How Important is 'Sustainability'?

quality is another word for sustainablilty -- make things that can be repaired and design them with that in mind. stop designing for the dump we do not need to trash the planet .

Sustainability is what business's do to make sure they can open the next day. They use all of the resources at their disposal more effectively and efficiently than the competition. They embrace new markets, and if the market wants to buy from companies they believe operate with high regard for the environment, they can make substantial gains by adjusting the marketing message to inform and recruit new customers. The word sustainable is not very informative, but the concept is sound.

The problem is that it is almost impossible to distinguish the good from the bad, so sustainable claims can be synonymous with hybrid, green, eco friendly, luxurious, sophisticated, etc. It's largely a marketing term.

The word has had an important environmental (and related business) connotation: Selling Douglas Firs can be sustainable with a managed forest: it could go on forever, using a particular plot of land.

Mining coal, however, is not sustainable: once it's gone, it's is gone, for all practical purposes.

The term gets muddier when applied to more complex businesses and situations. And now, it has become almost completely muddy in its corporate speak connotation, as you point out.

"Sustainablity" reaches its cynical zenith with the Fisker Karma, the lowest efficiency electric car on the market, by far. 5300 lbs. 20 mpg. But they use "fallen, sunken and rescued wood" for the dashboard.