In 2015, the United Nations developed a 15-year plan to “shift the world on to a sustainable and resilient path”.  That plan listed 17 Sustainable Development Goals that aim end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that all people have equal opportunities to enjoy peace and prosperity.

Sustainable development is about protecting the future - our future.

What is Development?

The word “development” describes efforts to encourage progress in human civilization. This progress relies on 3 things.

A Favorable Environment

The ideal environment provides breathable air and clean water. It supports the gathering or growing of food and does not suffer from extremes in weather.

Advancing Technology

Technology helps people accomplish more with less. It helps them share and save information. Technology is what allows towns and cities to develop and grow.

Social Organization

Education, law, and government provide structure and help prevent violence. Trade rules allow businesses to operate and grow. This creates job opportunities.

When these 3 things are shared fairly, human populations can grow and flourish.

How does it work?

For most of recorded history, development focused on technology and social institutions that supported the growth of urban areas. This included farms that could grow surplus food, roads and vehicles for transport, and complex buildings.

Engineering not only made this possible, it also rapidly increased the pace of change – particularly in the 19th and 20th centuries.

But there was a downside. 

Human-induced climate change is now creating extreme weather events that take hundreds of lives, cause billions of dollars in damage, and threaten food supplies. Unregulated development has created smog, threatened water supplies, and used up natural resources in ways that cannot be replenished for hundreds or thousands of years.

What is Sustainable Development?

In 1987, the United Nations published a report entitled Our Common Future that focused on the idea of “sustainable development”:

“Humanity has the ability to make development sustainable to ensure that it meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”

In other words:

In practice, this means considering the environment and a wider group of stakeholders - including people of the future - when designing technology and public policy.  The engineering design process makes this easier.

Engineering the future?

Engineering design considers stakeholders and limits. Engineers are trained to look for people affected by a problem and its potential solutions. They study available resources and consider time and safety issues.

By expanding stakeholders to include the environment, a wider community, and people of the future, engineers create more sustainable solutions.

That's how we engineer a better future.

In your community, what might prevent peolple from reaching their potential -
now or in the future?

Next: Sustainable Development Goals