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Sustainability Working Group

How to Get Involved

If your organization is part of the book publishing ecosystem—whether you’re a publisher, printer, distributor, retailer, library, or system vendor—your contributions can help our sustainability efforts in the book industry. Participation is open to both BISG members and nonmembers.

  1. To join, e-mail info@bisg.org to express your interest and get on the mailing list for meeting invites, agendas, and other key communications.
  2. Attend working group meetings, which are one hour and held every other month. View the full schedule of Sustainability Working Group meetings here. 
  3. Engage in discussions, resource development, and programming based on you and your organization’s expertise and capacity.

By joining, your team will have a direct impact on amplifying sustainability in the book industry.

Resources

We're currently working on a curated list of valuable resources on this topic. Stay tuned for updates, and check back shortly! In the meantime, if you have a resource you'd like to recommend, please share it with us via this form.

BISG also features updates on sustainability in the book industry in our  weekly newsletter, Making Information Pay. Subscribe to stay up-to-date on the latest BISG and book industry news!

2026 Working Group Charter

Current State

The need for more sustainable practices is growing in the United States. Although other markets, including the United Kingdom and the European Union, are more advanced in their consideration of sustainability goals, the global nature of most businesses means that international trends are affecting US organizations. For the book industry—whose economic viability depends on natural resources such as paper, water, and energy—these trends have direct implications for long-term cost stability, supply-chain resilience, and risk management across the entire book publishing ecosystem. Simply put, environmental sustainability is key to economic sustainability.

Companies and nonprofit organizations have initiated sustainability efforts, some dating back to the mid-2000s. However, overall knowledge of the basic components of sustainability—the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), carbon footprints, and scope 1–3 emissions, as examples—remains limited in the US. More can be done to build awareness, educate, and foster action around sustainability in the US market.

The US market is challenged to make sense of sustainability in a global context. There is too much data and not enough actionable information related to reporting requirements, deadlines, and expectations for progress against multiple sustainability targets. A US focus could help the industry better understand and address the increasingly complex regulatory environment. Regulatory shifts—including tariffs and EUDR—continue to muddy the water, making it harder to focus on sustainability and thereby increasing operational risk.

In 2026, the US book industry is experiencing mounting pressure to understand and curtail environmental impacts as reflected in expanded reporting expectations. Sustainability discussions have become more grounded in specific challenges, such as fiber sourcing, manufacturing energy use, transportation emissions, and returns, indicating a shift from general awareness toward practical, data-driven understanding.

For the purposes of this working group, BISG defines a sustainable business as one that has a minimal negative impact—or potentially a positive effect—on the environment, society, or economy. BISG can serve the community by focusing on deliverables that make reporting as simple as possible and by working with the Green Book Alliance and other entities to understand and serve local and global needs. Sustainability for the book business would involve meeting or exceeding commitments to environmental stewardship as outlined in the UN’s SDGs.


Objectives

  1. Identify and address opportunities to create more uniform (standard) approaches to collecting and reporting data related to sustainability efforts

  2. Coordinate with other US and international sustainability efforts, building relationships within the group and across organizations

  3. Share information about work done to define and establish sustainability goals

  4. Link available resources, like the SDGs, to book publishing supply chain activities, advising US organizations on current and emerging requirements. Consider resources like the Publishers Compact as a way to engage companies and individuals.

  5. Inform the industry about the SDGs and other measures of sustainability

  6. Share information about critical metrics, such as CO2 equivalents, or the relative impact of physical and digital formats


Stakeholder Impact/Benefits

  1. Providing a forum in which multiple segments can discuss sustainability, as well as inform the community and provide a foundation for coordinated change.

  2. Creating a shared understanding of the work done to date, how it applies to book publishing, and where progress has been made (and who is making it) allows the industry to focus on opportunities—as well as issues and threats—that it can address through education, measurement, and adoption of best practices.

  3. Sustainability standards can increase transparency in reporting when they are deployed across the supply chain. In reporting progress against agreed-upon goals, the measures gain value when they use similar, interoperable frameworks.


Deliverables

  1. Identify and map  workflows for obtaining data around sourced materials.  

  2. Support the development, testing, and launch of a free carbon calculator for publishers in support of the Green Book Alliance. 

  3. Support graduate students from Portland State University’s Ooligan Press in their development and publication of a resource that highlights sustainable book design and production practices. 

  4. Collaborate with the Green Book Alliance and Supply Chain Committee to ensure delivery of educational programming at major industry events (London Book Fair, Frankfurt Book Fair, BISG and BMI annual meetings), with a focus on book industry sustainability challenges and global regulatory requirements.


Blockers

The current political climate is less favorable to sustainability efforts, particularly in the United States, where shifting federal and state priorities have created uncertainty around environmental regulations, reporting requirements, and enforcement. At the same time, international markets continue to advance sustainability expectations, creating misalignment between domestic and global requirements that complicates compliance for US-based organizations. In addition, external challenges such as tariffs may create headwinds that weaken interest in sustainability by increasing near-term cost pressures.

While the largest impact in determining carbon footprint comes from paper, printing, and shipping, participation in this working group reflects the experiences of companies from across the supply chain, including distributors and retailers. Representation in key areas needs to be maintained so that the working group can fully address relevant issues.