Between 1965 and 1974, the Swedish Parliament decided to build one million dwellings, called Million Program. The million program buildings were erected with new, untried design solutions, in a short range of time, and at low cost. The residential buildings from that time are now greatly in need of renovation. The municipal housing company, Gavlega?rdarna, renovates and improves the energy efficiency at some of it?s apartment buildings in the district Sa?tra, Ga?vle.

This thesis concerns how Sweden relates to life cycle assessment (LCA) in the construction process. LCA means analyzing a products impact and the analysis includes the whole life span of the product. A building has a high complexity and the combination with its unique shape will make the LCA more comprehensive, unlike e.g. aluminum cans. Recently there has been a development of a working procedure in the construction industry.

In June 2006 the Council of the European Union agreed on the review of the EU sustainable development strategy. This renewed strategy voices a commitment to sustainable development that includes a diverse list of safeguarded interests. Sustainability is to be attained in the spheres of democracy, solidarity, the rule of law, gender equality and at the same time it should promote a dynamic economy. Given this multifunctional application of sustainable development, curiosity may soon give rise to questions such as; What is the legal significance of the concept? Is it to be considered a general principle of Community law? And can it be used as an instrument in adjudication and legal reasoning? Anyone who looks deeper into the concept of sustainable development is soon to find a labyrinthine complex of ideas, expressions and opinions.

The purpose of this report was to investigate how the Umeå School of Business and Economics at Umeå university can work to increase the share of courses and programmes that discuss sustainable development. Furthermore the purpose was to develop an action plan that can be used to increase that share. Methods used were a questionnaire directed towards the educators at the Umeå School of Business and Economics and an assessment of the content of courses and programmes connected to the Umeå School of Business and Economics. There was no clear structured way of working with education for sustainable development, but at the same time there was a will to integrate sustainable development in the education. Curricula were according to the educators an important tool to achieve this integration, their experience were that there are not enough time, people and money to work with sustainable development in the education and they would like to see more clear directions from the management.

The concept of sustainable development is a challenge that demands cooperation from all levels of society for it to be successful. The focus for this thesis is how politicians within the local councils understand the concept of sustainable development and how they implement it in political decision-making.The basis for the study is a questionnaire that was distributed to 303 local politicians in three municipalities of varying size in Southern Sweden. The study concentrates on departments within the local councils that are directly connected to the Swedish environmental law and the Swedish planning and construction law. One of the primary goals with the aforementioned laws is the achievement of sustainable development within one generation.The outcome of the study was that over half of the local politicians could correctly define sustainable development according to the World Commission on Environment and Development?s (WCED) definition.

The concept of sustainable development is a challenge that demands cooperation from all levels of society for it to be successful. The focus for this thesis is how politicians within the local councils understand the concept of sustainable development and how they implement it in political decision-making.The basis for the study is a questionnaire that was distributed to 303 local politicians in three municipalities of varying size in Southern Sweden. The study concentrates on departments within the local councils that are directly connected to the Swedish environmental law and the Swedish planning and construction law. One of the primary goals with the aforementioned laws is the achievement of sustainable development within one generation.The outcome of the study was that over half of the local politicians could correctly define sustainable development according to the World Commission on Environment and Development?s (WCED) definition.

More efficient energy consumption is essential to secure a sustainable future, not least within the building and real estate sector which answers for approximately 40 % of the EU countries total energy consumption. One part of EU: s work to reduce the energy consumption is the directive on energy performance of buildings which among other things have lead to stricter demands on energy performance in new and renovated buildings.One of the difficulties with making buildings more energy effective is that it often demands big investments and although it results in lower operating costs the extent of these savings and therefore also the repayment time can be difficult to decide beforehand. To make it interesting for property owners and also tenants to invest in energy efficient buildings powerful incentives are needed. Favorable loans to energy efficiency projects are one example of governmental instruments that have been tested in other European countries with good results.Reduced operating costs appear to be the main incentive for property owners to make their buildings more energy efficient. The best result of an energy efficiency project is usually achieved by cooperation between property owners and tenants but in order to make that interesting it is important that both parts can profit from the savings.

The purpose of this study is to make a close and critical scrutiny of the EU Lisbon Strategy and the assumption of `sustainable growth´. A basic question is to clarify what is meant by `sustainability´ in the economic and the environmental dimension respectively, and also, to analyse the meaning of `sustainable growth´. Secondly, I try to investigate the relationship between the economical and environmental dimensions of the strategy. Are the goals of the dimensions compatible and mutually supporting or are they conflicting? By illuminating these issues the study moves towards a final set of questions: What are the arguments that encourage or counteract the Lisbon assumption of `sustainable growth´? Is the European Union approaching `sustainable growth´ looking at different economical and ecological indicators? What are the prospects for the Lisbon Strategy as a way towards global `sustainable development´?.

The climate change the earth today has to face is no longer a global problem when every individual has a responsibility to act. The residents in Sweden have no understanding how their energy consumption affects the environment, nor what measures can be taken to reduce the energy consumption.The use of the energy in new Buildings is considerably lower than in the older ones as conditions have improved and the requirements have been more stringent. As most of the buildings in the future have already been constructed it´s important to take every opportunity for energy efficiency and rebuilding of available buildings will become a significant act. Reconstruction of a building contributes generally to both a reduced individual and a reduced total energy use, while new constructions only keep a low individual energy use but a increase the total energy use. For this reason we present the opportunities for reconstruction, mainly to reach the standards for a passive house..

Previous studies have shown that there exists a gap between purchase intention and behavior in consumption situations. This gap is especially prevalent for sustainable or green products and even more so in terms of sustainable apparel consumption. Therefore, the adoption of sustainable fashion remains low as fast fashion dominates the industry. A counter-movement for mass consumption - access-based consumption - has reached the apparel industry and in Sweden we see it in the form of clothing libraries. This qualitative thesis uses in-depth interviews to uncover the feelings of seven consumers towards the idea of accessing rather than owning their clothing as a more sustainable consumption form, factoring in the strong identity connection that we have to our clothes and how this affects their perceptions.

The study is a case study about the green urban district, East Kvillebäcken, located in Gothenburg, Hisingen. East Kvillebäcken is the first urban district in Sweden with ambition to build sustainable according to the certification system Miljöbyggnad, which make it a pioneer project. The purpose is to investigate the upcoming and the meaning of the green urban district in East Kvillebäcken and show how public employees think the urban district can affect social, ecologic and economic aspects in the area. Dialogue interviews were done with four public employees, one estate agent and two residents. Local plans and other authority documents were used to get a deeper understanding for the case study.

This thesis has been written with our society?s current energy-situation in mind.Although it only deals with one particular block of buildings, the solutions and suggestions presented herein are quite applicable on other objects of the same type.This thesis is intended to be used as a guideline for energy-preserving projects in general, with an eye to buildings erected during the Swedish ?million-programme? in the sixties and seventies.The paper starts with the acquiring of all necessary blueprints and technical specifications. It then moves on to a thorough description of the buildings in question, and their heating- and ventilation-systems.Followed by this the reader is guided through the successive stages of energy-perseverance measures that are available, and possible. Reasoning around the economic factors concerning all measures is also held.The paper ends with conclusion, and a discussion concerning the delicate issue of the higher return-temperatures possibly reaching the district-heating plant..

Environmental problems are accelerating with energy consumption and the release of greenhouse gases as the major issues. This affects landscape planning mostly through environmentally hazardous transportation and heating of buildings. In environmental work, the term "Sustainable development" is often used. This term was coined in the Bruntland report in 1987. A number of frameworks have been developed to clarify the term and to remind the user about relevant aspects of sustainability.

In this study environmental work in the Swedish hotel chain "Scandic" is investigated. Earlier studies point out sustainability and different environmental certificate programs as essential for the housing sector to contribute to sustainable tourism. The purpose and willingness to fulfill such a mission has been investigated by interviewing central actors in the hotel chain. The result shows that there is a desire to be part of environmental certificate programs mainly for the reason to be part of the system and not for the benefit of nature. Sustainable development is understood as being environmentally friendly. Different solutions to adapt and being more environmentally friendly is discussed.

The environment has become an important part in people´s lives, and in today´s society stakeholders demands have increased upon companies when it comes to sustainability reports. How these sustainability reports are designed depends on whom it?s for, laws and regulations, and the companies own norms and values. The purpose of sustainability reports is to measure, monitor and compare a company´s enviromental impact. It?s not only about integrating economics, but also enviromental and social standards together to get both financial and competitive advantages.Sustainable Value method is a new model and is the first real method that can be used to evaluate a company´s resources, both financial, social and enviromental to a sustainable value.This model is used to compare the resource efficiency between companies.In this thesis, a documentary study with an experimental approach has been made.Sustainability reports from six selected companies (in the engineering and forestry sector) have been investigated with respect to their accounting for carbon dioxide, and an experiment using the method ?Sustainable Value Approach? was subsequently performed.