initiatives being pursued throughout the U.S. Army
to improve its environmental performance (Stine and
Cockerill-Kafka 1992).
In the 21st century, attention has expanded from
environmental protection toward ideas of sustain-
ability, which recognizes interrelationships among
national security, economics, and the environment.
Acknowledging these linkages, the 2010 Quadrennial
Defense Review included climate change and energy
issues as destabilizing forces and therefore priorities
for the military (DOD 2010b). In response, the Depart-
ment of Defense (DOD) (2010c) published a Strategic
Sustainability Performance Plan with the following
goals:
- Reduce fossil fuel use
- Improve water resources management
- Reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions
- Minimize solid waste
- Minimize chemicals of environmental concern
- Sustainable practices become the norm
- Sustainability built into DOD Management
Systems
Each of these goals has environmental and eco-
nomic implications and hence is relevant to ensuring
national security. This plan is intended to enable DOD
to “continue its culture of excellence in environmental
and fiscal stewardship and improve national security,
both home and abroad” (DOD 2010c, i).
The military is a sustainability resource
The DOD employs more than three million people
manages more than 5000 sites, and its 2010 budget
was $680 billion. By any measure it is larger than nu-
merous small nations or multinational corporations.