Cleaner Production and Eco-Efficiency in Australian small firms

This paper reviews the Cleaner Production (CP)and Eco-Efficiency (EE) initiatives from 30 Australian small firms that participated in government-funded programs. The review focuses on the type of opportunities implemented, their technical complexity and business significance, and motivators for their identification and implementation. Even though the results are only illustrative, they clearly show the diversity of solutions, which is testimony to the fact that CP and EE are business improvement strategies rather then fixed sets of technical solutions that can easily be replicated by other businesses. Moreover, the comparative analysis reveals that the business decision to implement CP or EE is a result of a complex interplay of environmental and business considerations.