Is your facility prepared to maintain its environmental compliance throughout the year?  Many manufacturing companies are struggling with ways to cost costs while still producing a high quality product and meeting the needs of their employees. One area that tends to be continually looked at from a cost-savings perspective is environmental, health and safety (EH&S). Often times, it is common for facilities to cut EH&S costs to save on overall operating expenses with the hope they will not be caught by a regulatory agency.

While there may be some savings in cutting corners, the risks far outweigh the rewards. If a facility is caught ignoring environmental regulations, potential fines and penalties would exceed the cost of maintaining compliance. Not to mention, there is the potential of possible jail time for more egregious acts of non-compliance.

According to the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM), Indiana State law authorizes fines up to $25,000 per day per violation. Although most fines are less than this, the amount of the fine depends on the magnitude of the violation, potential harm to human health and the environment, economic benefit gained by the violator by not complying and violator's efforts to achieve compliance.

If a facility decides to “get by” for a while and then when there is an upturn in the economy, go back to normal operations, this could put a target on the facility’s back. If compliance actions are not being conducted on a routine basis and then all of a sudden reports are submitted and permits are acquired, it could put that facility on the radar of the enforcement officers. This could lead to discovery of non-compliance and the levying of fines.

There also is the reality that state governments are looking for funding themselves. Where is one area they can get some funding?  The states can take enforcement action. By maintaining compliance you completely remove the possibility of enforcement action and having to pay hefty fines.

According to the International Network for Environmental Compliance and Enforcement (INECE), there are benefits from maintaining compliance. Compliance creates both “public value” and “private value.” Public value is created through environmental compliance by promoting rule of law, ensuring fairness of environmental requirements and protecting goods, services and public health. Private value is created when there is an increase in investor confidence by reducing business risk, stimulation of innovation and new job creation.

The Environmental Compliance Assurance Program (eCAP^®) provided by August Mack is ideally suited to help a facility achieve and/or maintain environmental compliance in today’s economy. eCAP^® outsources a facility’s EH&S administrative duties to a team of experts for a fixed monthly fee. The program can save a manufacturing facility more than $100,000 per year in implementation and administrative costs. eCAP^® ensures a consistent, reproducible environmental management system that can be tracked and reviewed by management and/or corporate personnel on a real-time basis. There also is reduced risk associated with non-compliance. eCAP^® provides assurance of compliance with new and changing regulations. Through the use of eCAP^®, a facility can maintain institutional knowledge even during EH&S personnel changes.

Maintaining environmental compliance can be tricky, but given the right circumstances, outsourcing a facility’s environmental management can be a cost saving measure. If done correctly, maintaining environmental compliance can be beneficial to your facility, the environment and the public.