Integrating total quality principles into an environmental training program

To effectively comply with pressing environmental regulations, Northrop Aircraft Division needed to quickly train 5,000 employees to handle and dispose of hazardous waste properly. To accomplish this environmental cultural change process, Northrop decided to incorporate the principles of another culture change being effected within the company—that of Total Quality Management. The necessary information was delivered to thousands of workers in a limited amount of time through a new Focal Point training program, the effectiveness of which was demonstrated by marked improvement in inspection reports.     

Materials innovation—key to economic survival

For years now, there has been a growing consensus that US national economic problems, such as inflation and industry down-turn, are closely linked to innovation and technology; and there has been growing concern that US capability in both these areas has been steadily declining, particularly the propensity for innovation. Accordingly, the sixth Henniker National Materials Conference (held in Henniker, New Hampshire, 28 July–1 August, 1980) was designed to face the problem of innovation in the materials field.     

Integrating product quality and environmental performance through innovation—the l'oréal case

Meeting the demands of today's marketplace has become an increasingly complex challenge for corporations in all industries. The consumer is demanding high-quality products, low cost, and more recently, a new variable: environmental performance. Customers will not accept sacrifices in quality or cost to help businesses meet regulatory requirements or develop environmentally sound products. They want it all. Consequently, companies are faced with the complex task of balancing cost, quality, and environmental performance.     

Municipal solid waste production and composition in Finland—Changes in the period 1960–2002 and prospects until 2020

Waste reduction was recognised as the main goal of waste management policy in the EU in the 1990s. Although knowledge of past waste generation is essential for effective waste reduction policy there are no comprehensive statistics on the past development of municipal solid waste (MSW) production. MSW management is currently under turmoil in many EU countries as the requirements of the EC landfill directive (1999/31/EC) are set into force. In this study, the production and composition of MSW in Finland between 1960 and 2002 is presented using historical data. The impact of population, affluence and technology on MSW production are analysed using the IPAT equation and three scenarios are constructed until year 2020. The results are compared with national future targets on MSW production. Production of MSW increased in Finland until 1990, declined to year 1997, increased to 2000 and then declined again. The share of organic and plastic waste increased over the study period while the share of paper and cardboard declined. The results suggest that so far national targets on MSW reduction have been set fairly low. Moreover, our scenarios depict a wide range of future MSW production, even though the time horizon is not longer than 15 years into the future. In order to narrow this range, continuous improvement of the statistics of MSW is essential.     

Trace element chemistry in residual-treated soil: key concepts and metal bioavailability

Trace element solubility and availability in land-applied residuals is governed by fundamental chemical reactions between metal constituents, soil, and residual components. Iron, aluminum, and manganese oxides; organic matter; and phosphates, carbonates, and sulfides are important sinks for trace elements in soil-residual systems. The pH of the soil-residual system is often the most important chemical property governing trace element sorption, precipitation, solubility, and availability. Trace element phytoavailability in residual-treated soils is often estimated using soil extraction methods. However, spectroscopic studies show that sequential extraction methods may not be accurate in perturbed soil-residual systems. Plant bioassay is the best method to measure the effect of residuals on phytoavailability. Key concepts used to describe phytoavailability are (i) the salt effect, (ii) the plateau effect, and (iii) the soil-plant barrier. Metal availability in soil from metal-salt addition is greater than availability in soil from addition of metal-containing residuals. Plant metal content displays plateaus at high residual loadings corresponding to the residual's metal concentration and sorption capacity. The soil-plant barrier limits transmission of many trace elements through the food chain, although Cd (an important human health concern) can bypass the soil-plant barrier. Results from many studies that support these key concepts provide a basis of our understanding of the relationship between trace element chemistry and phytoavailability in residual-treated soils. Research is needed to (i) determine mechanisms for trace element retention of soil-residual systems, (ii) determine the effect of residuals on ecological receptors and the ability of residuals to reduce ecotoxicity in metal-contaminated soil, and (iii) predict the long-term bioavailability of trace elements in soil-residual systems.     

Urban waste recycling behavior: antecedents of participation in a selective collection program

ABSTRACT/ The aim of this study is to analyze the antecedents of urban waste recycling behavior. To achieve this goal, a concrete urban waste management program was chosen. The study focuses on the Selective Collection Program (SCP) in Zaragoza, a medium-sized city in northeastern Spain. The research starts with a conceptual model in which the variables that potentially affect recycling behavior can be classified into two groups: incentives and barriers. Moreover, the sociodemographic characteristics of the individuals are included in our study. Given that the proposed model requires specification of latent variables or constructs, the analysis is based on the Structural Equation Models (SEM) methodology. The results revealed that environmental awareness, knowledge of the environmental impact of urban waste, and the positive perception of management by local government exercise a positive effect on individual recycling behavior, while perceived personal difficulties (space and time availability) and distance to and from the container have a negative effect. As regards sociodemographic variables, this study found that annual family income sustains a negative relationship with recycling behavior, while age maintains a positive one. The results obtained clearly show the important role that the public authorities play, especially municipal governments, in achieving the waste recycling objectives established in accordance with international legislation.     

Hazardous waste sites,stress, and neighborhood quality in USA

Summary Seven neighborhoods adjacent to hazardous waste were surveyed. The authors found that respondents did not rate their neighborhoods as highly as Americans as a whole, but, like most Americans, they did rate their present neighborhood better, or the same as, their previous one. The adjacent hazardous waste site was mentioned as distressing more often than any other neighborhood characteristic. Yet in four of the seven neighborhoods, dilapidated buildings and streets, odors and smoke from sewage treatment plants and factories, noise from trains and traffic congestion, or another neighborhood characteristic was mentioned as more stressful than the hazardous waste site. It is argued that govemment needs to be more aggressive about understanding community viewpoints before proposing multi-million dollar hazardous waste remediation plans that could be resisted by a community.Professor Michael Greenberg and Dr Dona Schneider are regular contributors to this Journal. All three authors work in the Department of Urban Studies and Community Health, and support the New Jersey Graduate Program in Public Health at Rutgers University.     

An evaluation of four key methods for monitoring household waste prevention campaigns in the UK

Household waste prevention in England has been recognised in national strategy as a key component for future sustainable practice. To support the policy agenda, the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) in England has funded an extensive programme of fundamental research in the area. The specific research aim reported on here, in this Defra funded project, was to trial and assess methods for monitoring and evaluating approaches detailed in the National Resource and Waste Forum (NRWF)’s Household Waste Prevention Toolkit. The methods that formed the basis for the four research Objectives for the project were: using pilot and control areas (core Objective), tracking waste arisings, measuring specific activities and declared awareness and behaviour surveys. A primary objective of this research was to quantify the direct waste tonnage impacts of implementing a targeted household waste campaign in Dorset County, UK. A key performance indicator chosen for this assessment was the weight of waste collected at the kerbside from households. In an area where a waste prevention campaign is well planned and implemented then reductions in household waste arisings in pilot areas can be in the region of 2% per annum. This method for monitoring can be used, in the hands of an expert project team, to communicate to the public the direct benefits of waste prevention. It was found that there are a wide range of factors that need to be taken into account in the UK, and that these had hitherto been given little prominence, such as careful matching of pilot and control areas – this proved problematical in this research. However, a range of techniques used to support the methods, e.g. doorstepping surveys and focus groups could not show clear attributable waste prevention impacts but their findings could be used to direct new future messages to the public. The most successful and measurable campaign activities that were revealed by evaluation were: mail preference registrations, Home composting and doorstepping. An expert evaluation of all major methods found that no clear preference was revealed as to which were the most useful. None of the methods were judged very poor neither very good, all had major issues about their use. Tracking waste arisings and focus groups were assessed to be the best techniques in terms of input effort to output value. It is likely that waste prevention teams for household waste will need very careful training in the cost-effective use of the NRWF Toolkit before they are competent to apply it to a given place; the issues are more complex than were first thought.     

Total quality product design—how to integrate environmental criteria into the product realization process

Recent case studies on the financial benefits of pollution prevention programs well attest to the notion that a commitment to the environment can help profitability not only by avoiding costs and potential liabilities, but also by generating environmentally-based opportunities for competitive advantage. Achieving these benefits, however, represents a complex management challenge that requires embedding environmental concerns in the day-to-day decisions and actions of a company'S employees. This article shows how the marriage of corporate environmental stewardship and TQM, better known as TQEM, is particularly well suited to the area of product design and why environmental health and safety experts can improve a product'S environmental performance.     

Environmental training and cleaner production in Indian industry—A micro-level study

An attempt has been made to analyze various types of organizational training imparted in Indian Industries while implementing cleaner production. The study was carried out in two industrialized states of India, namely Maharashtra and Gujarat. with participation of eight firms from each state. The various sources of training for the Indian industries have also been studied. A case study each from the two states, viz. Maharashtra and Gujarat have been presented in this paper. It is found that more than half of the industrial units have given importance to various kinds of training during the implementation of cleaner production. When it comes to training in environmental management system (EMS), nearly half of the firms have gone in for it. Among the sources of training, the most useful training was the training imparted by in-house staff and on-the-job training. Lastly, suppliers of cleaner technologies seem to have also played an active role in training as revealed by few of the participating units     

Biodegradable municipal waste (BMW) management strategy in Ireland: A comparison with some key issues in the BMW strategy being adopted in England

Due to increasing pressure from the European Union to meet recycling and recovery targets, (e.g. the packaging waste, waste electronic equipment and landfill directives), both the Irish and England's governments’ policy on waste management is changing to meet these pressures, with major emphasis upon the management of biodegradable municipal waste (BMW). In particular, the EU landfill directive requires reductions in the rate of biodegradable waste going to landfill to 35% by 2016. The objective of this paper is to examine how Ireland plans to meet this challenge and to compare the Irish strategy to that being adopted in England. The approach in England is driven by a clear understanding that the practice in the late 1990s was unlikely to ensure compliance with EU targets by the set dates. England has therefore developed a discrete, programme (Waste Implementation Programme) to drive a new approach, based on rigorous science and international best practice, which includes a Demonstrator Programme for new technologies. The dynamic, high cost, large scale programme in England stands in sharp contrast to that for Ireland and only future, detailed analysis of outcomes will be able to evaluate the cost effectiveness of each.     

REAL-TIME QUALITY CONTROL OF STREAMFLOW DATA—A SIMULATION STUDY1

ABSTRACT: The problem of real-time quality control of streamflow data is addressed. Five methods are investigated via a Monte-Carlo simulation experiment based on streamflow data from Bird Creek basin in Oklahoma. The five methods include three deterministic approaches and two statistical approaches. The relative performance of the investigated methods is evaluated under hypothesized random mechanism generating isolated outliers. The deterministic method based on streamflow gradient analysis and the statistical method based on forecast residual analysis perform best in detecting such outliers.     

CHANGING A GREAT CITY IN EASTERN EUROPE — CRACOW: ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGES1

ABSTRACT: The main factor in the location of medieval Cracow was drainage. In the 700-year history of the City, there were numerous changes in water conditions, particularly in channel network, runoff, ground water level, and ice phenomena. The most dangerous threat to surface water and ground water in Cracow in the last decades has been from industrial and municipal sewage. Currently there are no rivers that meet Drinking Water Quality standards in Cracow. The quality of the ground water has declined because of infiltration of contaminated river water, water from sewage disposal ponds, and pollution from the atmosphere and soil. Cracow does not have enough waste water plants to meet its needs. Most municipal and industrial sewage has not been treated or has been treated only partially. Because of considerable contamination of surface and ground waters in Cracow, more than half of the city's fresh water is pumped about 50 kilometers from a reservoir on the Raba River. A Polish government declaration of April 4, 1989, recognized Cracow as an area of particular protection, and directed that a number of actions be undertaken for the protection of environmental quality.     

Identifying the key factors in increasing recycling and reducing residual household waste: a case study of the Flemish region of Belgium

The competent waste authority in the Flemish region of Belgium created the 'Implementation plan household waste 2003-2007' and the 'Implementation plan sustainable management 2010-2015' to comply with EU regulation. It incorporates European and regional requirements and describes strategies, goals, actions and instruments for the collection and treatment of household waste. The central mandatory goal is to reduce and maintain the amount of residual household waste to 150 kg per capita per year between 2010-2015. In literature, a reasonable body of information has been published on the effectiveness and efficiency of a variety of policy instruments, but the information is complex, often contradictory and difficult to interpret. The objective of this paper is to identify, through the development of a binary logistic regression model, those variables of the waste collection scheme that help municipalities to reach the mandatory 150 kg goal. The model covers a number of variables for household characteristics, provision of recycling services, frequency of waste collection and charging for waste services. This paper, however, is not about waste prevention and reuse. The dataset originates from 2003. Four out of 12 variables in the model contributed significantly: income per capita, cost of residual waste collection, collection frequency and separate curbside collection of organic waste.     

Environmental legislation and regulation in 1995—what to expect

The environment will continue to be a “hot” issue in 1995. Having accomplished its early goals of attracting attention, cleaning up existing environmental problems, and preventing the development of new ones, the environmental movement in the last decade of the twentieth century will be a more measured, moderate response to environmental issues, driven in part by economic realism, economic opportunity, and the forces of political conservatism.     

Resource conservation in the pulp and paper industries—rational-use-of-energy approach

Sharp rises in energy prices have generated an interest in the pulp and paper industries in cogeneration and heat pump applications. However, the institutional and industry-specific barriers to their implementation, despite economic viability, indicate the inadequacies of the energy conservation and energy saving approaches to minimise energy costs. A systems approach, referred to as rational-use-of-energy, is proposed to overcome some of the barriers and to highlight the conservation potential of other resources, such as chemicals and water at appreciably low effluent loads.