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The sharing economy is a new form of resource distribution that is affecting traditional markets, cities and individuals, and challenging the prevalent regulatory frameworks, social norms and belief systems. While studies have examined some of its disruptive effects on institutional actors, there has been less focus on the ways in which sharing economy organisations work to create new or disrupt prevalent institutions. This study aims to fill this gap by 1) applying a framework for institutional work by Lawrence and Suddaby (2006) to help understand, map out and classify a variety of mechanisms for urban sharing organisations to engage in institutional creation and disruption, and by 2) testing and adjusting the framework to the context of the sharing economy. The analysis builds on empirical data from case studies, field observations and almost 70 interviews with representatives of urban sharing organisations and actors in their organisational field.

CO2 emissions caused by private motorized traffic for the city of Graz, a typical European inland city with about 320 000 citizens, are investigated. The main methodology is a newly developed agent-based model that incorporates empirical data about the mobility behavior of the citizens in order to calculate the traveled routes, the resulting traffic and subsequent emissions. To assess the impact of different policies on CO2 emissions, different scenarios are simulated and their results are compared to a base line scenario. The model features a local and temporal resolution, effects like congestion and stop-and-go traffic as well as commuters to and from other regions. In addition to the evaluation of certain policies (like a focus on electric cars, telecommuting or an improvement of the road infrastructure), a method is provided, that makes it possible to compare many diverse scenarios, featuring technological changes, societal changes or changes in the road network, all within the same framework. The findings suggest that one of the most promising strategies to decrease urban CO2 emissions is to focus on the use of electric cars, especially if it is combined with offering alternatives to private car traffic and incentives for telecommuting. Banning the use of old cars only yields a significant result if a large amount of cars is affected, which would make such a policy difficult to implement. Expanding the road network has no significant positive effect and may even encourage using cars, therefore leading to even more CO2 emissions. Due to its flexible structure the presented model can be used to evaluate policies beyond what is presented in this study. It can easily be adapted to other conditions and geographical regions.

This study intends to clarify the understanding of the role of the contingency factors (i.e. long-term orientation, competitiveness and uncertainty) in the relation between sustainability practices (sustainability exploitation and sustainability exploration) and organizational performance. Using empirical data based on a large-scale survey among European organizations, this paper utilizes the regression analysis to gain insight into the relationship between sustainability practices and organizational performance. In general, the results support the contingency view of the relationship between sustainability practices and performance rather than relying upon “universal” view of sustainability practices. Particularly, the results show that in moderate environmental contexts (moderate competitiveness and uncertainty) sustainability exploitation practices seem to be a predominant predictor of organizational performance. Further, it appears that sustainability exploration practices are the most important predictor of innovation performance, especially when organizations are faced with high levels of competitiveness, uncertainty and long-term orientation. In contrast, sustainability exploitation practices seem to dominate in explaining the effects on quality performance. In this regard, we can argue that organizations with similar characteristics (capabilities, performance, and activity) may develop different and customised approaches for managing the interface between business and natural environment.

In this study, we compared the impacts of energy transition, efficiency, and electrification on carbon emissions using regulation indicators and empirical data. We constructed an empirical model to examine the relationship between energy variables and carbon emissions for 109 countries using Regulatory Indicators for Sustainable Energy (RISE) score data from 2010 to 2017. The fixed-effect estimation model and quantile regression with fixed effects showed consistent results. Regulations on energy efficiency contributed to carbon mitigation with 0.003% elasticity. Moreover, a 1% increase in the energy intensity increased carbon emissions by 0.74% owing to inefficient energy usage, implying that energy efficiency is the most effective energy policy tool for climate mitigation. While regulations on energy transition generally did not have a significant impact, the harshness of regulations on energy transition had a meaningful impact on carbon mitigation. Electrification consistently increased carbon emissions by increasing accessibility to energy for 0.23% elasticity, which was 0.11% in the case of regulation. Accordingly, the electrification policy should be implemented after the energy transition policy in the generation sector. Finally, countries should decrease the energy intensity by implementing regulations and policies for improving energy efficiency.

This study describes an integrative approach to product flow analysis of (waste) electrical and electronic equipment using trade statistics and consumer survey data. We demonstrate this approach with a case study of mobile phones. Using statistical and empirical data for Australia over 1997–2014, we have shown how different sources of information can be collated and cross-checked to estimate the product in-use stocks and flows, product lifespan and lifespan structure, as well as to detail the product age structure in stock and at the end of life. From our results, the total number of mobile phones in in-use stocks in Australia has been estimated at 46 million at the end of 2014, or about 2 phones per capita. The proportion of phones kept in storage (not being in use) has been constantly rising, reaching 50% in 2012–2014. The average expected lifespan for a mobile phone sold in Australia decreased from about six years in the late 1990s to about five years in the early 2000s, and then stabilised at around four years (±0.5 years). The average time of active use for mobile phones was estimated in the range of 2.0–2.6 years (which includes first use and reuse). The estimated lifespan profile for mobile phones in Australia has been confirmed to be relatively similar to that reported in Japan. While this methodology presented here provided meaningful results, the accuracy and relevance would be improved by better quality of original data. Therefore, in conclusion, we also highlight potential improvements in consumer surveys that would help to enhance the analysis.

The purpose of this study is to analyze the attitude of builders towards construction and demolition waste recycling in India. A conceptual framework was proposed using theory of planned behavior (perceived benefits, perceived costs, attitude, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control), institutional pressures (regulatory, normative and mimetic) and environmental consciousness on behavioral intention of builders towards construction and demolition waste recycling. Empirical data with 260 responses from different builders of construction sector in two large Indian cities were analyzed through partial least squares based structural equation modelling. The findings indicate that behavioral intention towards construction and demolition waste recycling is mainly driven by personal motivations (perceived benefits, perceived costs, attitude and perceived behavioral control), regulatory pressures and environmental consciousness. The study is relevant for policy makers, regulatory institutions, industry, and academia who study or manage construction and demolition waste and recycling.

Industrial firms are central to the effort to grapple with emission of greenhouse gases due to large material flows they process. Thus, employing system dynamics approach, the present study explored influencing factors of industrial firms' carbon footprint. Using empirical data from selected firms in China, simulation results revealed that price of raw material; governmental subsidy and pressure from international rules, as well as firm's awareness of social responsibility have slightly affected firms' carbon emissions. On the contrary, some factors have obvious effects on firms' carbon footprint including governmental regulation, awareness of consumer, company size, the ratio of low carbon package and recycling.

Employing an adaptive agent-based modeling approach, the present study explored the evolvement of firms’ environmental behavior and influencing factors. Using empirical data from 167 firms in China, the simulation results revealed that firms’ environmental behavior followed this evolvement path: defensive behavior, preventive behavior, and enthusiastic behavior. Computational experiments indicated that with increased financial ability and level of environmental preparedness, the number of firms in all three categories of environmental behavior increased and so did their profits. With increased public pressure, the number of firms with defensive environmental behavior and their profits decreased, but the number of firms with preventive and enthusiastic environmental behavior and their profits increased. On the other hand, when managers’ education level increased, the number of firms with defensive behavior deceased, but their profits increased slightly, though the number of firms with preventive and enthusiastic behavior and their profits increased sharply. In addition, with the increased regulation level, the number of firms with a different category of environmental behavior and their profits decreased. Finally, with increased financial subsidy and market share, the number of firms with different behavior and their profits were modified slightly.

There is an increasing growth of customers and regulators requesting enterprises to adopt the ISO 14001 environmental management standard over the last 15 years. Yet, any evidence for consistent environmental, market, and social benefits has been widely debated, which in turn, might be partly linked to the underlying organizational motives for environmental management system adoption. Based on the Institutional Theory and the Natural Resource-based view , this study examines the relationship of two different organizational adoption motives (i.e., internal and external) with triple bottom line perceived benefits (i.e., environmental, social, and market) on the adoption of ISO 14001. Using empirical data collected from a large-scale survey of Australian firms, we found that the motivation for environmental management system adoption was aligned closely with the types of benefits that accrued. The results indicate that external motives enhance social and market positioning, whereas internal motives better serve environmental benefits. Thus, managers may be seeking only a narrowly bounded set of outcomes from ISO 14001, rather than broader strategic improvement. The results also show the environmental benefits of adopting ISO 14001 to improve both the social and market benefits of the adopter enterprises. Practically, environmental benefits should be realized before firms can expect to reap social and market benefits from the environmental management system adoption . Our investigation on multiple motivations for organizational adoption of a voluntary standard provides important theoretical and practical insights on which organizational environmental management system adoption motives are conducive to fostering a broader set of strategic benefits.

This article presents a comprehensive managerial model for a sustainable university created by D.Sc. L. Velazquez with empirical data collected from about 80 higher education institutions around the world. The sustainable university model offers a clear perspective about how people responsible for sustainability initiatives achieve their initial momentum to progress to advanced steps in the process to become a sustainable university. This model depicts a structured framework that is comprised of four phases in a strategic management process. In these phases, four diverging strategies, and many practices undertaken by key players of sustainability initiatives in higher education institutions are analyzed.

Research is lacking on the process of identification and assessment of environmental aspects in an environmental management system (EMS) context. The aim of this paper is to contribute knowledge by identifying factors of importance for the process that can be used as a basis when developing existing methods for identification and assessment of environmental aspects. The empirical base is quantitative and qualitative data from 46 ISO 14001-certified or EMAS-registered organizations from three counties in Sweden. Problem areas are also identified through a review of the concept literature in the EMS area. Six important areas where the identification and assessment process can be improved are identified: the definition of environmental aspects, the procedures for update of aspects, the aggregation of aspects, the exclusion of business considerations in the assessment, employee and stakeholder participation, and the competence levels of people involved in the process. Since the empirical data is taken from Swedish organizations, the results of this study are valid for Swedish conditions and may not be valid for other countries.