INSTITUTE FOR SUSTAINABILITY

The Institute for Sustainability has three sub-entities: the Sustainable Engineering Forum, the Youth Council on Sustainability and the Center for Sustainable Technology Practices.

The Sustainable Engineering Forum is an organization of individuals and is focused on transfer of information regarding sustainability and technology. SEF does the programming for AIChE in the area of sustainability at AIChE meetings; it holds "virtual" meetings for its members; and has a website for members and others which has information about incorporating sustainability principles into engineering profession practices. SEF publishes at least one newsletter every month via E-mail and already has 120 members. The first Virtual Meeting focused on sustainability tools, the results of which will be posted on the SEF website this month. Membership is $20 per year. An application for membership may be downloaded from http://home.att.net/~aiche/SEF_AIChE_MembershipForm.pdf

The Youth Council on Sustainability is an organization of young engineers; its leadership is based in Washington, DC. Forty NGO and governmental stakeholders have been recruited and show interest. The Youth Council on Sustainability serves two functions: education and participation. It will provide a forum for outreach to youth and will facilitate youth participation in national and international sustainability efforts, including reaching goals made in international agreements such as Agenda 21 and the Johannesburg Plan on Implementation. In addition, the Youth Council will help young people understand the federal government and empowers them to work towards sustainability through federal channels.

The Center for Sustainable Technology Practices is an organization of companies that conducts projects of interest to industry representatives. It sets priorities for collaborative project work, prepares requests for proposals, seeks project funding from outside sources, monitors the execution of projects and acts to disseminate the results. The Center will hold an organizational meeting in Washington, DC on May 26, 2004 after which operational practices will be published, leaders will be named and preliminary project priorities will be set.

The Institute for Sustainability will have its own website linked from the AIChE home page later this month. In the meantime, you can reach the Institute at inst4sust@sbcglobal.net or contact Earl Beaver at Erbeav@aol.com for more information.