Using Internet Technologies and Services for Sustainability Reporting: Research Initiative, Agenda, Early Results
Authors: R. Isenmann; Hans-Knud Arndt; Jan Brosowski; J. Gómez; Monika Schappert
Year: 2007

The paper provides an outline of a research initiative embedded in the environmental informatics community focused on the use of environmental informatics methods and the application of current internet technologies and services with the goal to improve sustainability reporting at corporate level. The outline includes the research agenda and a research map as an illustration covering the different facets of research and implementation as well as further developments that will be dealt with in the near future. The paper is organised in four major parts: First, the early history of the research initiative on internet-based sustainability reporting and major milestones are described with the help of current literature in the field. Based on the above, the research agenda and primary objectives are presented. Such a catalogue of issues seems useful for clarifying the focus of the whole enterprise and perhaps for an evaluation what has been achieved and where further work needs to be done. A research map of the co-operation network provides the whole picture the initiative is focused on. It particularly illustrates the domains in environmental informatics and corporate sustainability reporting that are of relevance to achieve the objectives set in the research agenda. Further, a current project is described. Finally, conclusions are drawn and an outlook is given on how sustainability reporting might evolve in the near future and where to support the developments through ICT. 1. Research initiative on internet-based sustainability reporting The research initiative on internet-based sustainability reporting is supported and promoted through four institutions all located at German Universities: (i) Institute for Project Management and Innovation (IPMI)/Research Institute for Sustainability (artec), University of Bremen, (ii) Department of Business Information Systems and Operations Research (BISOR), University of Kaiserslautern, (iii) Institute for Technical and Business Information Systems, Otto-von-Guericke-Universität Magdeburg, and (iv) Department for Business Information Systems, University of Oldenburg. The institutions provide different intellectual resources from outstanding scholars with international expertise and reputation. This makes it possible to combine different knowledge and expertise needed for such an interdisciplinary and challenging enterprise, including the areas of: sustainability management, stakeholder management, corporate online reporting, project management, business information systems, database management, internet technologies and web services, mark-up languages, document engineering, software engineering as well 1 University of Bremen, Institute for Project Management and Innovation (IPMI), and Research Institute for Sustainability (artec), Wilhelm-Herbst-Strasse 12, D-28359 Bremen, Germany, email: ralf.isenmann@innovation.uni-bremen.de, web: http://www.innovation.uni-bremen.de 2 Otto-von-Guericke-Universität Magdeburg, Institut für Technische und Betriebliche Informationssysteme, AG Managementinformationssysteme, Universitätsplatz 2, D-39016 Magdeburg, Germany, email: hans-knud.arndt@iti.cs.unimagdeburg.de, web: http://wwwiti.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/iti_mis 3 University of Kaiserslautern, Department of Business Information Systems and Operations Research (BISOR), P.O. Box 3049, D-67653 Kaiserslautern, Germany, email: brosowski@bisor.de; web: http://www.bisor.de 4 University of Oldenburg, Department for Business Information Systems, Ammerländer Heerstr. 114-118, D-26129 Oldenburg, Germany, email: marx-gomez@wi-ol.de; web: http://wi-ol.de/ 5 University of Kaiserslautern, Department of Business Information Systems and Operations Research (BISOR), P.O. Box 3049, D-67653 Kaiserslautern, Germany, email: schappert@bisor.de; web: http://www.bisor.de