Arizona State University’s Sustainable Purchasing Research Initiative (SPRI) is collaborating with the United States Environmental Protection Agency to launch a website that makes it easier for companies looking to make environmentally conscious purchases.

Sustainablepurchasing.issuelab.org is a searchable database that contains a trove of information on research articles that discuss “servicing,” a popular sustainability concept that has received a stamp of approval from the United Nations Environmental Programme.

The concept of servicing is simply a new, eco-friendly approach in which customers are “charged for the function of a product rather than the product itself.” The goal is to make consumers “pay to be users of the product.” Servicing has been shown to have a host of benefits, among which are cost reduction and less waste sent to landfills. Nicole Darnall, co-founder of the SPRI and a senior sustainability scholar in the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability, said: “The EPA partnership expands SPRI’s reach in an important way by highlighting the importance of service models as a means for organizations to advance sustainable purchasing.”

A research initiative within ASU’s Center for Organization Research and Design, the SPRI “conducts transdisciplinary research to understand why and discover solutions to sustainable purchasing barriers.” The website is yet another example of the actionable research insights the SPRI presents as it strives to advance eco-friendly purchasing.