Our story
We founded the Except Academy after 20 years of working hands-on in creating systemic change in society towards a sustainable future.
The Academy focuses on courses for engaged individuals and professionals, using systems thinking and integrated sustainable development practices.
Who we are
Except Integrated Sustainability was founded in 1999, and works on realizing systemic change in society. Its project work is at except.eco. The Except Academy was launched in 2019, and offers courses that share our experience, methods, and core sustainability knowledge.
Most sustainability work is about minimizing impact, and carbon savings, small adjustments and circularity are all worth doing. On their own they do not add up to a society anyone would want to live in, so the courses start from the whole system.
Our approach and experience is captured in the Symbiosis in Development framework, which we publish open source and teach with. More on SiD at ThinkSiD.org.
The work it comes out of
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Heineken, a vision, strategy and roadmap to fully circular and energy-neutral operations
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IKEA, the paper supply chain behind the print industry
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Salesforce Park in San Francisco, an ecological rooftop park over a transit centre
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Utrecht Community, the Dutch centre for sustainable entrepreneurship, where the Academy sits
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Starprint Vietnam, sustainable packaging in Asia
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Orchid City, a framework for regenerative cities
Those are six of about seven hundred projects since 1999. The rest are at except.eco.
"Except creates magic with a flexible and complementary team of experts in different fields."
Matthieu LeroySustainability Innovation, Inter IKEA Systems B.V.