PurposeThe paper seeks to examine the latest stage in a process of change aimed at introducing concepts of sustainable development into the activities of the Department of Engineering at Cambridge University, UK.Design/methodology/approachThe rationale behind defining the skills which future engineers require is discussed and vehicles for change at both undergraduate and postgraduate level are described. Reflections on the paradigms and pedagogy of teaching sustainable development issues to engineers are offered, as well as notes on barriers to progress which have been encountered.FindingsThe paper observes that the ability to effectively initiate a change process is a vital skill which must be formally developed in those engineers wishing to seek sustainable solutions from within the organisations for which they will work. Lessons are drawn about managing a change process within a large academic department, so that concepts of sustainable development can be effectively introduced across all areas of the engineering curriculum.Practical implicationsA new pedagogy for dealing with changes from the quantitative to the qualitative is required, as the paper questions where the education balance should lie between providing access to technological knowledge which can be applied to designing hard solutions, and training engineers to rethink their fundamental attitudes towards a broader, multiple perspective approach in which problem formulation and context setting play a vital role in reaching consensual solutions.Originality/valueThe paper reviews previously recognised key themes for engineering education for sustainable development, and proposes three further essential ingredients relating to an engineer's ability to engage in problem definition, manage change in organisations, and understand the nature of technical and business innovations.

The complex, fragmented and diverse aspects of a sustainable development perspective are translated into an eight-point framework that defines a problem boundary larger than that traditionally adopted by civil engineers. This leads to practical questions intended to inform engineers who ask ‘am I being sustainable?’ during project implementation. The value of the questions is tested against a case history of a wastewater treatment project. This demonstrates the relevance of the questions to successive project delivery phases of defining the problem, choosing a solution and implementing that solution through design, construction and operation. The case history highlights that answers to several of the additional questions raised by considering this wider problem space are currently buried within government and clients' policies, regulations and standard practice; these answers may not be accessible to the professional engineer.

The UK government has agreed to a 26% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and an 80% reduction by 2050, against a 1990 baseline. Britain's approximately 26 million existing homes account for 27% of total UK greenhouse gas emissions. Given the low-build rate for new homes, today's homes will comprise at least 80% of the 2050 housing stock. Therefore, it is essential that significant improvements are realised to existing homes if the UK is to meet its sustainability objectives. This paper develops a building rating system designed to assess the sustainability merits of existing home retrofits and to indicate the success of a range of retrofit measures. With the methodology applied to six case studies, performance of the retrofit measures adopted and their prioritisation are discussed, together with the effectiveness of a retrofit building rating system. The creation and adoption of a purpose-designed building rating system, such as the one described and demonstrated here, with escalating mandatory performance levels in energy and water efficiency, would help to drive improvement in existing homes. Such an approach would be used to rate existing homes, galvanise stakeholders around a common framework and provide long-term visibility to the marketplace. It must be integrated with existing building regulations, planning mechanisms, incentive programmes, and assessment requirements such as energy performance certificates. Encouraging action now will not only result in quality improvements to the existing housing stock and a reduced ecological footprint but will also build resilience in energy and water systems and facilitate adaptation to future climate change.

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