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Environmental Management System
DEVELOPING AN ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT SYSTEM FOR IMPROVED PUBLIC UTILITY PERFORMANCE
Andrew Kricun, P.E.
Deputy Executive Director
Camden County Municipal Utilities Authority
1645 Ferry Avenue
Camden, NJ 08101
and
Tom Pedersen
Camp Dresser & McKee Inc.
One Cambridge Place
Cambridge, MA 02139
ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
An EMS is defined by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) as "the part of the overall management system that includes organizational structure, planning activities, responsibilities, practices, procedures, processes and resources for developing, implementing, achieving, reviewing and maintaining the environmental policy." Environmental policy is defined as the "statement by the organization of its intentions and principles in relation to its overall environmental performance, which provides a framework for action and for the setting of environmental objectives and targets" (ISO, 1996). The ISO 14001 environmental management system standard is the most widely recognized EMS framework and to date, more than 12,000 entities have had their EMSs certified as conforming to ISO 14001. Some private corporations are now encouraging their suppliers to attain ISO 14001 certification as a means to improve the overall environmental performance of their value chains. Others like Ford Motor Company require suppliers to achieve third-party certification of their systems.
In addition to business drivers, regulatory agencies and professional organizations are fostering the adoption of EMSs. In 1999 the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) developed a draft action plan for promoting the use of EMSs (December 20, 1999) and more recently the USEPA Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation (OPEI) has actively encouraged development of EMSs by private and public entities to prevent pollution, improve environmental performance, and comply with regulatory requirements. The benefits of an EMS for government entities were recognized by then President Clinton, who on April 21, 2000 signed the Greening the Government through Leadership in Environmental Management. The National Biosolids Partnership, an alliance of the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies (AMSA), the Water Environment Federation (WEF) and the USEPA have also recognized the benefits of an EMS and are developing and implementing an EMS for biosolids, and an EMS blueprint to assist organizations developing an EMS (National Biosolids Partnership, Annual Report, February 2000).
The National Enforcement Investigations Center (NEIC), located in Denver, Colorado is the technical support center nationwide for USEPA enforcement and compliance assurance programs. NEIC supports the environmental enforcement community through expertise in field activities and engineering evaluations, forensic laboratory activities, information management, computer forensics, technical analysis and training, and in the courtroom. NEIC determined that the cause of noncompliance in a significant number of cases arose from an inadequate EMS. In response, NEIC developed key elements for a compliance-focused EMS (NEIC, 2000) and continues to provide national leadership in the area of EMS, both in negotiating EMS provisions for enforcement settlements and in promoting EMS understanding and use. The CCMUA developed their EMS in conformance with the 12 elements outlined in the NEIC EMS guide.
The CCMUA recognized that the NEIC EMS framework would allow for the systematic analysis and control of environmental impacts associated with their activities, products and services. The CCMUA further realized that NEIC EMS model, which is built on the Shewhart "plan-do-check-act" quality improvement cycle, would foster the sustained implementation of their system. The CCMUA EMS provides an organized, structured approach to managing environmental affairs. The system includes the staff, processes and principles that accomplish CCMUA's business objectives and environmental mission.
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