Discuss about the effective Sustainable Engineering Management practices

Posted by David Harbour on July 12th, 2022

Literature Towards Effective Sustainable Engineering Management Practices:

Increasing existential threats to ecosystem services, our future generations, and the environment calls for engineers across the world to not only provide solutions by solving problems within fixed boundaries but to also pay special attention to the upstream and downstream impacts of the proposed perfect solution. In others words, engineers must have an innovative and a holistic approach to account for the whole of life impacts so that there is a net sustainability benefit in terms of its social, environmental and economic aspects. Moreover, there is a need to practice responsible engagement with the community and relevant stakeholders from the private sector as well as various non-governmental organisations and eventually practice engineering to promote an environment where health, safety and well-being of the environment and the broader community is of paramount importance. It is required that the governments, industries, and enterprises must embrace sustainable business models and integrate sustainable best practices into their operations so that sustainability engineering becomes the new corporate world order. Diffusion of renewable energy technologies must be accelerated to reduce dependency on fossil fuels and to facilitate this, the engineering cohort must actively work with government agencies to design relevant policies. Furthermore, the Life Cycle Assessment approach must be made mandatory to assess every engineering activity, process, and product from its infancy till handover so that the environmental, social and economic impacts of that activity are addressed appropriately. Embracing “Design Thinking” in engineering products or activities is an efficient way of achieving sustainability because of the human-centric approach of the concept. It is recommended that practicing engineering professionals work closely with engineering students so that sustainability principles are embedded in the students and they help develop the responses to our sustainability challenges that will shape our current and future life.