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Sustainable Industrial Design and Waste Management
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preserve resources of any type. However, formal attention and labeling of this
concept began during the 1970s. In 1972, the global community came together
in Stockholm to discuss international environmental and development issues
for the first time in “the United Nations Conference on Human Environment”.
This conference was the first significant link between business and environ-
ment to take responsibility for the environmental problem that uncontrolled
industrial development was causing. The conference resulted in the creation
of United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) to adopt a global action plan
for protecting the environment. From its creation until now it tried to develop
guidelines and tools for the above cause. In 1986, the “World Commission on
Environment and Development WCED” was established. This commission’s
report is what first spread the term “sustainable development” and it became
the benchmark for thinking about global environmental and development
issues. The crest of global attention towards sustainability was during the
United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in 1992 held
in Rio de Janeiro. During this conference an action agenda was produced. This
Agenda 21 was a comprehensive global plan of action for local, national, and
global sustainable development. An equally comprehensive summit was the
Johannesburg Summit in 2002 which was more focused on eradication of
poverty as it also revived the commitment towards global sustainable devel-
opment. These summits, augmented with vast global efforts, have aided in
increasing awareness as well as multilateral agreements concerning various
sustainability issues and critical environments.
The concept of sustainable development is a methodology that attempts
to encompass social, technological, economic, and environmental aspects.
Thus, focus is on the interactions and impacts of these four factors on each
other rather than the fallacy that they are independent of one another. The
elements of Environmental, technological, social, and economic growth are
seen to reinforce each other thus attaining “win–win” solutions that do not
compromise any aspect. In order to develop a methodology for sustainable
development, a number of tools are required. The main tools necessary for
implementing sustainable development are cleaner production (CP), envi-
ronmental management system (EMS), 7Rs Golden Rule, industrial ecology
(IE), environmental impact assessment (EIA), and information technologies
(IT) as will be explained in detail in Chapter 4.

3.2 Industrial Ecology
Since the beginning of human history, industry has been an open system of
materials flow. People transformed natural materials; plant, animal and min-
erals into tools, clothing and other products. When these materials were worn
out they were discarded or dumped, and when the refuse buildup became a
problem, the habitants changed their location, which was easy to do at that
time due to the small number of habitants and the vast areas of land.