Associations & NGOs

Sustainable Minds collaborates with professional associations and NGOs to advance environmental sustainability through greener product development.

The American Center for Life Cycle Assessment is a non-profit membership organization whose mission is to build capacity and knowledge of LCA. This mission is supported by the following goals:

  • To increase awareness of and to promote the adoption of Environmental LCA among industry, government, and NGOs.
  • To support education and outreach through conferences, online educational opportunities, information exchange and other media.
  • To support presence of underrepresented American groups in national and international conferences and other forums related to LCA.
  • To promote networking among LCA practitioners and researchers.

ACLCA is a part of the Institute for Environmental Research and Education (IERE), a 501(c)3 organization.  Become a member today! 

The Design and Sustainability Symposium, part of COFES, explores the intersection of design, simulation, and sustainability for the built (AEC) and manufactured environment.

COFES is a unique gathering of individuals from companies representing a wide variety of industry sectors, each with significant interest in software used to design the world around us. The DaS Symposium exists within that community to focus on how design software can facilitate the visibility of sustainability issues at the design stage. The goal of the DaS Symposium is to raise the issues that need to be addressed and to identify areas of common ground that may be best served by collaborative, rather than competitive solutions.

Founding members of The DaS Symposium include Autodesk, Building Smart Alliance, CIFE, Cyon Research, Gensler, Phoenix Integration, PTC, Siemens, SolidWorks, and Sustainable Minds.

In late June 2007, the Designers Accord was founded with the goal of changing the way the creative community does business. Designers, educators, and business leaders adopted a “Kyoto Treaty” of design (later renamed the Designers Accord) that specified a particular ethos and behavior around sustainable design. The underlying philosophy of this agreement was that by collectively building our intelligence around issues of climate change and humanitarian issues – and tackling those challenges with optimism and creativity – we would catalyze innovative and sustainable problem solving throughout the creative community.

Environmental Defense Fund is a leading national nonprofit organization representing more than 700,000 members. Since 1967, we have linked science, economics and law to create innovative, equitable and cost-effective solutions to society's most urgent environmental problems. Guided by science, Environmental Defense Fund evaluates environmental problems and works to create and advocate solutions that win lasting political, economic and social support because they are nonpartisan, cost-efficient and fair.

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.