Case Study - Corporate Obstacles to Pollution Prevention
Overview
This case focuses on corporate obstacles to pollution prevention. Pollution prevention can complex especially for large corporations. There are many different forms of pollution prevention including emissions control devices and incremental changes in existing technology. The author reviews the impact of emissions controlled devices, however the focus of the case study is on incremental changes in existing technology. Incremental changes include substituting one or two steps in a production process or relationship changes between production steps. One example of incremental changes that was provided by the author was eliminating chlorofluorocarbons and saving energy by replacing a refrigeration process with a heath exchanger that can exploit waste cooling from another part of the process. There are three critical decision-making stages for incremental changes; identifying a pollution prevention opportunity, finding a solution appropriate to that opportunity, and implementing that solution. The author discusses the three aspects of an organization (culture, ability to process information, and its politics) and how they impact the decision-making stages.
Culture can affect an organizations pollution prevention in a number of different ways. First, organizations can make a cultural assumption that knowledge cannot be built based on hands-on experience. Also, corporations use committees or "SWAT" teams and due to their limited knowledge of the production processes they typically conclude that there are no preventative opportunities.
Politics can also prove to be an obstacle to pollution prevention. When the environmental manager develops a solution, it requires the engineers and operators to work together. Engineers are often younger and lack the advanced interpersonal skills needed to solicit and obtain help from operators. Operators are older and generally do not relay possible improvements to the engineers.
The following will discuss the problem, stakeholders, solution and implementation.
Statement of the problem
The problem with pollution prevention is that it requires people to understand more than the intimate details of the production process; they must also understand the technical possibilities. Many corporations have environmental managers, which are generally responsible for helping corporations comply with the law. According to the case study, the work of environmental managers often expose them to many pollution prevention solutions, but they often have trouble getting access to production areas. Production often sees Environmental Managers as "the compliance police".
Stakeholders
The stakeholders in this case study include the corporation, the community and the countryside.
Air pollution is an ongoing and serious problem. From Mexico to Argentina, pollutants in the air have reached dangerous levels, with implications for both public health and the planet’s changing climate (Maxwell). There are many solutions that can be used; there are international standards that can be adopted in Latin America, clean transportation and energy generation technologies. If those who govern the countries within Latin America work to get their countries off of dirty fossil fuels, the skies will clear up and their people will breath freely. For example, “the Chilean Environmental Superintend has taken significant steps against big polluters, forty-nine sanction proceedings are underway this year, with only one acquittal. The firms in question are required to invest time and money in fo...
The U.S. has approximately 119,000 companies involved in the environmental technologies and services industry, which is a $782 billion market. Also, firms must offset new or additional emissions with emission reductions by a 5-to-1 ratio. This means any firm who increases their emissions output in one area by one ton must reduce their emissions output in another area by 5 tons (McKee, 1991). Finally, new emissions producing companies will have to start up with state-of-the-art equipment.
A predominant driver of our country’s economy is that increases in technological innovation lead to improved standards of living. Despite these economic benefits, some technology creates pollution,
Greetings, and thank you for reading this letter. Pollution is something that is gradually destroying our planet. It is responsible for about 6.7% of deaths worldwide. There are many forms of pollution, including; hazardous spills in important bodies of water, household dumping and littering, the release of greenhouse gasses, and most importantly, smog. Smog is extremely harmful for humans to breathe, along with animals and nature. This poisonous gas is a heavy combination of fog or haze with smoke and other atmospheric pollutants. The main contribution of smog is factories and powerplants. This letter will be addressing the result of smog and pollution and what your corporation can do to help reduce it.
Industries release toxic pollutants into the air, soil and water. As we develop, out demands and needs also increase, which opens door for more factories and businesses. The problem is not how many factories are built or how much of the earth’s resource we used, it is how we use it. We immediately need to take action on how balance and change our ways of living relation to the environment. All factories around the world should be required to recycle and to dispose hazardous wastes in a manner that would not pollute any water source, soil or the air. The EPA has been passing many laws in order to minimize the global changes due to pollutions. But these laws should apply to all the other countries too. The waste factories in Asia or Africa release affect all of the world, so all nations need to take immediate action. If no actions are taken, air, water and soil pollution will lead to extinction of all types of
First, there is a ‘command and control’ approach which the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sets a pollution level through a standards approach and there will be a punishment or penalize if polluters do not meet the level of pollution controlled that is already regulated. Besides, EPA also sets a requirement on technology that manufactures use for production in order to control the pollution, called “Best Available Technology (BAT)”. In this context, polluters are required by law to install BAT to control pollution. However, this approach could not deliver the efficient level or cost effectiveness of pollution controlled because when every business whether small or big business installs BAT, it would impose high MCC for small businesses and low MCC for big businesses. Thus, it will create inequity between small and big
Although Maniates labels the “A” in IWAC as “meaningful consumption Alternatives,” his thoughts on the matter refer more to the institutional influences on product development. In Woodhouse’s words, “The public’s failure to embrace sustainable technologies has more to do with institutional structures that restrict the aggressive development and wide dissemination of sustainable technologies than with errant consumer choice” (48). Instead of attributing the lack of environmentally friendly products to happenstance, Maniates claims that there are production-side structural aspects which hinder the development of green products. Woodhouse mirrors Maniates in this aspect by recognizing the influences on engineers to overlook environmental concerns. “Neither law nor professional norms make [sustainable] design tasks a required aspect of most engineers’ responsibilities, and most employers place substantial obstacles in the way of engineers taking those design elements farther than law and market competition require” (27). By and large, companies are driven by the desire to maximize profit above all else, and from the perspective of employers, adding in environmental concerns is merely an additional constraint on potential profit margins. If engineering ethics and government regulations are sufficiently detailed on sustainability, then employers
Throughout the world pollution is happening all the time due to the society managing to keep on living and improving. According to the most prominent
The larger a company becomes, the larger their global footprint. IBM recognized that they were susceptible to devastating the environment with both their manufacturing and services. In order to become environmentally sustainable and remain an environmental leader, they developed the Global Environmental Management System in 1971 which identified impact projections. Some of the major sources that attributed to environmental impact were the use of chemicals and water-intensive processes. IBM focused on a means to more efficiently manage these processes, from storage, use and disposal. Furthermore, they went on to create more eco-friendly products that could be recycled. The EMS policy focuses on employee well-being as well as resource conservation and creating products that have less of an impact on the environment. These responsibilities and expectations are seen on a company wide spectrum, where IBM employees have a commitment to environmental leadership. Training is provided to all employees, who are consistently being updated and certifying their compliance with IBM’s expectations.
Shown or hidden, indoors or outdoors, all around us, air pollution is becoming extremely dangerous. Doctor Thomas Scarborough, who specializes in allergies and immunology, claims that, “[t]he solutions fall into three main categories: controlling the source, ventilation, and air filtration” (1). As of today, the laws and regulations on air pollution not only affect humans, but multiple corporations seem to be suffering as well. Though corporations can suffer from these laws, they are still trying to find ways to improve the environment. In spite of the fact that air pollution laws are often helpful and may raise awareness, the benefits these laws have in the world are outweighed by the loss of profit companies are experiencing, the amount
Every day when looking out a window, people see a beautiful earth. The earth is intriguing, but hinges on a delicate balance. Many natural resources keep the grass green and the sky blue. Man has made quite an impression on our world, and has transformed the earth's resources into tools to make life easy. However, mans' manipulation on earth has become detrimental to the health of our planet and the safety of mankind. Through the use and production of resources such as oil and energy, man is gradually poisoning the earth. Pollution has become such a dilemma in society; there is no real control or a feasible solution to society's recklessness. Without complete change, our system will collapse. The earth will eventually retaliate with disaster, or corporate control of our economy will cause hysteria and depression. Evaluation of the consequences and repercussion of worldwide pollution, may give people a better idea of what the future holds.
Though some may argue, the biggest barriers of changing pollution and energy habits include cost and the general “fear of change (Paragraph 1 and 4).” Considering how tight money can be for some families and individuals, the costs of these implementations will be a huge concern for most people. It will cost a great deal of money in order to build the facilities such as windmills or solar power stations along with building recycling plants. Since this is a newer technology, it will be more expensive, but since the renewable energy sources require less maintenance and upkeep, they will basically pay for themselves within a few years compare to non-renewable sources. Also, instead of viewing it as an expense, it is best to view cost as an investment for the future wellbeing and success of the human species. Secondly, the “fear of change” comes from people who are afraid of what might happen with such dramatic changes. It will take time for people to get used to cars not running on gasoline or running their home on solar power, but like most scenarios, it just takes a small amount of time to become accustomed to such changes. Also, people may be concerned about job loss; considering that there are about 700,000 jobs in the coal industry, (Paragraph 1) most of those will
...sues with environmental concerns with mining and smelting, the economic issue is one of them that tops the list. Something needs to be done to drive the cost of environmental control equipment down. Should this be how the equipment is manufactured differently, made more efficiently, or created with lower cost material.
Pollution has been a nasty irritant since the day it was first introduced, thanks mainly to the industrial revolution. Due to the increase in the human population over the centuries, new technologies have improved the way of life, but at a cost. Pollution (whether air, water, soil or food) alongside deforestation has had adverse effects on human life. Pollution and deforestation has become one of the most ignored aspects of human nature. It’s become similar to the Loch Ness monster where have the world cares for it while the other, simply doesn’t. Thousands of trees are chopped everyday to pave way for human life. Fossil fuels, and ammonia are used everyday by factories and farmers respectively, contributing
...ir pollution is a very huge environmental issue that has such a large effect on all living organisms. There are a lot of simple things can people around the world can do to keep it a clean and safe place for everyone. I have very strong feelings because of the huge effect it has on things all over the world. Air pollution needs to be controlled so we can have a better earth to live in.