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The west surgery wing of the University Hospital “Insel” in Bern, which was completed in 1971, no longer meets operational requirements. A decision was made in 1995 that it must be completely renovated. The INO renovation project embraces in particular the Intensive care, Emergency and Surgery Centre. The Building Department of the Canton of Bern, which is responsible for overseeing construction work on the Insel hospital, is pursuing an open building method for the INO project to ensure that the “serviced structure” of the building (with main utility infrastructure) will continue to be highly adaptable, and that the components of the building are interchangeable and reusable. Building sections with differing service lives and designated purposes are therefore kept consistently separate in the planning and execution phases. The use of separate (discrete) systems anticipates the long-term life cycle of the building, and thus safeguards its value in terms of future use. Work is divided into discrete system levels: the primary system (building shell) is designed for a service life of 50 to 100 years, the secondary system (fit-out) for 15 to 50 years and the tertiary system (hospital equipment) for 5 to 15 years.

The project is currently in the execution phase and is being developed in three stages. The 1st stage, the primary system, was completed at the end of 2002, the other stages have not yet been implemented. The 1st stage of the INO project is to go into operation by 2006 and the 2nd stage by 2009.

This first issue of 2005 contains a selection of some articles from the recent Open Building conference on Sustainable Environment held in Paris at the CSTB headquarters in September 2004. This issue signals the start of the regular publication of material dealing with Open Building projects either as additional articles in theme issues or as full open building issues twice a year. After more than thirty five years of experience Open Building is a recognizable part of mainstream Architecture in housing and in health care and renovation projects found in many different countries of the world. Open Building projects in general show how users are indispensable decision makers in the design process and act as forces of change and adaptability over time.

The purpose of this paper is to provide evidence of connections between sustainability policy goals included in public procurement tenders and offers and their achievement through contract award.

Two hypotheses based on extant literature and the inducement–contribution theory were tested by means of a survey of 281 procurement files from 2007 to 2009 relating to eight product categories and four European Union (EU) member states. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling.

Findings indicate that public procurement was more effective in influencing socially responsible goals than environmental goals. In terms of supplier readiness, vendors achieved greater progress in delivering green than socially responsible operations.

The collection and analysis of data are based on procurement files, which is a new but also a complex procedure. In comparison to survey data, the data from procurement file analysis are less biased.

Public procurement practitioners and sustainability policymakers should consider the use of public procurement as a lever to attain environmental and socially responsible goals.

Evidence has been provided to demonstrate the strategic use of public procurement impacts on environmental and socially responsible goals, thereby benefiting society.

This study contributes in three main ways: first, by adding to existing, limited research on the use of public procurement as a lever of policy goals attainment; second, by examining environmental and socially responsible policy in one study; and third, through providing evidence across EU member states.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the scope of applications and benefits of sustainability accounting for the production and industrial use of biomass as an energy source and substitute for fossil‐fuel use. As environmental degradation and unacceptable social impacts not only increase from the production and use of fossil‐fuel based energy, but also from alternative energy sources, the monitoring, controlling and measuring of the (un‐)sustainability of alternative energy production and use emerges as an area in critical need of research.

The paper presents a review of the issues surrounding the accounting for the (un‐)sustainability of industrial biomass production and use, considering what biomass is, the current and forecast importance of industrial biomass, different approaches to its production, and the subsequent measurement and monitoring of its potential (un‐)sustainability.

The paper finds that it is insufficient to conclude in general terms, as is often done or assumed in policy documents and statements, that industrial production and use of biomass is sustainable (or unsustainable) and that accounting for biomass must recognise the broader ecological and social system of which the production and use form a part. A further finding of the paper is that from agricultural or industrial production of biomass through to consumption and industrial use of biomass, the accounting issues surrounding biomass production and use are essential to determining its (un‐)sustainability.

The paper provides an overview of the importance of and problems with the production of biomass for industrial use, and related sustainability issues. It discusses possibilities for and limitations of accounting to address these sustainability issues as well as the need for and the challenges in measuring the (un‐)sustainability of biomass production for industrial use and the accounting for sustainability improvements.

This article raises the question of how recent labour market developments affect the transition from school to work (i.e. labour market entry) and the successive employment career. The focus of interest are countries characterised by well‐established and wide‐spread vocational training systems, constituting strong institutionalised links between the educational and the employment systems (i.e. Austria, Germany and Switzerland). The arguments advanced show that the changing structure of work (i.e. the shifting nature of work, the decrease in the temporal validity of skills and the changing cultural significance of work) is likely to modify the well‐established interplay between the supply and demand sides in the labour markets of these countries, thus exerting considerable pressure on the stability and orderliness of employment trajectories. Against this background, the most critical issues of vocational training systems are described and reforms of these systems are discussed.

This paper investigates the challenges encountered by manufacturing companies in managing sustainability in new product development (NPD). It describes six case studies of manufacturers aiming for sustainability improvements but experiencing difficulties in implementing them.

The paper starts with a literature study. Academic literature offers explanations as to why manufacturers want to implement sustainability in NPD, and suggests methods for such implementations. This paper employs the systems theory of control to build a research framework for analyzing the challenges. Empirical data are gathered through workshops and interviews with NPD managers in the case companies.

In-depth analyses have provided three insights. First, the study shows that sustainability pressures and incentives in a firm's contexts can be fuzzy or even absent. The fuzziness of sustainability incentives is often neglected in the literature on sustainability and NPD. Second, the case companies face difficulties when setting the scope, goals, and ambitions that effectively direct NPD decisions and efforts toward designing sustainable products. Third, the results show that deploying sustainability methods, tools, and metrics, such as a life-cycle assessment or design for environment (DfE), are not sufficient to achieve sustainability in NPD. These findings call for research on sustainability and NPD processes in contexts where sustainability incentives and needs are fuzzy so as to acquire insights applicable to sustainable product development management that is proactive rather than reactive.

Instead of focusing only on the output of sustainable products, this paper presents a more nuanced perspective on managing sustainability in NPD. Moreover, by adopting the holistic perspective of the systems theory of control, the authors challenge the assumption that there are already sufficient external incentives to force companies toward greater sustainability. Consequently, in the light of proactive sustainability management, the authors recommend three tracks for further research: organization and filtering of information concerning sustainability pressures and incentives in a firm's context; and how to manage sustainability proactively rather than reactively.