Sustainable development integration in Greek schools of engineering: current situation, experiences and actions

Abstract

In this paper, a comprehensive study regarding the assessment of sustainable development (SD) integration in Greek schools of engineering is presented. More specifically, the undergraduate and graduate curricula and websites of all schools of engineering in Greece were examined to identify SD-related content and actions. Moreover, a simple guide for embedding SD into engineering schools was established, based on the experiences of successful implementation and strategies from highly recognised technical universities worldwide, to benchmark the Greek experience and to propose indicative measures for incorporating SD teaching in Greek universities. Results indicated that changing the curriculum is not the only way to efficiently incorporate SD in universities, whereas there are gaps concerning the integration of sustainability principles and tools in Greek engineering universities. Furthermore, the initial steps of incorporating SD-related actions at an engineering department are presented and analysed indicating some characteristic key factors affecting the efficient incorporation of SD tools in engineering courses.

Keywords:

• education
• universities
• sustainability incorporation
• survey
• industrial ecology

1. Introduction

Although there are many studies covering the efficient incorporation of sustainable development (SD) in engineering curricula and the improvement of engineering education, the level of sustainability integration has not been adequately quantified and assessed. Comprehensive information regarding the status of sustainability education and practice at different nations is missing (Desha et al. 2009). However, there are a limited number of surveys that could be used to examine the progress towards engineering education for SD (Desha and Hargroves 2010). These surveys could be sorted in two basic categories. The surveys of the first category assess the familiarity and knowledge of students with sustainability through questionnaires and interviews (Azapagic et al. 2005, Desha et al. 2008). The surveys of the second category assess the sustainability performance of a university through the examination of some defined criteria. These criteria could be the number of SD-related courses and specialisations offered at undergraduate or graduate level, the adoption of an environmental management system (EMS), etc. (The Alliance for Global Sustainability (AGS) 2006, 2008).

This study consists of four parts. In the first part, the scene setting is provided regarding the concepts of ‘sustainability’ and ‘engineering’. Following that, the integration of SD in engineering universities in Greece is assessed through a comprehensive examination of study guides and university websites. No similar study has been undertaken for Greece as far as the authors are aware of.

In the next part, a review of successful experiences from the implementation of SD strategies at technical universities worldwide is presented. Based on this review, an indicative guide for embedding SD into engineering schools is developed and is compared with the existing situation in Greek technical universities.

Finally, a series of actions are developed to enhance SD teaching through Industrial Ecology (IE) in an engineering department of a university in Greece, taking into account the worldwide experience and the recommendations for the incorporation of SD into universities (GMV 2008).

2. Theoretical background

2.1 Sustainable development

A frequently quoted definition of SD is available in the Brundtland report from the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development and is defined as the ‘…development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ (WCED 1987). It consists of a development process that leads to a society in which everyone has fair and equitable access to the environment, is able to pursue meaningful work and utilises its full human potential for both personal and social progress (Segalas 2009). Environment, economy and society are the three pillars of sustainability and equal importance should be given to each. SD has been designated as a definite challenge of the twenty-first century and is a fundamental goal of society's economic and social progress (DIUS 2007).

2.2 Education for sustainable development (ESD)

It is widely accepted that higher education contributes significantly to the promotion of sustainability (Moore et al. 2005) by training citizens to build a fairer and more open society (Alvarez 2000). In that aspect, higher education institutions have the responsibility to educate graduates so as to achieve an ethical and moral vision and acquire the necessary technical knowledge to ensure the quality of life for future generations (Corcoran et al. 2002).

In December 2002, the United Nations General Assembly declared a Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD, 2005–2014) and entrusted UNESCO with the responsibility to implement and coordinate the relative action. In that aspect, UNESCO has identified key areas of action regarding strategies and policies for education for sustainable development (ESD; UNESCO 2009). More specifically, increased networking at a local, national and international level and multi-stakeholder participation found to be crucial for the efficient promotion of ESD (UNESCO 2009).

However, the interdisciplinary character of ESD significantly challenges its implementation. SD is a complex and multi-layered notion, whereas its challenges, being inherently holistic, require responses from different disciplines and professions represented within the institution (Grierson and Hyland 2010). Programmes which are promoting an interdisciplinary approach to sustainability are often recognised as innovative by their host institution, yet common problems are identified that need to be overcome (Blake et al. 2009). It should be mentioned though that change in teaching and learning policies and practice in terms of embracing interdisciplinary approaches is slow to take effect (CSF 2009). Most of the barriers that could be possibly met for incorporating SD into university curricula are given elsewhere (Dawe et al. 2005, Lidgren et al. 2006).

2.3 SD and engineering

According to the IPAT master Equation (Chertow 2001), environmental impact is proportional to population, gross domestic product (GDP) per person and environmental impact per unit of GDP. Although simplified as a statement, a valuable inference can be extracted from the IPAT equation. More specifically, since population and GDP per person are expected to increase over the next 50 years by a factor of over 1.5, the fundamental way to efficiently reduce environmental impact of products and processes is the application of technological changes. Sustainability cannot be understood, studied or even conceptualised without understanding the technology (Allenby et al. 2009); therefore, engineers are expected to play a leading role in achieving sustainability.

A sustainable society needs ‘a new kind of engineer who is fully aware of what is going on in society and who has the skills to deal with societal aspects of technologies’ (De Graaff and Ravesteijn 2001). Furthermore, engineers should apply a holistic and systemic approach for solving problems and let the stakeholders express their opinion regarding development of new technologies and infrastructures [Engineering Education in Sustainable Development (EESD) 2004].

Thus, an engineering programme must (1) provide students with the broad education necessary to understand the impact of engineering solutions in a global, economic, environmental and societal context, (2) promote the professional and ethical responsibility and (3) help students to develop the ability to design a system, component or process to meet desired needs within realistic economical, environmental and social constraints (ABET 2007).

Several researches have addressed the importance of incorporating SD into engineering education, whereas others provide approaches for successfully integrating SD in universities mainly focusing on changes in curriculum and courses (Lidgren et al. 2006). Engineering schools have been at the forefront of SD incorporation (Glavic et al. 2009). However, only recently, colleges and universities have included topics such as life cycle assessment, renewable energy and waste minimisation methods, which are closely related with sustainable engineering, in their course material (Davidson et al. 2010). Thus, this study attempts to contribute to the promotion of SD integration in engineering schools through a survey regarding the integration of SD in Greek schools of engineering.

3. Current situation in Greece

3.1 Method applied

The active engineers in Greece are approximately 117,000 according to the Technical Chamber of Greece (TEE 2010), corresponding to a continuously growing analogy of 10.3 engineers/1000 population.

In this study, nine Greek universities and 43 engineering departments were examined covering all the engineering schools available in Greece (Table 1). To assess the integration of SD in Greek engineering universities, their study guides and their available websites were comprehensively examined. The criterion for assessing the sustainability-related content was the presence of specific keywords either in the title, aim or in the description of the course. These words were

Table 1 Overview of the data examined.

		Departments examined
No.	Universities examined	No.	Name of the department
1	National Technical University of Athens (NTUA)	9	AE, AMPS, CE, ChE, ElCE, ME, MEM, NAME, RSE
2	Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (AUTH)	7	AE, CE, ChE, ElCE, ME, RSE, URPDE
3	Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH)	5	AE, CE, EE, ElCE, PEM
4	Technical University of Crete (TUC)	5	AE, ECE, EE, MRE, PEM
5	University of Ioannina (UOI)	1	MSE
6	University of Patras (UPATRAS)	6	AE, CE, CEI, ChE, ECE, MEA
7	University of the Aegean (AEGEAN)	3	FME, ICSE, PSDE
8	University of Thessaly (UTH)	5	AE, CCE, CE, ME, PRD
9	University of Western Macedonia (UOWM)	2	EIT, ME
	Total number of departments examined		43
	Total number of undergraduate courses examined		5001
	Total number of graduate programmes examined		73
	Total number of graduate courses examined		2204
Notes: AE, Architectural Engineering; AMPS, Applied Mathematical and Physical Science; CCE, Computer and Communications Engineering; CE, Civil Engineering; CEI, Computer Engineering and Informatics; ChE, Chemical Engineering; ECE, Electronic and Computer Engineering; EE, Environmental Engineering; EIT, Engineering Informatics and Telecommunications; ElCE, Electrical and Computer Engineering; FME, Financial and Management Engineering; ICSE, Information and Communication Systems Engineering; ME, Mechanical Engineering; MEA, Mechanical Engineering and Aeronautics; MEM, Mining Engineering and Metallurgy; MRE, Mineral Resources Engineering; MSE, Materials Science and Engineering; NAME, Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering; PEM, Production Engineering and Management; PRD, Planning and Regional Development; PSDE, Product and Systems Design Engineering; RSE, Rural and Surveying Engineering and URPDE, Urban-Regional Planning and Development Engineering.

•Sustainability	•Waste minimisation	•Sustainable engineering
•SD	•Zero waste production	•Cleaner production
•Earth's carrying capacity	•Social justice	•Green process
•Social responsibility	•Depletion of natural resources	•Green chemistry
•Life cycle assessment	•Ecological footprint	•Design for sustainability
•Renewable energy	•Design for environment	•Generational equity
•Material/substance flow analysis	•Industrial ecology

Moreover, to identify independent actions that promote SD in each department, their websites were searched for data related to strategies, commitments and synergies with other universities and so forth.

3.2 SD in Greek schools of engineering

Results indicated that only 2 and 3.2% of the examined undergraduate and graduate courses, respectively, found to be related with ‘sustainability’ issues according to the established criteria. Wide discrepancies were observed among different departments for both undergraduate (0–12%) and graduate level (0–39%).

The departments that exhibited the best performance in terms of incorporation of SD issues into undergraduate curricula were mostly those related to environmental, mechanical and architectural engineering. This result could be attributed to the fact that several courses of those departments are related to environment and energy issues (e.g. environmental management and renewable energy systems management) and design (e.g. bioclimatic and sustainable design).

On the contrary, civil, electrical and computer engineering departments have not incorporated SD issues into their curriculum considerably. The schools of engineering with the 10 highest performances are presented in Table 2.

Table 2 Top 10 Greek schools of engineering in terms of incorporation of sustainability issues into their undergraduate curricula.

No.	Name of the engineering department	University	Number of courses that are ‘sustainability’ related	Percentage (%)
1	Environmental	DUTH	13/110	11.8
2	Mechanical	UOWM	6/80	7.5
3	Urban-Regional Planning and Development	AUTH	4/58	6.9
4	Architectural	NTUA	6/105	5.7
5	Mechanical	AUTH	8/145	5.6
6	Environmental	TUC	4/83	4.8
7	Architectural	TUC	3/64	4.7
8	Rural and Surveying	NTUA	4/88	4.6
9	Chemical	NTUA	5/117	4.3
10	Architectural	DUTH	4/96	4.2

Concerning the examination of the graduate-level programmes, the results were differentiated. More specifically at 9 out of 73 M.Sc. programmes examined, more than 10% of the courses were related with SD issues. Those programmes focus on SD issues and environmental engineering (Figure 1). On the other hand, the rest of the M.Sc. programmes exhibited a rather poor incorporation of SD issues in their curricula.

Figure 1 Top 10 M.Sc. courses in Greek schools of engineering in terms of incorporation of sustainability issues into their graduate curricula.

Furthermore, independent actions related with sustainability principles, such as relevant research, workshops and projects, were rarely found and none of the universities/departments examined have proceeded to a clear commitment for promoting sustainability.

4. Benchmarking with highly recognised universities

The results described above indicated the limited integration of SD principles and tools in engineering universities in Greece. At that point, it is useful to examine successful examples from the implementation of SD principles at highly recognised universities worldwide.

The top five European universities that have extensively incorporated sustainability issues in their curricula are University of Strathclyde, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Blekinge Institute of Technology, Delft University of Technology and Chalmers University of Technology (AGS 2008).

An overview of engineering education and history in SD at Delft University of Technology is presented elsewhere (Kamp 2006, Quist et al. 2006). According to those studies, a series of interconnected actions were developed in Delft, to offer basic knowledge on SD issues. These actions included the design of relative elementary courses, graduation with a specialisation in ‘SD’ and development of a competent group responsible for organising and implementing these actions. Further actions include workshops, site visits to industrial facilities, information exchange, development of websites–forums and regular meetings.

University of Strathclyde has made a clear commitment through its Sustainability Policy (University of Strathclyde 2010a) to ensure that sustainability and responsible citizenship are embedded in all its operations. Some of the actions include the reduction of waste, energy use and resource consumption and engagement with communities to enhance knowledge of sustainable living. Furthermore, it gives the graduate students the ability to graduate with a M.Sc. programme while learning about sustainability issues and joining industry-based group projects (University of Strathclyde 2010b). Finally, a special centre for sustainability (David Livingstone) was created, to promote the teaching and researching of sustainability-related issues (University of Strathclyde 2010c). More details about University of Strathclyde framework for embedding SD, especially for graduate programmes, can be found elsewhere (Grierson and Hyland 2010).

Chalmers is another university that promotes the incorporation of SD in universities through research on relevant issues and teaching (Chalmers University 2010). A key characteristic of Chalmers University strategy for sustainability is the participation in several networks for SD like the AGS (2010), the European Panel on Sustainable Development (EPSD 2010) and the Centre for Environment and Sustainability (GMV 2010).

Following a similar approach as in Europe, a partnership among Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Texas at Austin and the Arizona State University was established in 2005 to assist the promotion of sustainable engineering in American universities [Centre for Sustainable Engineering (CSE)]. A discussion regarding the sustainable engineering education in the USA and the actions of CSE is provided elsewhere (Allenby et al. 2009, Davidson et al. 2010). CSE has mainly focused on the incorporation of sustainable engineering modules in existing courses. Additionally, workshops and website with relative material are also referred, and IE was found to be especially useful for teaching SD to engineers.

On the basis of the mentioned successful examples, the efficient incorporation of SD in universities should include the following:

•	Development of a strategy and/or an action plan to incorporate and promote SD. This should be expressed through the official policy of the university and a commitment that sustainability is of high priority.
•	Cooperation through synergies and networks with other universities to promote SD and exchange experience. Collaboration with industries could also benefit the university through work project groups on sustainability.
•	Adoption of an in-campus EMS.
•	Incorporation, where possible, of an elementary course in their curriculum to introduce SD principles to students.
•	Incorporation, where possible, of sustainability-related aspects in every undergraduate–graduate course using appropriate case studies, in such a way that it fits with the nature of the course.
•	Development of actions such as workshops, lectures and site visits.
•	Establishment of a special Sustainability Group to develop, organise and implement sustainability-related actions.
•	Communication and promotion of the above-mentioned actions outside of the university environment.

Comparing the above-described actions with the findings for Greece, the following conclusions can be drawn. First, none of the Greek universities have stated an official commitment expressing its intention to follow SD practices, and no EMS was found to be adopted by any institution. Technical University of Crete (TUC) took the 42nd place out of 56 universities in EESD observatory of 2008 being the only Greek university that took part in the survey (AGS 2008). The reasoning behind its ranking was poor performance on EMS adoption and lack of graduate sustainability-related courses and specialisation, verifying the findings of this research.

Moreover, no evident collaboration among universities and/or universities and industries for promoting research on SD was identified. The development of synergies among Greek universities and the establishment of an inter-university sustainability Centre is therefore recommended. A Centre of that type could coordinate, for example, SD-oriented research and/or could develop an elementary course for sustainability to be included in every engineering curriculum, following the example of similar worldwide experience (e.g. CSE in USA). Finally, supplementary actions such as workshops, visits to industrial facilities, special lectures and sustainability project groups should be encouraged. These proposed actions, however, should gradually be shifted from individual initiatives and should be incorporated into the strategy of each university.

5. Incorporation of SD actions in an engineering department: first results

Taking into consideration the results identified so far, a series of actions based on the principles and tools of IE were developed and implemented in an engineering department namely the Production Engineering and Management Department (PME) of Democritus University of Thrace. PME was established in 2000 and welcomes almost 100 students every year. Its study guide is a combination of managerial and core mechanical subject areas, aimed at developing multidimensional engineering skills in its students.

5.1 Industrial ecology

IE was found to be especially useful for teaching SD to engineers (Allenby et al. 2009) and is increasingly becoming a key reference at universities throughout the world (ISIE 2010). IE consists of various holistic and systemic concepts and tools that try to simulate the way that nature works by eliminating material and energy losses thus leading to sustainability. Figure 2 provides an overview of the concepts and tools of IE. IE can be potentially related to different scientific fields due to the variety of the specialities engaged such as environmental policy, economy, sociology and so forth.

Figure 2 An overview of concepts and tools of IE.

According to a report examining the infiltration of IE in higher education (Cockerill 2010), 15 out of 37 universities in USA (40%) and 12 out of 23 universities in other countries (52%) offer IE-related degrees at engineering- or technology-related departments indicating the significant potential of IE in the curricula of engineering departments.

The potential of IE as an enhancement tool for teaching SD is further supported by the fact that the book ‘Industrial Ecology’ of Greadel and Allenby is the most commonly used textbook regarding sustainable engineering education in the USA (Allenby et al. 2009). More details about IE principles, tools and its effectiveness compared with other approaches are provided elsewhere (Ayres and Ayres 2002).

5.2 Actions performed

On the basis of recommendations for the incorporation of SD into universities found in the Gothenburg recommendations on education for SD textbook (GMV 2008) and the analysis described above regarding successful examples of sustainability integration in top-performance universities, a series of actions have been performed to promote SD teaching through the introduction of Industrial Ecology in the Department of PME (Table 3).

Table 3 Actions performed for the integration of IE.

Action	Focus area	Aim
IE-related theses	Undergraduate students	Give undergraduate students the opportunity to work in depth with IE-related tools and principles.
IE-related graduate dissertations	Graduate students	Give graduate students the opportunity to work in depth with IE-related tools and principles and promote IE.
IE-related lectures	Undergraduate students	Introduction of SD and IE principles to undergraduate-related courses.
IE-work project	Undergraduate students	Give undergraduate students the opportunity to further expand their knowledge about IE.
Visit to industrial facilities	Undergraduate students	Give undergraduate students the opportunity to discuss with experienced engineers and visit real-time working environments.
IE-related research	Graduate students, industry	Further expand the knowledge about IE, publish prototype works and create synergies with industries.
Survey	Undergraduate students	Assessing the degree of knowledge of students regarding SD and IE-related issues.

A number of IE-related graduation theses were elaborated since 2007, which applied characteristic tools and/or concepts of IE such as life cycle assessment, sustainable consumption, and sustainability assessment methodologies.

Furthermore, a series of lectures were introduced in the fourth-year course of ‘Environmental Technology’ (ET), introducing IE principles and relevant examples. The lectures were combined with visits to industrial facilities to facilitate future synergies with industry.

Finally, a survey was performed to (a) assess the familiarity of the students with SD-related issues, (b) examine the feasibility of introducing an autonomous IE course and (c) find whether the IE-related activities that took place during the fourth-year course of ET had exerted any quantifiable results on the student's attitude towards IE. The survey was conducted using a questionnaire adopted from a similar study (Azapagic et al. 2005) and included questions regarding various environmental issues (e.g. climate change), legislation, policy and standards (e.g. Kyoto protocol), environmental tools and technologies (e.g. life cycle assessment) and general aspects of SD (e.g. social responsibility). The students could choose between ‘Not heard of’, ‘Heard of but could not explain’, ‘Have some knowledge’ and ‘Know a lot’, quantified through a scoring scale of 1–4, respectively. More specifically, a score of 1.00 corresponds to the answer ‘Not heard of’ anything regarding the specific topic, whereas a score of 4.00 corresponds to the answer ‘Know a lot’ about this specific topic. Furthermore, three more questions were added, relating to the contribution of the existing ET course to the comprehension of various environmental issues and the willingness of students to undertake an extra SD-related course (e.g. IE). A total number of 221 questionnaires were answered anonymously (142 and 79 male and female students, respectively).

5.3 Results from SD integration actions

5.3.1 Survey results

Table 4 summarises the score distribution according to gender and study year, whereas Table 5 summarises the results of the survey according to various categories and topics.

Table 4 Score distribution according to gender and study year.

	Male		Female		Total
Study year	No. of students	Average score	No. of students	Average score	No. of students	Average score
1	33	2.15	14	2.20	47	2.18
2	23	2.21	11	2.38	34	2.29
3	23	2.21	13	2.13	36	2.17
4	23	2.44	11	2.44	34	2.44
5+	40	2.23	30	2.32	70	2.27
Total	142	2.25	79	2.30	221	2.27
Note: Italics indicate the performance of the fourth-year students which was the highest according to the survey performed.

Table 5 Knowledge assessment of the participants of the survey for various categories and topics.

Assessment category	Average score	Best-known topics for every category	Average score	Least-known topics for every category	Average score
Environmental issues	2.79
		Global warming	3.39	Salinity	1.76
		Climate change	3.26	Particulate matter	1.91
		Acid rain	3.26	Photochemical smog	1.99
SD	2.21
		Population growth	2.79	Inter- and intra-generational equity	1.67
		Social responsibility	2.62	Stakeholders' participation	1.81
		Connection between poverty, population, consumption and the degradation of the environment	2.55	Components of SD	1.96
Environmental tools, technologies and approaches	2.17
		Renewable energy technologies	2.99	Tradable permits	1.70
		Waste minimisation	2.61	Fuel cells	1.77
		Life cycle assessment	2.23	Product stewardship	2.00
Environmental legislation, policy and standards	1.67
		Kyoto protocol	2.11	EMAS	1.24
		Copenhagen summit, 2009	1.87	Rio declaration	1.44
		The Florence convention	1.83	Johannesburg summit	1.50
All categories	2.27
Notes: 1, not heard of; 2, heard of but could not explain; 3, have some knowledge and 4, know a lot.

Several results could be drawn from the following survey:

Figure 3 Importance of SD according to the students' opinion (1, not important; 2, possibly important; 3, important and 4, very important).

Figure 4 Assessment of the contribution of the ‘ET’ course and the analysis of the potential of introducing an SD-related course.

1.	No great differences were observed between male and female students (2.25/4 and 2.30/4, respectively).
2.	The overall level of knowledge for all categories and topics related to SD issues was not very satisfactory (average score 2.27/4).
3.	The most well-known topics were those related to ‘environmental issues’ (average score 2.79/4), whereas the least-known topics were those related to ‘legislation, Policy and Standards’ (average score 1.67/4).
4.	The results were in accordance with a similar worldwide survey (Azapagic et al. 2005) that gave an average score of 2.23, a score of 2.78 for ‘environmental issues’ and a score of 1.53 for ‘environmental legislation’.
5.	Fourth-year students exhibited the best performance (average score 2.44/4) indicating that the IE-related activities performed for incorporating IE as an enhancement tool for teaching SD had a noticeable impact on the performance of students (see Table 4, italics).
6.	Most students answered that SD is important for them, either personally or as engineers, for their country and the society worldwide but most importantly for the future generations. Those results are shown in Figure 3 and support the hypothesis that actions for the promotion of SD in the department will be probably supported by the students.
7.	The apprehension of SD topics was substantially supported by the IE-related activities that were incorporated in the existing ET course (Figure 4). More than three out of four students stated that the ET course contributed to the sensitisation and apprehension of the examined topics, respectively.
8.	Three out of four students (74%) are positive for an extra SD-related course (Figure 4). The rest of the students based their rejection on the theoretical nature of the course, indicating that a future course should also focus on more practical issues.

5.3.2 Benefits and shortcoming of the approach

The survey indicated that IE-related activities positively influenced the understanding of SD principles of the undergraduate students. In addition, three out of four students would welcome an extra sustainability-related course, whereas most of them believe that sustainability is important. Personal communication with students who had conducted an IE-related diploma thesis showed that they were satisfied with the content of their thesis and many of them applied for a graduate programme related to sustainability. Moreover, those initiatives increased the percentage of sustainability-related theses conducted in the department. Visits to industrial facilities on the other hand gave undergraduate students the opportunity to discuss with experienced engineers and helped the development of synergies with industries. Moreover, the IE doctoral dissertations being in progress promote SD-related research.

So far, the results presented mainly focused on the benefits of the approach used. However, some shortcomings were also observed and should be mentioned.

An attempt was made for the results of the survey to be as reliable as possible. Yet, some of the questionnaires did not cover an adequate quality level (e.g. same scores in every category and many unanswered questions) and in that aspect a filtering procedure had to be performed and those questionnaires were not taken into account.

Another shortcoming of the approach was that not a great number of students participated in the IE-related activities. Because the course, the work project and the field trips were non-mandatory, a certain number of students have not come in contact with SD and IE issues at all. The most important drawback of this approach, however, was that the actions described in the methodology were performed by an individual professor and were not under a general sustainability strategy of the department.

5.3.3 Lessons to be learnt

The key findings for the promotion and the efficient incorporation of SD through actions related to IE are presented below:

•	IE principles were incorporated within the content of an existing course, and the feedback was hopeful, indicating that introducing SD modules into existing courses could promote the incorporation of SD in an engineering department.
•	Students consider that sustainability issues are important and a SD-related course should be oriented towards case studies (like Eco-Industrial Parks and Design for Environment), practical problem solution through software applications and should not be based on theoretical issues.
•	Developing synergies with industries, municipalities and universities could increase the quality and innovation of the studies, because in most IE research works raw data from industries or municipalities are essential and the necessary expert opinion can usually be found in academic institutions.
•	Site visits to industrial facilities worked mostly as an inspirational factor for the students and as an opportunity to develop synergies.
•	Graduate students found it difficult to master IE and sustainability tools in the beginning, due to lack of basic knowledge and the variety of IE tools and principles. Thus, an introductory period is deemed necessary to become familiar with the subject.

These lessons could be useful to universities that are also in the initial steps of developing a sustainability integration strategy. In a relative study, skills training workshops aligned with sustainability and live projects in collaboration with industry were also the two key factors for the efficient incorporation of SD skills (Grierson and Hyland 2010).

It is clear that all the above refer to pilot actions and should be cautiously adopted due to expected differentiations among institutions. For a deeper implementation of a SD strategy, respective actions from highly recognised universities are available (Kamp 2006). Additionally, general frameworks for current practices and future developments for embedding SD in higher education are also available (e.g. HEA 2006).

6. Conclusions

This work provides some initial information concerning the incorporation of sustainability principles in engineering universities in Greece. As far as the authors are aware of, data and literature dealing with similar issues from Greece are not available. It should be noted, however, that only the course content, the department curriculum and website were analysed and, therefore, this work is an introductory assessment of the incorporation of SD principles to engineering universities in Greece. The key findings of this study are summarised below:

•	A percentage of 2 and 3.2 of undergraduate and graduate courses, respectively, in engineering universities in Greece, was found to be related with SD issues according to the criteria set.
•	Most of these courses were primarily related to environmental issues, whereas the other aspects of sustainability (economical and social) were barely integrated into the courses.
•	Benchmarking the Greek experience with successful examples from universities worldwide indicated the potential measures that should be taken to incorporate SD principles into the engineering universities in Greece.
•	The necessity for interdisciplinary scientific approach and cooperation with industries, municipalities and universities were some of the indicative factors affecting the efficient incorporation of IE tools in engineering courses.
•	Survey results indicated that the overall level of knowledge for SD issues was not very satisfactory. However, implementation of IE-related actions exerted a noticeable effect on students with regard to their enthusiasm for sustainability issues and their understanding of SD principles.

The authors are planning to further update this study through the continuous implementation of IE actions described above and by communicating the results. The findings of this work are expected to be useful for engineering departments that are taking their initial steps for the integration of a SD strategy.