the company for each residue/sub product.

Despite the evidence that the corporation do not conduct washing of gases emitted from the chimney of the foundry furnace, which consists an environmentally inadequate attitude, the result of I_epa=97.50 percent was obtained. This favorable result is due to the adequate allocation given to residues generated in greater volume in the process, the molding sand. This sand is addressed to an industrial landfill, which is an environmentally adequate practice and approved by competent environmental authorities.

The method used can be applied to measure the environmental impact generated by any business of the foundry sector industry.

The originality of the work is in the developed method, which takes into account: the potential impact of each residue/sub product generated, the amount of each residue/sub product generated in a given time period, the dispersion that each residue/sub product can attain, and the evaluation of eventual allocation of each residue/sub product.

Companies need to excel in many areas to achieve a competitive advantage. This, together with pressure imposed by regulators and customers regarding sustainability concerns, leads companies to address sustainability in an integrated fashion across all management processes. The purpose of this paper is to suggest a model for the assessment of the environmental performance of a supply chain, based on four perspectives used in the balanced scorecard. Performance indicators are proposed based on the literature, as well as on the ISO 14031 and GRI standards, and were validated by a panel of experts.

Based on a literature review on models for environmental performance management a novel model to assess the environmental performance of the supply chains (Env_BSC_4_SCPM) is proposed. Data collected from the first tier suppliers of an automotive industry case study are used to test the proposed model.

The model developed was tested in a case study company, showing it ability to benchmark the company first tiers suppliers and products. The model is also useful as a decision support tool to define actions to be taken in order to improve the global environment performance of the supply chain.

The proposed model was developed to evaluate the environmental performance of supply chains. Nevertheless, the case study only takes account of the first tier suppliers, due to difficulties associated to data collecting for the other elements in the supply chain. Widening the frontiers, the next phase may include the application of this model to second, third and lower tier suppliers, as well as the final customer. Improvements in the model could also include the construction of a composite index to measure the environmental supply chain performance.

The paper provides a model that can be used by practitioners to evaluate the environmental performance of their supply chain and to decide on actions to be taken to improve it.

As stated by several authors, there has been limited research conducted in the field of environmental evaluation of supply chains. This paper proposes a novel model for the environmental performance of the supply chain and tests it using industrial empirical data.

The purpose of this paper is to combine studies that describe the spin-off creation process with studies that analyze spin-off determinants to understand the phenomenon of spin-off development.

This paper proposes a theoretical framework to improve our understanding of academic spin-off development in southern Italy. Following a systematic combining approach, the framework is constructed by iteratively matching the concepts derived by the literature on spin-off processes and spin-off determinants with the empirical findings obtained through a case study of 19 spin-offs in southern Italy.

The combination of empirical results and literature analysis helps us to identify a general model for spin-off creation that could be particularly useful to explain the criticalities of their development.

This paper provides implications for policy-makers in southern Italy regarding factors for which intervention would support the creation of new spin-offs. This study also provides useful implications for policy-makers in other contexts, such as areas that may or may not be at a disadvantage.

The resulting framework represents an original contribution to the literature because it: links two aspects – the stages of spin-off creation and determinants of spin-off development – which are often considered separately in existing studies; explores factors that either impede or facilitate the different stages of spin-off development; provides a series of findings that can be successively tested in other studies; and sheds more light on the context of southern Italy, which has been investigated in only a limited number of previous studies.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the mechanisms through which ISO 14001 can contribute to the corporate sustainability. In this regard, the paper examines the underlying theoretical concepts and discusses the ISO 14001 in the context of the corporate sustainability. Additionally, the paper discusses the benefits of ISO 14001 from the perspective of the triple bottom line.

The paper uses a multiple case study approach focusing on four ISO 14001-certified Slovenian organizations and two non-ISO 14001-certified organizations. The data collection methods included semi-structured questionnaire and interviews with managers in all studied organizations.

It is suggested that the motives could be perceived as explanatory variables of the benefits realized from ISO 14001 certification. Further, the findings of this study indicate that environmental management system should be seen in a wider perspective that includes elements such as quality and social responsibility. Moreover, the results also lead us to the suggestion that there could be a reciprocal causal mechanism linking the environmental performance and economic performance.

ISO 14001 can be an effective tool for pursuing sustainable development; however, organizations should move a step beyond ISO 14001’s environmental focus and recognize a multidimensional perspective by simultaneously addressing environmental, quality and social responsibility issues.

The paper contributes to the corporate sustainability literature by investigating the mechanisms through which organizations can shift to more sustainable patterns using the ISO 14001.