Karioja, Elina2025-09-242025-09-242013Buckingham, B. J. (1994). Weeding the library media center collections. Second edition. State of Iowa department education, 1-20. Ekokompassi. (2013). Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://www.ekokompassi.fi/. HelMet. (2013). What is HelMet? Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://www.helmet.fi/en-US/Info/What_is_HelMet. ISO. (2009). Environmental management. The ISO 14000 family of International Standards. Retrieved April 23, 2013 from: http://www.iso.org/iso/theiso14000family_2009.pdf. Karioja, E. (2013). Sustainability in libraries. A comparative study of ecological sustainability in IFLA WLIC 2012. Oulu University of Applied Sciences. Degree Programme in Library and Information Services. Bachelor´s thesis. Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-201305025876. McBane Mulford, S. & Himmel, N.A. (2010). How Green Is My Library?. Santa Barbara: Libraries Unlimited. Nicholson, S. (2004). A conceptual framework for the holistic measurement and cumulative evaluation of library services. Journal of Documentation 60(2). Available online at: http://bibliomining.com/nicholson/holisticfinal.html. Retrieved April 30,2013 Olsen, R. (2011). Green and Growing: The Impact of a LEED Library on an Organization’s Sustainable Practices. Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://conference.ifla.org/past/ifla77/109-olsen-en.pdf. Oulu University of Applied Sciences. (2012). Sustainable development at Oulu UAS. Retrieved April 4, 2013 from: http://oamk.fi/tietoa_oamkista/kestava_kehitys/sustainable_development/. Oulu University of Applied Sciences. (2013). Bachelor Programmes. Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://www.oamk.fi/english/exchange_opportunities/ects/curricula/bachelor/?page=oj_kuvaus&koodi1=K1114YY&kieli=EN&opas=2013-2014&lk=s2013&vuosi=13S14K. Oulu University of Applied Sciences Library. (2013). Vihreä kirjasto. Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://www.oamk.fi/kirjasto/tietoa_kirjastosta/vihrea_kirjasto/. Sahavirta, H. (2011). Showing the Green Way - Advocating green values and mage in the Vallila Library: Helsinki, Finland. Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://conference.ifla.org/past/ifla77/109-sahavirta-en.pdf. Tomlinson, B. (2010). Greening Through It : Information Technology for Environmental Sustainability. Cambridge: MIT Press. Vallila library. (2013). Vallila library – Green library. Retrieved May 21, 2013 from: http://www.helmet.fi/en-US/Libraries_and_services/Vallila_Library/Whats_going_on/Vallila_Library__Green_Library(1983). WWF Finland. (2013). What is Green Office?. Retrieved May 22, 2013 from: http://wwf.fi/en/our-earth/green-office/.https://repository.ifla.org/handle/20.500.14598/5074This paper originated from conclusions I wrote down in doing my thesis about sustainability in libraries. At first it is necessary to understand library’s recycling role in society and its sustainable development in basic functions like borrowing and returning books or offering open and free space to the public. Environmental certifications like LEED or environmental management systems (ISO 14000) are not fully compatible with libraries and they lack the understanding of special features of libraries. Oulu University of Applied Sciences is planning a project in order to meet this need and creating an evaluation model and indicators of sustainable development for libraries. Sustainable areas taken into consideration in evaluating library’s sustainability could be space, green IT, strategies, collection management, location and environmental awareness of both public and staff. It is also noteworthy to consider different levels of analysis: users, library staff, decision makers and host organization. Users should be offered recycling points for books and waste, staff should be committed to sustainability and communicate their awareness. Library strategies should include a sustainable point of view. It is noteworthy that the library is often a part of a large organization in a municipality, town or school, college, university etc. If the host organization has an environmental management system, library is most likely a part of that. In cases where there is no environmental policy in a host organization, it is much more difficult to follow one. Sustainability needs commitment from every person in the organization. As a result of this project, a specific libraries’ environmental label and auditing system could be developed which would increase environmental awareness among staff and customers and would make libraries greener, more sustainable, which is the ultimate objective. One can optimistically state that this model could be used worldwide and this project made international from the very beginning.enAttribution 3.0 Unportedhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/Articlehttp://2013.ifla.orgopen accessSustainable developmentlibrariesevaluationindicators