Many of you have heard the word "sustainability" used to refer to a business initiative or process, and you probably wonder how it fits with continuous improvement activities in your own business. At the recent AME Annual Conference in Chicago, Hunter Lovins, who founded and runs Natural Capitalism Solutions and was one of the keynote speakers, presented the hypothesis that sustainability is good business and, done well, can be very profitable for an organization.

When you think about the goals of lean manufacturing and sustainability, the two are very synergistic. Continuous improvement efforts in lean are focused on the elimination of non-value-added waste to produce exactly what the customer wants, when they want it, in the quantity they specify -- and to use the minimum amount of time, material, space and labor to accomplish this at the lowest possible cost. Sustainability is all about minimizing the use of natural resources like materials, energy and even replenishable biomass resources like trees, while reducing solid waste and hazardous materials from our production processes and minimizing our carbon footprint.