Environmental effects of sustainability management tools: An empirical analysis of large companies
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In: Ecological Economics, Vol. 120, 01.12.2015, p. 241-249.
Research output: Journal contributions › Journal articles › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Environmental effects of sustainability management tools
T2 - An empirical analysis of large companies
AU - Hörisch, Jacob
AU - Ortas, Eduardo
AU - Schaltegger, Stefan
AU - Álvarez, Igor
PY - 2015/12/1
Y1 - 2015/12/1
N2 - Given the huge global environmental problems and their political and economic impacts, companies are challenged to improve their performance with regard to issues such as climate change. To successfully reduce corporate environmental impacts, management not only needs to develop environmental strategies, it also has to use effective sustainability management tools for their implementation. There are many studies reported in the literature on sustainability management tools such as life cycle assessments or sustainability reports. However, with few exceptions little is known about the efficacy of these tools. We address this research gap by analyzing survey data from the largest companies of five industrialized countries and empirically test the impact of implementing sustainability management tools on key dimensions of corporate environmental performance. The findings show that the implementation of sustainability management tools does reduce environmental impacts per unit of revenue. However, different groups of tools are found to be effective for different purposes.
AB - Given the huge global environmental problems and their political and economic impacts, companies are challenged to improve their performance with regard to issues such as climate change. To successfully reduce corporate environmental impacts, management not only needs to develop environmental strategies, it also has to use effective sustainability management tools for their implementation. There are many studies reported in the literature on sustainability management tools such as life cycle assessments or sustainability reports. However, with few exceptions little is known about the efficacy of these tools. We address this research gap by analyzing survey data from the largest companies of five industrialized countries and empirically test the impact of implementing sustainability management tools on key dimensions of corporate environmental performance. The findings show that the implementation of sustainability management tools does reduce environmental impacts per unit of revenue. However, different groups of tools are found to be effective for different purposes.
KW - Sustainability sciences, Management & Economics
KW - Corporate environmental performance
KW - Sustainability management
KW - Sustainability management tools
KW - Planetary boundaries
KW - International Corporate Sustainability Barometer
KW - Barometer
KW - Corporate environmental performance
KW - sustainability management
KW - sustainability management tools
KW - planetary boundaries
KW - international corporate sustainability barometer
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84946842596&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2015.11.002
DO - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2015.11.002
M3 - Journal articles
VL - 120
SP - 241
EP - 249
JO - Ecological Economics
JF - Ecological Economics
SN - 0921-8009
ER -