Criteria for sustainable projects

Or it could also be stated as criteria for sustainable development.

Following principles could be taken as starting point:

• balancing or harmonizing social, environmental and economical interests
• both the short term and the long term
• local and global
• consuming income, not capital
• transparency and accountability
• personal values and ethics

GPM Global's PRiSM methodology and related P5 standard are other useful pieces when building the framework. They are based on the following guidelines, standards and declarations:

• The United Nations Global Compact Ten Principles for Sustainability
• GRI G4 Framework
• IPMA ICB 3.0 Competence Baseline
• and following ISO standards:
  • ISO 9000 – Quality Management
  • ISO 14000 - Environmental Management
  • ISO 50001- Energy Management
  • ISO 26000 - Social Responsibility
  • ISO 21500 - Guidance on Project Management

P5 comes from the words people, planet, profit, process and product meaning that the short-term (process) and long-term (product) aspects are added to the 'traditional' triple bottom line concept. Based on the above mentioned standards and guidelines it essentially gives the criteria to be considered when planning and implementing sustainable projects.

The idea is to use the framework as the basis for impact and risk analysis by scoring individual elements and either calculating a single sustainable impact score or alternatively taking the most important risks under closer consideration and including them into the sustainability management plan.