Leveraging the Federal Government's Buying Power to Mitigate Climate Change

Abstract

As global temperatures continue to rise, this brief article focuses on the evolution of sustainable public procurement (primarily in the United States federal or central government marketplace).

Among other things, the article introduces expanding efforts by the National Contract Management Association (NCMA) and its community of practice (COP) to raise awareness of the procurement profession's and community's role in adapting to and mitigating climate change, support knowledge sharing about existing work in this area, provide resources and training to contracting professionals, and integrate sustainability into contracting professional standards. Ultimately, what procurement officials buy, how they buy, and who they buy from can drive large shifts in the behavior of industry and consumers.

The article asserts that the federal acquisition community needs to rapidly learn, embrace, and champion sustainable procurement practices. At the same time, nothing in the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) prohibits the acquisition community from learning, thinking about, experimenting with, and sharing experiences; nor does it impede acquisition professionals from integrating sustainability considerations into requirements generation, acquisition planning, solicitation development, incentive design, contract negotiation, and contract management.

Keywords: Government contracts, public procurement, sustainable procurement, value for money, life cycle cost analysis, professional development

JEL Classification: H42, H57, K12, K23, L33, Q56, Q58