Corporate Ethics and Sustainability

This article discusses the importance of corporate ethics and sustainability in the business world. It includes a case study on ethical issues faced by Energy Australia and mitigation strategies to prevent such scandals. The article also highlights the role of environmental ethics and a code of conduct for ethics in protecting the environment.

Running head: CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
Corporate Ethics and Sustainability
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

1
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Discussion..................................................................................................................................2
Case study on Ethical issues......................................................................................................2
Mitigation strategies...................................................................................................................5
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................7
Reference....................................................................................................................................8

2
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
Introduction
Business ethics is related not only to the fact that whether a business organisation is
treating its clients transparently or whether the company is doing business with honesty.
Ethics means giving equal respect to various environmental factors also in the modern days
environmental pollution become a major cause of concern for the world and the corporate
bodies should also maintain ethical norms regarding various environmental issues. The
ethical factors include giving proper attention regarding the fact that whether the operation
process of the business causes any major damage to the environment. In the business world
the ethical behaviour consists of the factors of maintaining ethical standard for protecting the
environment which is also a main stakeholder of the organisation.
Discussion
Environmental issues have become a major problem in the business world and some
of the big company in Australia become solely responsible for the cause of environmental
pollution .energy Australia one of the leading energy supplier in Australia is solely
responsible for carbon emission in the air, the company make emission of 20810266 tonnes
of Co2 in the environment that pollute the air of Australia massively.
Case study on Ethical issues
Almost 70% of the electricity is supplied by the company Energy Australia. In
Australia the demand of electricity is high for which the company has to produce more
energy and that become one of the major reasons for the breach of the limit of emission of
carbon di oxide in the environment. The national pollution inventory has recently measured
that almost 279.67 million kg of carbon di oxide is emitted from the factories of Energy
Australia and that contribute to about 13% of the Australia’s total carbon emission.

3
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
The companies for increasing their profit earning capacity started to produce more
electricity which causes harm to the environment and for that reason the percentage of air
pollution has increased over the years. Energy Australia is not following any ethical standard
which regulates that the manufacturing companies cannot emit carbon di oxide in the air up
to a certain limit and they should stop their production process if that limit exceeds (Kemper
and Martin 2017).
Energy Australia has 5 power station in Australia and one oil gas extraction facility in
addition to these power stations the company is acquiring two new power station in Portland
area of new south wales and another in Wallerawang which will further increase their carbon
emission percentage in the air. This excessive production of energy causes major effect in the
environment and also creates effect on the health of the common people of Australia (Ugalde
et al 2018).
In the Latrobe valley, where the main power station of Energy Australia is located, the
air pollution rate has increased significantly by 25% which is the main reason of the
occurrence of several health issues in the life of the people residing in that area.
The company’s Yallourn coal filed power station is the second largest emitter of toxic
hydrochloric acid in the air which causes major damage in the environment and responsible
for the occurrence of many critical health issues for human beings. The emission of carbon di
oxide in the air effects the biodiversity of Australia and the climatic condition also changes
with such massive air pollution (Marshall 2016).
The Australian government in response to these has issued some ethical guidelines for
the organisations so that they can bring a control in the level of pollution in the environment.
Energy Australia does not respond to such ethical guidelines and continue to increase the

4
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
emission of more carbon in the air and that become a major issue in Australia as the level of
air pollution increases continuously (Odera Scott and Gow 2016).
Environmental ethics
With response to the current situation environmental ethics plays vital role in bringing
control in the rate of pollution in the environment. In modern days sustainable growth is the
main objective of the organisations. The sustainable growth means that the organisations
should give emphasis on the growth of the environment along with the financial growth of
the organisations. The environmental ethics provides that as the environment is one of the
major stakeholders for the organisation and the organisation is taking benefit from the
environment it is the responsibility of the organisations to give equal benefit back to the
environment (Prajogo 2016).
To bring more transparency among the activities of the organisation some code of
ethic and professional conduct has been introduced which will provide guidance to the
organisations. There certain compliances which the organisations have to follow while
carrying on their operations, some of the guidelines are stated below:
 Promote the integrity of the natural environment and protection of the health of
human beings and to ensure the safety of the future generation (Chen et al 2016).
 Giving values to the protection of the environment and the mitigation of
environmental disaster on the basis of scientific and technical methods.
 The organisations have to undertake environmental practices as per the principles of
the environmental laws and regulations, the organisations have to be sustainable in
nature, with the objective to not to damage the environment and take appropriate steps
in protection of the environment.

5
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
The ethics that the organisations should follow to ensure environment protection are
 The organisations should be honest and trustworthy in their activities and they should
operate with more care and give more importance in the protection of the
environment. The organisations should not breach the guidelines that are specified by
the EIANZ (environment institute of Australia and New Zealand).
 The organisation should give value to the environmental factors and should maintain
confidentiality and privacy.
 The organisations should set an objective in their environmental protection policy and
they should maintain all the quality assurance of work which are applicable for the
protection of the environment (Knight 2019).
The code of ethics and professional conduct for the protection of environment
 The council from time to time amend their code of ethics that are made for the
protection of the environment and such code off ethics shall be binding on all the
members.
 On the violation of the code of ethics the organisations shall be liable for severe
penalty. The code contains all the provisions and guidelines that are essential for the
protection of the environment (Morrison Wilmshurst and Shimeld 2018).
The basic objective of the EIANZ are:
 To promote the interaction among the organisations and various environment
protection organisations.
 To increase awareness among the organisations about environmental issues and to
provide knowledge regarding the prevention of the environment protection.

6
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
 To ensure that advanced and effective ethical practices that will protect the
environment.
Mitigation strategies
In order to eradicate the problems of ethical issues there are several mitigation
strategies available by using these strategies the occurrence of such big scandals can be
prevented.
Some of the major strategies are stated below
Promoting the values and lead by example
Ethical practices can be implemented by promoting the values of the organisation
through leadership qualities of individuals. The values of the organisation can be promoted
by setting some examples by the top management. Generally, the words like honesty and
integrity are only written and are not applied in practical, as it happened with the energy
Australia. In the bank’s code of conduct all the points are stated but in the real time these
theories are not applied as there is no one to set a benchmark for the application of the
theories in to the practical world. The management of the Energy Australia neglected to set
any example from which it can be possible to implement honest and transparent activity
(Santos 2017).
Ethical training
The ethical rules and regulations can be easily implemented among the employees of
the company through ethical training. If the employees are well trained and provided with
adequate knowledge about the ethical issues that should be maintained in every department of
the organisation then it may be possible to prevent the occurrence of environmental scandals.

7
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
Another benefit of the training programme is that the employees will get awareness
about the unethical practices of the organisation and can take actions if they found that any
unethical behaviour is practiced within the organisation (Grimm 2019).
Whistleblowing system
The role of the whistle-blower is to inform the top management about any misconduct
in the organisation. The absence of a whistle-blower is the main reason for the occurrence of
environmental pollution in Australia. If Energy Australia appoints a whistle-blower then the
occurrence of such activity can be avoided and the report of the whistle blower will give a
signal to the management that some unethical practice is happening within the organisation
(Pour Webley and Cook 2018).
Effective communication system
An effective communication system within the organisation can help to mitigate the
effect of unethical practices. An effective communication system will bring more
transparency in the activities of the organisation and all the employees from the board
members to the subordinates will have information about all the activities that are happening
within the organisation (Block Van Poeck and Östman 2019).
Conclusion
From the above discussion it can be concluded that ethical issues in relation to the
environment have become a major problem for the organisations and it is essential to
maintain a code of ethics in order to prevent the occurrence of fraudulent activities like the
environmental scandals made by the Energy Australia. Ethical behaviours ensure that all the
activities of an organisation are done transparently and with honesty and the protection of the
interest of the environment are given the highest priority. With the increase in the number of

8
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
environmental scandals the need of a strict code of conduct for ethics has been realised by
most of the organisations in the world.

9
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
Reference
Block, T., Van Poeck, K. and Östman, L., 2019. Tackling wicked problems in teaching and learning.
Sustainability issues as knowledge, ethical and political challenges. In Sustainable Development
Teaching: Ethical and Political Challenges (pp. 28-39). Routledge.
Chen, L., Li, F., Zhang, Y., Bentley, C.L., Horne, M., Bond, A.M. and Zhang, J., 2017. Electrochemical
reduction of carbon dioxide in a monoethanolamine capture medium. ChemSusChem, 10(20),
pp.4109-4118.
Grimm, G., 2019. The Need for a Culture of Sustainable Agricultural Ethics & Practices as a
Response to Biocultural Homogenization, Food Security, & Environmental Degradation.
Kemper, A. and Martin, R., 2017. Carbon capture: the rise of the influence of Australia and Canada on
climate negotiations. International Journal of Innovation and Sustainable Development, 11(4), pp.336-
354.
Knight, A.R., 2019. How can the social sciences work with ecology in informing feral horse policy and
management in south‐eastern Australia?. Ecological management & restoration, 20(1), pp.9-12.
Marshall, J.P., 2016. Disordering fantasies of coal and technology: Carbon capture and storage in
Australia. Energy Policy, 99, pp.288-298.
Morrison, L., Wilmshurst, T. and Shimeld, S., 2018. Environmental reporting through an ethical
looking glass. Journal of Business Ethics, 150(4), pp.903-918.
Odera, O., Scott, A.H. and Gow, J., 2016. Factors influencing corporate social and environmental
disclosures: a systematic review. International Journal of Business Governance and Ethics, 11(2),
pp.116-134.
Pour, N., Webley, P.A. and Cook, P.J., 2018. Potential for using municipal solid waste as a resource
for bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS). International Journal of Greenhouse Gas
Control, 68, pp.1-15.
Prajogo, D.I., 2016. The strategic fit between innovation strategies and business environment in
delivering business performance. International Journal of Production Economics, 171, pp.241-249.

10
CORPORATE ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY
Santos, A.A.R., 2017. Application of membrane gas separation processes to CO2 and H2 recovery
from steelmaking gases for carbon capture and use (Doctoral dissertation, Université de Lorraine).
Ugalde, S.C., Preston, J., Ogier, E. and Crawford, C., 2018. Analysis of farm management strategies
following herpesvirus (OsHV-1) disease outbreaks in Pacific oysters in Tasmania,
Australia. Aquaculture, 495, pp.179-186.