Environmental Footprints and Eco-design of Products and Processes

This book presents five interesting chapters dealing with the sustainability of toys. The concept of sustainability has reached all industrial sectors these days and being practiced in almost all the sectors. One of the main sectors where sustainability has to be embedded to the core is the toy sector. Needless to enumerate the importance of sustainability in this sector especially when it comes to usage of chemicals and so on. There are various elements associated with the sustainability of toys and there is a dearth of published literature on this subject.

This book highlights the environmental footprints and best practices in sustainable agriculture. This first volume includes forty-four interesting chapters that present agriculture in the light of food security, circular economy, sustainability, food exports and imports written by leading experts in the field. It provides and interesting read for researchers, policy makers and professionals in the area of agriculture and economy.

This book highlights the environmental footprints and best practices in sustainable agriculture. This second volume includes fifteen interesting chapters that present agriculture in the light of forest conservation, circular economy, climate change, sustainability, food security during pandemics and soil conservation, written by leading experts in the field. It provides and interesting read for researchers, policy makers and professionals in the area of agriculture and economy.

This book highlights the impact of COVID-19 on sustainable waste management and air emission, using various case studies. The year 2020 was a historical year mainly due to the pandemic caused by COVID-19 and it influenced or affected the global economy, business models and the industrial sectors, thus impacting sustainability in various ways. Given that sustainability has many faces and facets, it is worthwhile to deal with the relation (or impact) of COVID-19 on various elements of sustainability. This book presents how COVID-19 has influenced waste management and air quality.

This book highlights the impact of COVID-19 on environmental sustainability and SDG’s, using various case studies. The year 2020 was a historical year mainly due to the pandemic caused by COVID-19 and it influenced or affected the global economy, business models and the industrial sectors, thus impacting sustainability in various ways. Given that sustainability has many faces and facets, it is worthwhile to deal with the relation (or impact) of COVID-19 on various elements of sustainability. This book presents how COVID-19 has influenced Environmental Sustainability along with the SDG’s.

Packaging plays a major role in the environmental footprints of products from any industrial sector, and thus is important to address the sustainability issues of packaging. Packaging and the packaging sector have to be eco-conscious as there are many types of packaging across various industrial sectors and so are their environmental impacts as well. Plastic packaging is one of the most common element and the packaging sector accounts for almost 40% of plastic pollution in the world.  Sustainable packaging is the only way forward to alleviate the environmental devastations from the the packaging sector. This book presents case studies and discusses how to make packaging more sustainable for a better future.

Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (ELCA)  that was developed about three decades ago demands a broadening of its scope to include lifecycle costing and social aspects of life cycle assessment as well, drawing on the three-pillar or ‘triple bottom line’ model of sustainability, which is the result of the development of the Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA). LCSA refers to the evaluation of all environmental, social and economic negative impacts and benefits in decision-making processes towards more sustainable products throughout their life cycle. Combination of environmental and social life cycle assessments along with life cycle costing leads to life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA). This book highlights various aspects of  life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA).

This book highlights the notion of Circular Economy under the umbrella of Sustainability because of the widespread momentum it is gaining. Today the whole world is certainly in emergent need of an alternative system to traditional economy which is linear, i.e. make, use and dispose to get rid-off the waste and very important to ensure continuous use of resources, which is possible by the advent of circular economy.  A circular economy aims to utilize the resources in use for as long as possible, extract the maximum value from them during use, then recover and regenerate products and materials at the end of each service life vis-à-vis traditional linear model.  This book discusses circular economy in terms of assessment with various case studies.

This book highlights the applications of blockchain technologies to foster sustainable development in different fields. The concept of Sustainability has grown widespread in today’s context and there are many requirements to achieve Sustainability in any industrial sector including mapping, tracing the supply chain to ensure sustainable supply chain management. Reliable and transparent, efficient data is one of the key requirements for Sustainability in today’s advanced industrial context. Achievement of Sustainability objectives in this advanced era demands various technological advancements such as Blockchain technologies. The core competencies of blockchain technology namely transparency, data auditability, privacy, value transfer, and process efficiency and automation are very much essential for achieving the multifold objectives under sustainability.

This book highlights the relevant and timely global change movement: green entrepreneurship. Presented in this book is relevant literature and academic knowledge. The book is expected to  support in creating more green entrepreneurship initiatives in collaboration with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

This book highlights the sustainability aspects of products and processes in forest science. The forest products sector supplies raw materials to several industrial sectors worldwide. These products can be classified as timber or non-timber products. Wood products are those that originate from the woody fraction and can include pulp, charcoal, firewood, and others. The non-timber products, on the other hand, have the products extracted from the different parts of the tree, such as bark, leaves, fruits, resins, oils, tannins, or even products extracted from non-woody biomass, such as palm heart or carnauba, among others. There are new studies and new products developed from forests worldwide each day. However, studies that evaluate the sustainability of these products and the processes related to their production are not so common. It is essential to highlight the sustainability aspects of these activities and the products obtained from them; such that steps can be taken to make the processes eco-friendly.

Allied to ecological sustainability studies that evaluate the technical and economic feasibility of such activities arise. With this book, the authors through the approach of other products and processes of forest science, present the practical vision of aligning production with sustainability in an economically viable way. The book analyses different products and processes, ranging from technological production of engineered wood products to handcrafted resins with a high commercial appeal. With the expertise of different authors, who are researchers in various specific areas of forest sciences, this book helps expand research and presents new insights, assisting industry decision-makers and researchers working in the areas forest sciences.