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Introduction

Some people see things as they are and ask why?
I dream of things that have never been and ask why not?
Senator Robert Kennedy

Ever since the Earth Summit of Rio de Janeiro back in 1992, much has been
written and continues to be written about “sustainability”. Throughout this
time, however, we seem to have lost a direction for measuring sustainability.
We need first to think about how we can develop sustainable projects and
industries, and then think about how we can develop indicators to measure the
sustainability or percentage of sustainability within these projects and indus-
tries. These two issues will help us draft plans for further sustainable develop-
ments. This book will discuss such indicators and the tools necessary for
sustainable development. In this way, it suggests a formula for sustainability.
The real environmental and economical problem of the 20th century is
that scientific and technological developments have increased the human
capacity to extract resources from nature, process them, and use them, but
have not offered parallel and similar insight into how these resources can be
returned to their environmental origin or how they could be entered into a
new cycle of extraction, processing, and use. Much of the resources extracted
from nature are used in unsustainable activities and end up as waste. This
can be described as a cradle-to-grave scenario in which the resources have
a “lifetime” and are disposed of after they are used, ending up in a “grave”
(a landfill, for example). If this were to continue unabated, we may end up
completely depleting our natural resources. The only way to evade this dead
end is to develop newer production and processing techniques that use up
resources in an alternative cradle-to-cradle scenario.
This book is original in that it presents cradle-to-cradle production and
processing alternatives to most of the traditional industries common today.
These alternatives are not only environmentally friendly, but are also
economically advantageous (either cutting costs or increasing profits). This
book is replete with creative ideas and innovative technologies that, when

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