FACILITY POLLUTION PREVENTION PLANNING REQUIREMENTS: AN OVERVIEW OF STATE PROGRAM EVALUATIONS

NPPR Facility Planning Workgroup Overview of State Program Evaluations

Primary Author: Kathryn Barwick, California Dept of Toxic Substances Control

Co-Authors: John Cross, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Scott Fortier, Massachusetts Office of Technical Assistance
Ken Geiser, Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Institute
(Workgroup Co-Chair) Lynn Helbrecht, Washington Department of Ecology
(Workgroup Co-Chair) David James Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission

Editor: Warren Weinstein, NPPR staff Liaison to the Facility Planning Workgroup

The following members of the National Pollution Prevention Roundtable Facility Pollution Prevention Planning Workgroup Members also contributed to this project:

Martha Arosemena, Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission
Ade Babatunde, Minnesota Office of Technical Assistance
Kathryn Barwick, California Department of Toxic Substances Control
Monica Becker, Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Institute
Bill Eberle, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
Joan Fassinger, General Motors Corporation
Leroy L. Gilbert, West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection
Renee Hudson Goodley, Georgia Department of Natural Resources
Tim Greiner, Greiner Environmental
Gary Gulka, Vermont DEC
Sandy Gurkewitz, Oregon Department of Environmental Quality
Jeanne Herb, New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection
Jennifer Kaduck, Georgia Environmental Protection Division
Bob Kerr, Kerr & Associates
Robert Solyan, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland
Raelyn Stockwell, Arizona Department of Environmental Quality
David Wigglesworth, Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation
Leslie Winik, Chemical Manufacturers Association

The following members of the NPPR ISO workgroup also contributed to the report:

Marianne Fitzgerald, Oregon Department of Environmental Quality
Ravila Gupta, North Carolina Office of Waste Reduction;
Krista Johnsen Leuteritz, NIST Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program

The Roundtable acknowledges the support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Pollution Prevention Division (and John Cross) in providing funding for facility planning workgroup members to attend NPPR Conferences.

Table of Contents:

Dear Colleague Letter

I. Executive Summary and Recommendations

II. Introduction

III. Facility Planning Requirements
-Common Elements
-Wastes and Chemicals Addressed
-Focus of Planning
-Key Plan Elements
-Confidentiality and Public Availability
-Statement of Corporate and Facility Management
-Employee Buy-ins
-Plan Summaries/Progress Reports
-Technical Assistance
-Compliance, Enforcement, and Requirements For Implementation
-Assessment of Progress
-Assessment of Effectiveness

IV. Emerging Issues for Facility P2 Planning Programs
-Integration of Planning and P2 into Production
-Cost Accounting
-Plan Implementation vs. Compliance with Planning Requirements
-Program Targeting

V. Environmental Management Systems
-Comparing Key Features in P2 Planning Programs and Environmental Management Systems
-Potential Problems
-Policy Options
-Should More States Incorporate Materials Accounting Reporting Elements Into their Programs?............ 30
-Relationship of Planning Programs to Traditional Environmental Regulatory Programs
-How Should Facility Planning Programs Best Evaluate Program Effectiveness
-Obstacles to Measurement
-How Can/Should We Use Planning Data
-Special Projects

VI. Recommendations
-Conclusions

Appendix 1 Materials Accounting

Appendix 2 Abstracts of P2 Facility Planning Program Evaluations

Appendix 3 NPPR

August 8, 1997

Dear Colleague:

The National Pollution Prevention Roundtable (NPPR) is pleased to release this report, Facility Pollution Prevention Planning Requirements: An Overview of State Program Evaluations. This seminal guide to facility planning is the culmination of 12 months of collaboration by the NPPR Facility Planning workgroup spanning two national NPPR meetings. This report is the final Facility Planning Workgroup project under the direction of former NPPR Facility Planning Workgroup Chair Kathryn Barwick.

As the first study to document national facility planning requirements, it is our hope that the information and recommendations contained in this document help guide pollution prevention professionals from the public and private sectors in evaluating P2 plans and planning requirements. The study concluded that overall, the P2 planning process identified and promoted P2, facilitated improved environmental managment, reduced waste generation, and resulted in cost savings. As a result, NPPR urges states that do not already have facility pollution prevention planning requirements to institute them.

This report also explores other issues the NPPR is working on including Materials Accounting for measuring pollution prevention and a comparison of facility planning to the ISO 14000 environmental Management System.

If you have any further questions regarding this report please contact Warren Weinstein at the NPPR office (202-466-P2P2).

Sincerely,

Natalie Roy
Executive Director

I) Executive Summary and Recommendations

Facility pollution prevention (P2) planning (regulatory) requirements arose from a recognition that pollution prevention involves technology and management changes that cannot be standardized across facilities. Regulatory requirements, unlike voluntary measures, generally receive the attention and support of management. The planning process is intended to make industry aware of the pollution and inefficiencies associated with generating and managing waste while allowing facilities the flexibility to come up with their own preventative approaches. This eliminates the need for government-prescribed technologies or a one-size-fits-all approach.

State programs need to understand if pollution prevention planning programs actually result in increased awareness of pollution prevention alternatives and in increased pollution prevention activity. The purpose of this white paper is to highlight the lessons learned from recent studies of state facility pollution prevention planning programs and to identify emerging issues related to regulatory pollution prevention planning requirements. The audience for this white paper includes government officials who administer these programs, industries that comply with them, and analysts, policy makers and legislators considering basic directions for environmental programs. This report also details recommendations for the future.

Twenty-three states administer some kind of "facility pollution prevention planning" program. These programs require facilities that generate pollution to evaluate their processes with an eye toward making process and procedural changes that would reduce or eliminate "non-product output" (i.e. waste, pollution, emissions, discharges, etc.). Waste results from inefficiencies within manufacturing operations, and as such, the elimination of pollution at the source is an activity that should be intrinsic to operating a business. Pollution prevention implementation requires at the minimum: technical information, capital for improvements, understanding of costs/benefits, and management support. Obstacles to pollution prevention include resistance to change, risk aversion, regulatory requirements and a general "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude. Facility planning requirements are designed to help facilities transcend these barriers.

For this report the National Pollution Prevention Roundtable Facility Planning workgroup conducted a detailed review of pollution prevention planning program evaluations from Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Oregon, Texas, California and Washington. Conclusions are based primarily on recent evaluations of facility planning programs in these seven states in addition to work already conducted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA). Unlike many other environmental statutes, state facility planning laws are not based on federal mandates that allow for authorization of state programs; thus, substantial variations exist among programs in different states.

The study concluded that overall, the pollution prevention planning program/process:

1) successfully identified and prompted pollution prevention opportunities;

2) facilitated "improved environmental management";

3) led to an overall reduction in waste generated; and

4) resulted in cost savings.

The report also found that the improved relationships between environmental and production staff within facilities that transpired during the planning process resulted in fewer regulatory problems. Moreover, in most cases the costs (for facilities) of preparing pollution prevention plans were offset by savings from the actual pollution prevention projects. This white paper summarizes common elements of state pollution prevention planning programs, reviews key findings from the evaluations, highlights lessons learned from these evaluations, and identifies some key emerging issues for facility planning.

On the basis of this study, the NPPR makes the following recommendations: Planning programs should ensure that requirements to perform complete financial analyses are included in planning laws, and that the potential benefits of adequately performing these analyses are sufficiently stressed to the regulated community during outreach and assistance activities. "Total" or "environmental" cost analysis is essential to understanding the potential savings (avoided costs) associated with pollution prevention. Without this, facilities will not have full information when making decisions about pollution prevention investments. Businesses will lack the ability to accurately compare costs and benefits of pollution prevention investments, pollution control investments, and other projects competing for capital. While it is evident that much "low-hanging fruit" remains to be implemented, it may be that as facilities move from the easier and less-expensive pollution prevention projects to more complex projects, improvements in cost accounting will be crucial. It may become increasingly difficult to fund more complex and capital-intensive pollution prevention measures that remain after the initial planning iterations.

State programs that do not contain a materials accounting reporting requirement in their facility planning program should be strongly urged to consider doing so. The two state programs (Massachusetts and New Jersey) with "materials accounting" or "process-level efficiency" data reporting requirements noted significant benefits associated specifically with these requirements. Materials accounting data is useful during plan preparation both as a tool for accurately tracking materials through production processes and identifying points where waste occurs and assessing the impact that the adoption of various pollution prevention strategies may have on reducing pollution. These benefits include the ability to identify process losses, a better attribution of costs (product costing), and a fuller understanding of the total costs of using toxic chemicals. In many cases, materials accounting procedures have stimulated important P2 improvements.

State facility pollution prevention planning programs should consider using planning data to identify research needs. Most planning laws require that businesses first identify potential options, then conduct a technical feasibility analysis. This process should be used to help identify pollution prevention technologies and strategies that need further research before widespread application is feasible. Communicating this information with researchers and technology developers in order to focus research on areas with the greatest need should have a beneficial effect on the overall progress of pollution prevention.

Pollution prevention data could be used to establish a benchmark for the base level of pollution prevention that should be implemented for each industry. State programs have varying uses for the pollution prevention data they collect. Some states are required to share technical pollution prevention information found within plans with similar businesses in the state. Planning data could also be used in emergency response planning, educational programs and academic research. Finally, data contained within the planning documents that is specific to amounts and rates of waste/pollution generation is and will continue to be used as part of process- and facility-specific measures of pollution prevention accomplishments.

Pollution prevention programs should work with other state programs (i.e., inspection, enforcement, and permitting) to ensure that consistent messages regarding the value of pollution prevention are conveyed via regulatory activities. Facility planning was designed as an approach that would be more effective at promoting pollution prevention (and perhaps achieving compliance with environmental regulatory requirements) than traditional regulatory programs, which tend to focus on end-of-pipe/ pollution management solutions. Facility planning progress to date is an important step toward achieving greater environmental benefits and complying with necessary environmental laws and regulations in ways that satisfy regulators and are helpful to businesses.

State programs need to know if P2 planning requirements result in increased awareness of P2 alternatives and activities. This report demonstrates that facility planning requirements are an effective motivator and vehicle for promoting pollution prevention. NPPR urges states that do not have facility pollution prevention planning requirements to institute them. Additionally, the report highlights the lessons learned from recent studies of state facility pollution prevention planning programs and identifies emerging issues to be considered for existing and future pollution prevention facility planning programs.

II) Introduction

Twenty-three states administer some kind of "facility pollution prevention planning" program. These programs are designed to encourage facilities that generate pollution to evaluate their processes with an eye toward making process and procedural changes that would reduce or eliminate "non-product output" (i.e., waste, pollution, emissions, discharges, etc.) associated with the manufacture of goods and service activities. This pollution results from inefficiencies within manufacturing operations, and as such, the elimination of pollution at the source is an activity that should be intrinsic to operating a business. However, due to a variety of reasons, some companies continue to prioritize waste management over waste prevention.

Much work has been done exploring why businesses do not always utilize pollution prevention opportunities (simultaneously minimizing the amount of waste and pollution generated and maximizing process efficiency). Common barriers to the implementation of pollution prevention include the lack of technical information, lack of capital for improvements, lack of a complete understanding of costs and benefits (often associated with accounting practices that obscure existing waste management costs), lack of management support, resistance to change, risk aversion (both associated with potential product quality concerns and environmental compliance concerns), regulatory barriers, and a general "if it ain't broke don't fix it" attitude. Overall, the focus on pollution control and end-of-pipe management is difficult to overcome.

Pollution prevention planning requirements are designed to help facilities transcend these barriers. A regulatory requirement will receive the attention and support of management, and may transcend other company requirements for capitalization (i.e., money spent in an effort to comply with regulations does not have to compete with other projects). The planning programs stop short of requiring quantifiable reductions (facility goals are set by the facilities themselves) or the implementation of specific source reduction alternatives. An assumption behind these programs is that once facilities see the intrinsic value of pollution prevention, they will implement those pollution prevention options that are appropriate for them.

There has been a need for state programs to understand if pollution prevention planning programs actually result in increased awareness of pollution prevention alternatives and in increased pollution prevention activity. The purpose of this white paper is to highlight the lessons learned from recent studies of state facility pollution prevention planning programs and to identify emerging issues related to regulatory pollution prevention planning requirements. We hope this white paper will be of value to the members of the National Pollution Prevention Roundtable (NPPR), to government officials who administer these programs, to industries that comply with them, and to analysts, policy makers and legislators considering basic directions for environmental programs.

The conclusions are based primarily on recent evaluations of facility planning programs in Texas, Minnesota, Washington, New Jersey, California, Oregon, and Massachusetts, in addition to work conducted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA). The facility planning programs were established pursuant to state legislation enacted, for the most part, between 1989 and 1991. Unlike many other environmental statutes, these laws are not based on federal mandates that allow for authorization of state programs; thus, substantial variations exist among state programs. The federal government has instead used state laws as models for managing its own facilities. Executive Order 12856 requires federal agencies to develop pollution prevention plans for reaching goals to reduce released and offsite transfers of toxic chemicals.

While the state programs vary, the basic approach is for facilities subject to the planning requirement to conduct assessments which identify the types and sources of wastes and evaluate opportunities to reduce waste and pollution generated at the facility. No single rationale can be documented for all of these statutes, but they share a common purpose. Facility planning is grounded in a philosophy of pollution prevention--reducing or eliminating waste at the source, or point of generation. It was designed as an approach that would be more effective at promoting pollution prevention (and perhaps achieving compliance with environmental regulatory requirements) than traditional regulatory programs, which tend to focus on end-of-pipe waste/pollution management solutions (treatment, recycling, disposal).

Facility pollution prevention planning requirements arose from a recognition that pollution prevention involves technology and management changes that cannot be standardized across facilities, or directed from the outside. The planning process was designed to make industry aware of the waste and inefficiencies associated with generating and managing waste, and encourage facilities to come up with their own approaches for preventing waste and pollution, without the need for government-prescribed technologies or a one-size-fits-all approach.

The evaluations show progress across the states toward this common goal, and raise interesting and important questions about the dynamics of the planning process. This white paper summarizes common elements of state pollution prevention planning programs, summarizes key findings from the evaluations, highlights lessons learned from these evaluations, and identifies some key emerging issues for facility planning.

III) Facility Pollution Prevention Planning Requirements

Common elements of pollution prevention planning programs. The state planning programs have a core of common elements, although there is substantial variation among the approaches taken by individual states. Planning requirements apply to facilities already subject to regulations, generally hazardous waste generators under RCRA or releasers subject to Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) reporting under section 313 of the Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act (EPCRA). Some states limit the planning requirements to RCRA large quantity generators, while others require planning from small quantity generators as well. It is important to note that there are significant differences from program to program in terms of what types of facilities and waste streams are captured, and in how the programs are administered. For instance, TRI-based programs are multimedia, while hazardous waste-based programs look only at hazardous waste source reduction.

Wastes and chemicals addressed. Facility planning laws generally address toxic chemicals, as listed under section 313 of EPCRA, or hazardous wastes, as defined under RCRA (may include state-only hazardous wastes as well). Some processes may go beyond the scope of particular lists of substances or wastes, to encourage prevention and to discourage waste transfer to other environmental media.

Focus of planning. All of the planning processes emphasize source reduction. Some also focus on reducing the use of toxic or hazardous substances. Some programs include recycling, reuse and/or treatment, if these approaches are included in their definition of pollution prevention (P2).

Key plan elements. Plan elements generally include:

an assessment of existing processes that use or generate toxic chemicals or hazardous substances or wastes,

a technical and economic evaluation of the feasibility of reduction options,

the identification of options to be implemented,

the establishment of numeric or other specific performance goals, and

the implementation of selected options.

There are varying degrees of specificity regarding content and format between the states. Some states define specifically the elements and prescribe a format for planning. In other states, the data elements are spelled out, but the facility determines the format.

Confidentiality and public availability. The planning process preserves the confidentiality of some documents, while making other elements available to the public. Plans, or the assessments that underlie the plans, are generally kept confidential, while plan summaries, annual reports, or planning goals are more often made public. Plans are generally available at the site to state officials, but not the public. Plans (or related planning documents) that are submitted to state officials for review and approval are generally available to the public, as long as there are no confidentiality claims.

Statement of corporate and facility management. Plans generally must include a statement from corporate or facility management. Key elements include a statement concerning the accuracy and completeness of the plan, and some form of commitment to implementation. Programs may include employee participation and awards elements.

Employee buy-ins. One important feature of the Massachusetts program is that it requires an employee notification before the planning process begins. Facility Planning greatly impacts employees as pollution prevention planning fosters health-related benefits, including improved worker health and safety. In some cases these benefits motivate firms to do P2 changes even when the cost analysis may not support the project. Furthermore, employees who are inextricably tied to the planning process are encouraged to suggest planning ideas and ensure that P2 changes are carried out.

Plan summaries/progress reports. Plan summaries and progress reports are generally provided to the state agencies and made available to the public. The summaries and reports may include numeric goals, information on wastes generated and released, and schedules and progress made toward attaining plan objectives.

Technical assistance. States are generally authorized to run technical assistance programs to assist companies, particularly smaller businesses, in plan development, among other activities.

Compliance, enforcement and requirements for implementation. States may have the authority to enforce compliance with the requirement for the facility to submit plans or reports. The state generally does not have the authority to enforce compliance with the plan itself, unless the plan is implemented through some other vehicle, such as a permit. The absence of a strong enforcement mechanism could discourage planners from including the more innovative source reduction alternatives in the plans; however, most programs provide sufficient flexibility for facilities to determine feasibility.

The private sector's recognition of waste and inefficiency, coupled with public awareness of releases into the environment, should function as an incentive for industry to implement the plans. Some states have eschewed the use of their enforcement authorities and have chosen to implement the program in a nonregulatory fashion.

Assessment of progress. Several state programs have provisions for assessing progress in particular industrial sectors. Some states are authorized to disseminate information about successful approaches, and others to set performance standards for particular segments.

Other planning elements that are not shared universally by the various state programs include:

process level data analysis and reporting,

materials use data analysis and reporting,

the determination of efficiency indices (indexing waste/pollution to production),

mandatory employee training, and

the frequency of planning/progress reports.

Assessment of effectiveness?

All of the facility pollution prevention planning program evaluations reviewed for this paper concluded that facility pollution prevention planning is valuable and has led to increased implementation of pollution prevention (see the Appendix for abstracts of the evaluation studies). Experience shows that the fact that pollution prevention planning is a regulatory requirement is significant in stressing to production managers the importance that states place on pollution prevention as an effective means of achieving environmental improvements. The regulatory nature of these requirements appears to be an essential factor in motivating companies to overcome the barriers that prevent companies from evaluating pollution prevention alternatives.

For this paper, program evaluations from the following states were included: Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Oregon, Texas, California, and Washington. A review of these studies shows that a majority of the programs found that the pollution prevention planning program/process:

successfully identified pollution prevention opportunities;

facilitated "improved environmental management";

reduced waste generation and led to cost savings.

At least half of the programs noted "less regulation" as a result of the planning activities, and a third noted an improved relationship between environmental and production staff within facilities.

Additional observations about facility pollution prevention planning programs contained within these evaluations come from a variety of sources including:

1) New Jersey Facility Planning Report;

2) Tufts University Report, "Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Industry P2 Planning Requirements & Guidance for Integrating P2 Plans", by Gouchoe, James, et. al.;

3) Ken Geiser Massachusetts TURI- Report at NPPR's Fall, 1995 Miami, Florida Conference; 4) Tim Greiner, Greiner & Associates- Report at NPPR's Fall, 1995 Miami, Florida Conference; and are listed below.

1. New Jersey facilities found the planning process to be useful, but found many of the details confusing and unnecessary. (This may be because many facilities had no experience with planning. For example, only 25 percent of facilities included in the New Jersey study had tracked non-product output per unit of product in some form before planning was required, and that was usually in the form of process-level yield. For many facilities, the New Jersey facility plan was their first efficiency calculation. The facilities preferred to have greater flexibility in the planning process.)

2. Facilities recommend that planning requirements be consolidated where possible.

3. Facilities reported that industry-specific, targeted planning requirements and technical assistance would be useful. Companies generally prefer the option to use one or the other; larger facilities want flexibility--smaller ones want targeted guidance.

4. Companies complying with facility pollution prevention requirements noted an increased awareness of environmental issues. Planning requirements generally caused facilities to scrutinize more processes, identifying more reduction options and setting higher reduction goals.

5. Including vendors/suppliers in facility planning is beneficial to the planning process.

6. Building materials tracking systems into facility tracking systems facilitates pollution prevention implementation. (Also, New Jersey staff found that tracking non-product output to individual sources was associated with greater pollution prevention reduction goals. The average NPO reduction goal was 15.6 percent for facilities that attributed NPO to individual sources, versus 8.4 percent for those that did not.)

7. Failures in the realm of pollution prevention planning (particularly as planning relates to pollution prevention implementation) were associated with a facility's lack of management commitment, entering into the planning process with a preconceived outcome, "enforcement savvy" plan preparation (i.e., just meet the minimum planning requirements), and the use of consultants, which may lead to minimal plan implementation. The value of upper management commitment to the planning process--associated with the regulatory nature of the planning requirement--cannot be over-stressed.

8. The two state programs (Massachusetts and New Jersey) with "materials accounting" or "process-level efficiency" data reporting requirements noted significant benefits associated specifically with these requirements (discussed more specifically in Appendix 1). These benefits include the ability to identify process losses, a better attribution of costs (product costing), and a fuller understanding of the total costs of using toxic chemicals.

9. An interesting finding common to at least two evaluations (New Jersey and Washington State) was that the requirement to conduct financial feasibility analyses on identified pollution prevention alternatives was useful among those facilities that complied with the requirement. However, in New Jersey, so few facilities complied with the requirement that its relationship to good planning and goal-setting could not be determined. In general, facility plans are weak in this area.

10. Progress reporting requirements are useful for keeping pollution prevention goals in the minds of facility personnel.

11. Some facility personnel look unfavorably on repeated planning requirements. These personnel question their usefulness once the "low-hanging fruit" has been picked via the initial exercise.

12. Notwithstanding item 12 above, the New Jersey study found that facilities that had undertaken pollution prevention activities prior to facility planning created greater reduction planning goals. This may indicate that there is a "learning curve" associated with identifying pollution prevention opportunities. It may also indicate that facilities become "pollution prevention literate" over time. Lastly, it indicates that pollution prevention opportunities are plentiful and that we have not exhausted the low-hanging fruit.

13. Some companies report that planning either caused them to look for improvement options in other areas, such as energy or water use, or that planning gave them tools for other planning activities within their facilities.

14. The Business Roundtable study found that mandated planning requirements were more significant for the smaller businesses than for the larger ones. However, 80% of the larger facilities believe pollution prevention opportunities are under-utilized. The U.S. EPA's draft "Study of Industry Motivation for Pollution Prevention" (1996) buttresses these findings. For this study, which attempted to identify the motivators for moving businesses toward pollution prevention, two groups of businesses were surveyed to determine pollution prevention motivators. Approximately 500 lithographers represented smaller businesses and approximately 500 facilities represented larger businesses required to report under the (TRI) program. Selected findings include:

Almost half the printers and two thirds of the larger businesses reported conducting their pollution prevention evaluations as part of government-required pollution prevention plans. Production managers in Massachusetts and New Jersey--the states with the most detailed planning requirements--answered several questions differently than similar firms in the rest of the country. Such respondents from smaller firms were more likely to report that state pollution prevention planning requirements were very important in first getting them to consider environmental issues in their jobs.

Traditional regulatory programs were almost unrivaled in bringing the attention of business decision-makers to their environmental obligations.

For large manufacturers, contact with enforcement personnel was associated with reductions in TRI waste normalized for production. In addition, for this group's managers, environmental regulatory requirements ranked near the top of issues considered very important in their jobs.

Government publications and assistance providers did not rank high among reported sources of environmental information about alternative practices or technologies. However, contact with assistance and enforcement organizations increased the reported importance of government publications and assistance providers served as sources of environmental information. Such contact also increased the reported influence of government employees.

Total Quality Management plans ranked just behind government-required pollution prevention plans in connection with evaluations of alternative practices and technologies.

This study is important to the NPPR's facility pollution prevention planning workgroup because it evaluates pollution prevention planning within an overall set of pollution prevention motivators. While the study found that there is no single "silver bullet" that motivates businesses to consider pollution prevention, it showed that facility pollution prevention planning requirements are a significant motivator for these businesses.

IV) Emerging issues for facility pollution prevention planning programs

As facility planning programs move into the next five to ten years, it is important for states to consider how planning relates to a number of emerging issues. Keeping pollution prevention planning a relevant and meaningful process for facilities will be vital for planning programs' continued success. The following section describes the more important issues that should be considered as programs continue through their planning cycles.

Integration of planning and pollution prevention into overall production. The view of many facility managers that planning is an environmental responsibility is problematic. The "environmental department" (or the environmental consultant hired to prepare the plan) has traditionally (and appropriately) focused on waste/pollution management, and may have little expertise in researching raw materials input alternatives, understanding processes and production lines, and environmental cost accounting.

Modifications to promote systematic planning as an integral part of business management should be adopted where feasible. Such revisions should be sensitive to the systems already in place in the more progressive organizations (e.g., EMAs, ISO 14000, Responsible Care, CERES, GEMI, etc.).

This issue is part and parcel of many of the topics discussed below.

Cost accounting. State programs should continue to assess how to encourage facilities to incorporate environmental cost accounting into business practices. Many facilities have a tremendous amount of difficulty assessing waste management costs. How do states ensure that facilities conduct adequate financial feasibility analyses on identified source reduction alternatives (essential to this is an evaluation of the true costs of generating and managing wastes/pollutants, including costs associated with regulatory requirements)?

At least two states found that although conducting total cost analyses was valuable, facility personnel were quite negative about this requirement. The workgroup believes this paradox may be associated with the difficulty facilities encounter when they attempt to conduct the analyses. "Standard accounting procedures" are inadequate for illustrating all of the costs associated with the generation of "non-product outputs", or with allocating environmental management costs back to generating processes.

Inadequate cost accounting may also be a function of the failure to integrate planning into overall production operations, resulting in environmental managers attempting to develop cost accounting procedures and financial analyses, which is normally beyond their usual responsibilities or areas of expertise. A person from one large corporation has confided to state planning personnel in California that, despite his company's progress (and leadership) in reducing pollution, the existence of regulatory planning requirements helps to maintain ongoing focus on continuous improvement (most importantly by maintaining upper management commitment to complying with the requirement). Thus, the state should not allow facilities out of the planning program.

"Total" or "environmental" cost analysis is essential to understanding the potential savings (avoided costs) associated with pollution prevention. Without this, facilities will not have full information when making decisions about pollution prevention investments. Businesses will lack the ability to accurately compare costs and benefits of pollution prevention investments, pollution control investments, and other projects competing for capital. While it is evident that much "low-hanging fruit" remains to be implemented, it may be that as facilities move from the easier and less-expensive pollution prevention projects to more complex projects, improvements in cost accounting will be necessary. It may be increasingly difficult to fund the more complex and capital-intensive pollution prevention measures that remain after the initial planning iterations. Pollution prevention and planning seeks to accurately present all obvious costs such as waste disposal and raw materials as well as typically overlooked costs such as long-term worker exposure and safety.

An alternative point of view notes the trend toward overestimating the importance of cost signals in environmental and business decision-making. This is evidenced by "cases of pollution prevention opportunities which were quite obviously profitable even without the full accounting for waste, yet were not implemented due to other factors, especially risk aversion. . . or the lack of a clear champion." The potential disastrous consequence of a product failure which can lead to significant loss of customers, sales and money is a significant barrier that must be overcome. The challenge for the assistance providers is to convince the firm that the change is necessary and it will not negatively affect the product.

While cost-effectiveness may not serve as the sole justification for a pollution prevention project within a business, the lack of economic information about the cost benefits of a pollution prevention project should not be a barrier. Planning programs should ensure that mechanisms to perform complete financial analyses are included in planning programs, and that the potential benefits of adequately performing these analyses are sufficiently stressed to the regulated community during outreach and assistance activities. An additional strategy might be to encourage diverse, non-traditional pollution prevention projects, such as energy efficiency.

Facility planning focuses on improvements to existing production processes. These improvements compete for capital within the corporation with regulatory compliance and new production, among other things. Environmental cost analysis is a more powerful tool when it is also applied to promote prevention-based approaches to regulatory compliance, and cleaner production for new facilities.

Plan implementation vs. compliance with planning requirements. How do programs ensure that pollution prevention planning is not conducted as a "compliance exercise"? In some cases, the exclusive use of consultants for plan preparation has not been associated with enthusiastic planning or the active implementation of pollution prevention. Programs should encourage facilities to use consultants to complement facility personnel participation in the planning process.

Certain planning elements are designed to prevent companies from adopting the bare minimum required to avoid compliance issues. Progress reports are designed to ensure that the facility revisits its plan periodically and assesses progress. Certification requirements ensure that top management commit to implementing the plans and also can ensure that plans are elevated to top management level. The confidential nature of some states' planning documents may lead to more aggressive goal-setting and more consistent adoption of pollution prevention alternatives. However, to a large degree, programs will have to leave this issue up to industry. The possession of a plan, as well as the possession of an EMS (or certification by ISO), does not guarantee pollution prevention implementation. We hope that consistent pollution prevention messages and increasing pressure for improved competitiveness and environmental performance will encourage facilities to view planning processes as vehicles to achieve these goals and documenting environmental progress. Ultimately, it is the facilities subject to these requirements that have the power to maximize the benefits of the process.

Program targeting. How should states target planning requirements to those facilities that can benefit most from them? Should facility planning programs exempt facilities that are already "with the program" and for whom such planning documentation might divert resources from source reduction implementation?

V) Environmental Management Systems

An approach currently being initiated by both Washington State and Oregon involves allowing a company's EMS to exempt it out of pollution prevention planning requirements, as discussed in the next section. Both states require that the toxics user EMS meet the intent of the Toxics Use Reduction Plan. Thus, the burden of proof is on the facility to demonstrate that certain key criteria are in place within the EMS. This allows the state program then to "target" facilities that are not involved in EMS activities. It is too early to tell if the Oregon and Washington State approach will achieve results comparable to traditional planning.

Should states allow companies that have an Environmental Management System, or are ISO 14000 certified, to exit from facility pollution prevention planning programs? In California, failed legislation would have created "exit criteria" for facilities that had achieved certain (quantitative) pollution prevention goals. Allowing facilities to exempt out of the planning may eliminate duplicative and redundant systems and regulatory burdens. This approach would have been difficult to implement due to the difficulty, even at the facility level, in measuring true source reduction accomplishments (as a basis for exiting the program).

Many who have participated in a pollution prevention planning process do not believe that good performers should be allowed to exit the planning process and are concerned that the planning process erroneously will be seen as having limited utility once a thorough pollution prevention analysis had been performed. It is important to note that even if states accept an EMS in lieu of state-required plans, federal requirements still mandate that generators have a waste minimization program in place. An EMS equivalency approach to waste minimization could help to overcome this barrier.

This section of the report addresses several pertinent questions regarding Environmental Management

Systems:

How does planning relate to the current movement within industry toward environmental management systems (EMS) such as ISO 14001 certification? How are facility plans and an environmental management system similar? Do they complement one another? Can or should they replace one another? In order to begin a discussion on these issues, a little background on the basic components of an environmental management system is useful.

An Environmental Management System (EMS) identifies policies, procedures and resources for implementing and maintaining environmental management. Such systems are characterized by routine assessment of environmental impacts and opportunities and a provision for continuous improvement. The ISO 14001 establishes one standard for an EMS, though it is by no means the only standard.

Key elements of the ISO 14001 standard include:

management commitment/policy statement, identification of all potential environmental impacts, development of objectives and targets, identification of roles and responsibilities, establishment of appropriate training programs, awareness of all pertinent regulations procedures for communication between levels and functions of the organization, monitoring and measurement of performance, and periodic audits of the system.

Comparing key features in pollution prevention planning programs and environmental management systems. One of the most significant differences between pollution prevention planning and the ISO standard is how pollution prevention is defined. Most pollution prevention planning programs define pollution prevention within the concept of a hierarchy, with source reduction the option of first choice. The fundamental intent of planning is to guide facilities toward the discovery and subsequent implementation of cost effective pollution prevention opportunities. However, since the ISO standards combine source reduction (pollution prevention) with control mechanisms in the definition of "prevention of pollution", there is no guarantee that an ISO 14001 certified facility will focus on source reduction.

In other aspects, the ISO standard is more comprehensive than many facility planning programs. The requirements for documentation, periodic audits, and maintaining compliance with relevant environmental regulations go well beyond the scope or intent of most facility pollution prevention planning programs. Similarly, fundamental to the development of an EMS is the requirement to establish objectives based on an identification of all business areas with a potential for environmental impact. Depending on how broadly a facility chooses to define its areas of environmental impact, and how aggressively it selects options for implementation, a facility's EMS could potentially be much more far-reaching than most facility pollution prevention plans, particularly those which, by regulatory statute, guide facilities to focus on a single environmental medium, such as hazardous waste.

ISO is a system created with industry input for the sake of industry and as such, it is considered a corporate driver. Thus the upper management of some businesses may be more willing to accept the ISO system than Toxics Use Reduction (TUR) plans which are frequently seen only as regulatory drivers. Facility planning and ISO 14001 are similar, however, in that neither requires implementation of pollution prevention activities. Instead, both require that facilities adopt a systematic approach to identifying and setting internal targets.

One of the core assumptions behind planning was that adopting a systematic approach to identifying and evaluating pollution prevention opportunities would result in voluntary implementation which would lead to pollution reductions and hence continuous improvement. In this respect an environmental management system and a pollution prevention plan are complementary.

Other features of the ISO standard would go beyond most facility planning requirements. For example, the concept of continuous improvement is integral to a successful EMS. While it may be the intent of facility planning to achieve continual improvement, the focus on developing a planning "document" has occasionally led to plans being "shelved" after development, rather than providing ongoing guidance for a facility.

ISO, on the other hand, can be broader and more far-reaching in identifying potential impacts to the environment and could result in much more multimedia-oriented prevention. The EMS definition of potential environmental impacts could include runoff from facility grounds, vehicle emissions from employee commuters, product stewardship, faculty operations, wastewater etc.). ISO's ability to set goals for all significant impacts makes it potentially more powerful than a facility plan focused on toxics use and hazardous waste generation. And, if facility planning tools like environmental accounting become embedded in environmental management systems, they may encourage corporations to adopt prevention approaches for regulatory compliance and for new production, as well as for improvements in existing production.

An EMS as described in the ISO standard, may be more formalized than facility pollution prevention plans, and may significantly emphasize appropriate and verifiable documentation. It follows that what is documented is much more likely to get implemented. Also, the requirement for communication between various levels and functions of the organization is clearly spelled out in the ISO standard, whereas it is only implied in most pollution prevention planning requirements.

Finally, as mentioned previously, the standard requires an identification of all significant environmental aspects, defined as areas of business with a potential to interact with the environment. Objectives and targets for achievement are then built on addressing these impacts. While specifics of planning requirements vary across the states, many focus on a limited number of chemicals, or on identifying pollution prevention opportunities in a single environmental medium.

Potential problems. Some members of the facility planning workgroup are concerned about public involvement associated with EMS and the absence of clear source reduction objectives. For instance, ISO standards are not readily available to the general public, thus, participation in standards development has been exclusive. "Notice and comment" rulemaking may not be a powerful engine for public participation, but it is certainly more open, providing a more level playing field. Planning, as opposed to ISO 14000, allows for more public involvement.

The lack of a strict "pollution prevention" definition that is consistent with United States law may result in EMSs' becoming interpreted as a waste management system, rather than a system that will encourage people to aggressively reduce environmental problems at the source.

Although auditing is a laudable component of EMS, it is difficult to determine the value to the public. EMS may be seen as an attempt to shield facilities from enforcement for violations uncovered by the EMS auditing procedures. Facility planners are concerned about how to make the public aware of pollution prevention goals, and the annual progress made toward those goals. Although an effective EMS will very likely uncover violations, the auditor may not be able to certify that the company is on track with its pollution prevention goals if the publicly-available data do not reflect reductions of wastes, non-product outputs, or chemical use. There is concern that ISO or EMS pollution prevention commitments will not be readily apparent via existing publicly available data. This may make it more difficult for state and industry pollution prevention programs to evaluate pollution prevention progress.

Finally, ISO does not have any specific requirement for process-level materials tracking. This may be problematic for those states with this requirement, that attempt to use ISO certification as a surrogate for pollution prevention planning.

Policy Options. While the number of facilities that will pursue ISO 14001 certification is still uncertain, an increased business interest in developing environmental management systems in general is clear. Given what might be termed a "gentle movement" toward environmental management systems, there are a number of policy options which may be attractive to states with facility planning legislation. A few of these selected policy options are briefly outlined below.

1. Accept an ISO-certified EMS in lieu of a pollution prevention plan. This option has merit only IF a more restrictive definition of pollution prevention, based on a hierarchy of options with source reduction at the top, is reflected in the policies, identification of objectives and targets, implementation and training elements of a facility's EMS and if facility planning requirements are met and incorporated into the EMS. A variation of this option would be to only allow facilities that had been through one iteration of state-required planning to use this option.

2. Develop an enhanced or advanced planning track. The advanced track could incorporate some of the systematic elements of an EMS that would help planning processes become more integrated into day-to-day business management. Incentives could be offered to facilities that select this track. For instance, Oregon is developing a Green Permits program which will provide incentives for facilities which implement environmental management systems and have stakeholder involvement and demonstrated improved performance.

3. Develop a set of EMS criteria that, if met, would substitute for a pollution prevention plan. These criteria would enable a facility that had in place key components of an EMS but was not necessarily seeking ISO certification, to allow that system to substitute for a pollution prevention plan. Washington State has selected this option.

4. Promote planning as a springboard for EMS/ISO certification. For example, Massachusetts companies that have complied with facility planning requirements have found that they have simultaneously completed much of the work required for ISO 14000 certification. A company, of course can still have an extremely effective EMS without ever having done a facility plan.

The state of Washington conducted a pilot project prior to adopting the policy option described in #3 above. In several of the pilot facilities, the existing system lacked an institutional mechanism for setting prevention-oriented targets. When asked for evidence of pollution prevention targets, several referenced those set through the pollution prevention planning process. This indicated a possible continued role for planning in the context of an EMS, to provide the impetus and expectation for setting prevention-oriented goals.

"Pollution prevention planning" and "environmental management systems" are clearly complementary, and have similar structures. At least two states (Washington and Oregon) are currently developing and implementing guidelines for using ISO 14001 certification as a surrogate for facility pollution prevention planning. This approach may address the issue of how to "institutionalize" pollution prevention planning while simultaneously allowing greater flexibility to facilities. Facility pollution prevention planning programs should carefully evaluate whether ISO-certified companies, or companies with environmental management systems in place, should be allowed to exit the pollution prevention planning program (outright or with additional informational requirements). Finally, viewing planning as a basis for ISO certification may be the most positive way to view the similarities between planning and EMSs. This way, programs do not run the risk of diluting the emphasis on source reduction over pollution control and management.

Should more states incorporate materials accounting reporting elements into their programs? Staff from the two states' environmental agencies with these requirements feel strongly that such analysis and reporting is the "heart" of their programs. The specificity of the New Jersey and Massachusetts materials use reporting requirements has led to numerous benefits to facilities and the programs themselves. Benefits associated with materials accounting reporting elements as part of planning requirements include:

1) increased facility knowledge regarding process efficiencies;

2) better unit pricing by facilities;

3) better information on materials in products, in processes and in waste streams;

4) better understanding of the flow of materials through production processe and

5) increased ability to measure pollution prevention effectiveness by both facilities and programs.

The downside to this type of requirement is its complexity. Firms felt that efficiency calculations were confusing; however, this may be because they had never undertaken this activity before. The value of the information derived from the analyses appears to have justified their efforts. Finally, if states should choose to focus planning efforts on smaller businesses, the resource requirements of these efforts could be more of an issue for those businesses.

Relationship of planning programs to traditional environmental regulatory (i.e., inspection, permitting, enforcement) programs. How can facility pollution prevention planning programs that reside within regulatory agencies leverage resources by more effectively incorporating planning requirements into regulatory programs (i.e., inspections, enforcement and permitting)? Planning requirements should be aligned for permitting and permit renewal requirements, to encourage prevention-based approaches for regulatory compliance.

In the enforcement arena, the study conducted by the U.S. EPA's Pollution Prevention Policy Office found a clear association between enforcement contacts and increased business interest in pollution prevention as a compliance strategy. Pollution prevention planning programs should work closely with enforcement programs to maximize the increased interest that facilities have in pollution prevention after an enforcement contact.

The Massachusetts study found that:

The TUR (Toxics Use Reduction) services in greatest need of improvement are in the area of TUR compliance and enforcement performed by inspectors located in regional offices. Although based on a limited sample, [the study] found that toxics use reduction strategies were not well integrated in regional compliance and enforcement activities. Few firms (four of 16) could recall toxics use reduction being mentioned during their inspections. Only five of 16 firms could recall inspectors reviewing their TUR plans. Generally speaking, inspectors seemed not to see TUR as an integral part of their compliance and inspection duties.

The study concludes that "A greater emphasis on TUR in multimedia compliance inspections and in enforcement would focus Massachusetts industry on the value of toxics use reduction." Similarly, in California, hazardous waste inspectors have had difficulty viewing source reduction planning requirements as a generator requirement they enforce. Efforts are underway to remedy this by providing more training for inspectors, and ensuring that inspection checklists include the planning requirement. Recognizing that the planning process may be more significant than the product (i.e., the planning document itself), hazardous waste inspectors that find facilities noncompliant with the planning requirements are instructed to use judgement when deciding when and how to use enforcement authority. Heavy-handed enforcement may be counterproductive (i.e., places the focus on the paperwork rather than on pollution prevention). Enforcement of planning requirements should be done, but in such a way as to achieve the desired result--that is, increased pollution prevention awareness and implementation.

Another model consists of inspectors making referrals to technical and compliance assistance programs when they discover facilities that have not complied with planning laws. Thorough integration of pollution prevention, including facility pollution prevention planning requirements, into regulatory approaches should have an added benefit--the strengthening of the "market" for pollution prevention expertise and technologies. The resource leveraging that occurs when pollution prevention is integrated into regulatory approaches could be significant.

How should facility planning programs best evaluate program effectiveness? "Prevention" programs of all kinds are notoriously difficult to assess. Measures that have been used in facility planning programs include: assessments of the value of the planning process, reductions achieved, cost savings, health and safety improvements, public relations improvements, improvements in product quality, market advantages, the level of employee participation, and increased industry awareness of pollution prevention. Some of these parameters are qualitative, some are quantitative. All have value and must be used to gain a complete picture of pollution prevention progress, and pollution prevention program effectiveness.

It is important that we keep in mind the specific goals of pollution prevention planning programs. Although it is presumed that the planning process leads to reductions in waste, the actual product of the requirements is the planning process itself, including the required documentation. Since waste is generated by facilities, only the facilities can be held accountable for the generation of the waste. The planning program evaluations reviewed for this white paper have shown that such programs do indeed lead to pollution prevention implementation.

In Massachusetts and New Jersey, with their materials accounting reporting element, normalizing quantitative data to production output is a valuable exercise and estimates production process efficiency. In addition, requiring the establishment of goals per unit of product to normalize at the process level provides for a true measure on which to base future analysis.

Facility planning programs, like other pollution prevention programs, use a three-fold approach to measuring pollution prevention progress: Facility/process-specific data is evaluated to determine the effectiveness of implemented source reduction strategies; Surveys are used to establish cause/effect relationships between program activities and facility pollution prevention implementation; and TRI (or manifest) data is used to establish overall trends in pollution generation (not necessarily directly related to pollution prevention planning programs). These measures have given programs a reasonably accurate picture of whether programs have had an effect on industry.

Obstacles to measurement. Pollution prevention advocates have been working on how best to measure pollution prevention progress for some time. Obstacles commonly encountered by facilities include changes in production rates, changes in products manufactured, changes in waste definitions, and other variables such as weather. Industries that produce, over time similar products via a routine production process (such as paint manufacturing) may have less difficulty in measuring progress. On the other hand, a job shop metal plater will generally have difficulty in finding ways to normalize waste generation data per production, since the quantity and type (i.e., shape) of the plated product may vary significantly from job to job. Pollution prevention programs are frustrated by the limitations of current data sets, which were not designed for assessing pollution prevention progress, and by the difficulty in establishing cause/effect relationships between public sector programs and private sector pollution prevention implementation.

Confidentiality provisions, which allow for protecting business information considered proprietary, are included in planning laws to assure that no competitive advantage is lost through the public disclosure of process information. There have been instances where some companies have hidden behind this proviso and withheld information that would have been useful in assessing progress. This makes data reporting and information inaccurate or incomplete, and prevents a true measurement of baseline values and progress.

There is a heavy reliance on Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes to determine statistically significant trends and other factors when measuring progress. The New Jersey data analyses show that there is often little correspondence between a facility's reported SIC code and the actual business activity that generates the waste/pollutants. For example, a utility company providing natural gas may generate waste from maintenance of its vehicle fleet. The primary SIC code for this facility is of limited use to describe the various waste-generating activities that take place at the site.

It is important to set up a quality assurance program for all data collected and used for analysis. Checks should account for reporting errors, changes due to plant closings or discontinued processes, etc. Baselines should be established based on accurate data, verified through established Quality Control protocols and procedures, which can be used to track consistently reportable chemicals throughout the time period of interest.

Finally, the continued confusion, and sometimes disagreement, about just what constitutes pollution prevention confounds measurement efforts.

How can/should we use planning data? State programs have varying uses for the pollution prevention data they collect. ("Data" here means both quantitative and qualitative data.) Some states are required to share technical pollution prevention information found within plans with similar businesses in the state. Many of the programs maintain databases cataloging the variety of pollution prevention measures that have been evaluated and/or implemented by facilities within the state.

There are additional uses for this data that could be considered by state programs. For instance, state facility pollution prevention planning programs should consider using data to identify research needs. Most planning laws require that businesses first identify potential options, then conduct a technical feasibility analysis. This process should be used to help identify pollution prevention technologies and strategies that need further research before widespread application is feasible. Communicating this information with researchers and technology developers in order to focus research on areas with the greatest need should have a beneficial effect on the overall progress of pollution prevention.

Pollution prevention data could be used to establish a benchmark for the base level of pollution prevention implementation that could and should be implemented within an industry type. Planning data could also be used in emergency response planning, educational programs and academic research.

Finally, data contained within the planning documents that are specific to amounts and rates of waste/pollution generation are and will continue to be used as part of process- and facility-specific measures of pollution prevention accomplishments.

Special projects. State programs should consider encouraging community-based groups to use the planning requirements to work with local businesses to implement more pollution prevention. States with public access provisions have found that, in general, the public has not availed itself of this opportunity to work with their local businesses to reduce waste. Again, states can leverage scarce resources by partnering with community-based groups to encourage public review of pollution prevention plans or summaries.

Facility planning information could also be used in situations where there is inadequate waste management capacity for specific wastes within a jurisdiction. Focusing source reduction efforts on facilities that generate such wastes could potentially obviate the need for additional treatment and/or disposal capacity.

Finally, the facility planning process could be used on a community level to identify contaminants of concern, sources of the contaminants, and pollution prevention strategies to address those contaminants.

VI) Recommendations

The Roundtable recommends that states that do not as yet have facility pollution prevention planning requirements consider instituting them as an effective vehicle for meeting pollution prevention goals. Other recommendations resulting from this analysis include:

Planning programs should ensure that requirements to perform complete financial analyses are included in planning laws, and that the potential benefits of adequately performing these analyses are sufficiently stressed to the regulated community during outreach and assistance activities.

State programs that do not contain a materials accounting reporting requirement in their facility planning program should be strongly urged to do so. State facility pollution prevention planning programs should consider using planning data to identify research needs. Pollution prevention data could be used to establish a benchmark for the base level of pollution prevention implementation for each industry.

Pollution prevention programs should work with regulatory programs (i.e., inspection, enforcement, and permitting) to ensure that consistent messages regarding the value of pollution prevention are conveyed via regulatory activities.

Conclusions. Facility pollution prevention planning requirements have been found to be a significant factor among the many incentives that facilities have to improve environmental performance. As one of the primary regulatory manifestations of states' pollution prevention policies, these planning requirements negotiate carefully between regulatory and voluntary approaches to pollution prevention. The regulatory nature of the requirements is essential in getting the attention of facility managers and environmental compliance personnel. However, the voluntary essence (i.e., actual selection and implementation of specific pollution prevention options is at the discretion of the facility) at the core of the program provides the requisite flexibility facilities must have to make appropriate business decisions without undue interference from government.

The pollution prevention planning process provides a structure for businesses to include environmental aspects of running a business into strategic planning and decision-making processes. This is essential if environmental issues are to be given the consideration necessary to achieve further environmental improvements. Indications are that the pollution prevention planning process is a step in that direction.

Facility planning programs fit well into current governmental efforts to achieve positive environmental results in flexible, innovative, and cost-effective ways. Planning programs' progress to date is an important start down the road to achieving environmental benefits, and complying with necessary environmental laws and regulations, in ways that are helpful to businesses. The progress based upon experiences to date has been verified. The Roundtable recommends that states that do not as yet have such requirements consider them as an effective motivator for pollution prevention.

Appendix 1

Materials Accounting

The comparison of the states' evaluation studies was undertaken in large part to determine whether materials accounting reporting requirements are generally effective and assess commonalities between the evaluations' findings, rather than to determine which programs were the most effective, or which program elements lead to best planning. For two states, however, a specific program element, materials accounting reporting, creates differences significant enough that the workgroup felt it important to provide specific discussion for this evaluation. There is much discussion of whether other state programs should endeavor to include materials accounting reporting into their programs.

In Massachusetts and New Jersey, firms are required to prepare pollution prevention plans that incorporate materials accounting information, in order to identify and evaluate changes in the materials, technologies or processes of production that would reduce or eliminate the use of targeted toxic chemicals or the generation of the toxic byproducts. Because of the stringent and potentially revealing nature of these evaluations, plans in these states are always confidential business documents, and remain on site following completion; this combination of a more rigorous, process-specific analysis with strict confidentiality may lead to these programs' resulting in more vigorous implementation of pollution prevention. Both New Jersey and Massachusetts require these computations to be based on a process-specific material accounting system. New Jersey also requires the submittal of a summary "materials throughput" analysis for the entire facility.

Massachusetts law requires firms to compute byproduct reduction and emission reduction indices. The indices compare to a base year a facility's generation of byproduct and emissions per unit of product. The law permits the firm to identify the two units of analysis upon which these indices are based: the production unit and the unit of product. New Jersey's program is similar: firms define their own production process and corresponding units of production. While this flexibility in the definition of production units and units of product has been helpful to the firms, it limits drawing conclusions from the data used in the aggregate, because the units are so highly varied and quantities of each chemical cannot be directly linked to each production unit.

Materials accounting data is useful during plan preparation both as a tool for accurately tracking materials through production processes and identifying points where wastes or emissions are or may be occurring, and for assessing the impact that the adoption of various pollution prevention strategies may have on reducing pollution. Firms are encouraged to prepare a materials balance on each production unit to account for all the process products and byproducts (or non-product outputs) by equating them against all of the material inputs. Chemical conversions within processes that change chemical outputs can then be accurately computed. Further materials accounting computations assist the firm at the point where feasibility analyses are being conducted to determine the material, cost and waste savings.

At the firm level, the materials accounting data provide the bases for computing facility-wide progress, and progress for each production unit for each chemical. In Massachusetts the company is only required to report this data as a percentage in the byproduct or emissions reduction index.

To use the materials accounting data effectively to assess pollution prevention progress, it is necessary to normalize the data to an economic activity index to account for fluctuations in the economy. The use and byproduct data can be normalized through the use of production indices, such as the "production ratio" used in the federal Toxics Release Inventory, to arrive at a facility or state-wide normalized measure of pollution prevention progress.

In many cases, the materials accounting procedures have stimulated important pollution prevention improvements. The Massachusetts Office of Technical Assistance has identified scores of cases where managers working to complete materials accounting calculations discovered surprising options for improvements. The management of one firm discovered that they were sending a large percentage of unreacted acid to waste treatment. Another realized that their measure of productivity was missing waste generated at each step. Where cost information has been included in the materials tracking system, this has led to a better attribution of costs and a fuller understanding of the total costs of using toxic chemicals.

An example of how materials accounting benefits the planning process involves a paper company that uses high volumes of acids, bases and chemicals which are largely consumed or neutralized within the facility boundaries. In reporting under the TRI, the staff made assumptions and calculated estimated emissions without significant analysis. When the firm had to report under TURA, the staff began a more thorough analysis of chemical use. Early indicators of inefficiencies led to the establishment of a tracking system for chemical use by unit of product on a daily basis. Results from this tracking system were used to identify operations and maintenance improvements, and to more closely regulate the input of chemicals to processes. In 1993, this resulted in more than one million pounds of avoided toxic chemical use and a considerable cost savings.

Appendix 2
Abstracts of State Pollution prevention Facility Planning Program Evaluations
(for complete information, see cited study)

1. State of New Jersey, Department of Environmental Protection "Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Pollution prevention Planning in New Jersey--A Program-Based Evaluation", May 1996

115 New Jersey facilities were evaluated for this study. In general, planning appeared to be successful in leading some facilities to identify new pollution prevention opportunities, although not all aspects of planning were equally successful and not all facilities benefitted equally.

A majority of facilities found planning worthwhile and found benefits beyond reduction goals and fulfilling regulatory requirements. Process-level materials accounting was a successful (and, in many cases, new) planning tool in examining processes for reduction opportunities. Some facilities appear to have set higher reduction goals than they would have without required planning, leading to an increased state-wide total for use and non-product output (NPO) reduction goals. Pollution prevention opportunities continue to be plentiful at facilities with pollution prevention plans and activities prior to the New Jersey requirements.

The required cost accounting was not associated with greater pollution prevention reduction goals (largely because most facilities did not perform a cost analysis as specified in the planning rule). Facilities that did undertake the full cost analysis did not appear to benefit more than those that did not, in terms of creating a better plan or greater reduction goals. "Small" facilities benefitted less from the planning process than larger facilities. Planning appeared to be less effective for facilities with smaller amounts of non-product output, since these facilities set lower percent use reduction goals than facilities generating greater amounts of NPO. Many are reluctant to "tamper" with operations that are running well and are profitable, even though small reductions in NPO generation can provide cost savings. Average savings from reduction projects outweigh planning costs. Facilities that could estimate their costs spent an average of $35,000 on planning activities; the cost per facility drops to $13,000 when calculating planning costs using an average salary and time figures provided by facilities. At the same time, facilities that predict cost savings from their actions to reduce toxics use and NPO expect to save an average of $116,000 per year, including facilities that had not estimated actual savings. The average annual savings is $66,000 for all facilities that were able to state that they would or would not save money through planning. There is still considerable confusion about just what constitutes pollution prevention.

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection's preliminary results indicated that planning paid for itself eight-fold, including administrative costs of the program. For more information, contact Jeanne Herb or Melinda Dower at (609) 777-0518

2. Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission "Is Pollution prevention Planning Beneficial in Texas?" 1995 (Gayle Bowles Haecker, Baylor University)

An independent survey was conducted in Texas to assess the benefits of pollution prevention planning from an industry perspective. Approximately 190 facilities were surveyed; approximately 60% responded. Key results:

80% considered the planning document to be beneficial to their facility 77% broke even or had a net cost savings from pollution prevention activities 48% had a net cost savings of $40,000 or greater 37% may become small quantity generators within 3 years due to pollution prevention efforts, thereby reducing environmental regulatory reporting requirements Increased environmental awareness and management support occurred after the plan was in place.

For more information, contact David James of the TNRCC at (512) 239-3184.

3. Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance "1996 Pollution prevention Evaluation Report"

60% of the 1994 progress reports showed a reduction in the use or release of at least one TRI chemical. Facilities establishing numeric pollution prevention objectives were more successful in achieving reductions in TRI releases than facilities establishing non-numeric objectives.

For more information, contact Ade Babatunde at (612) 215-0222.

4. The Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Program, "Evaluating Progress--A Report on the Findings of the Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Program Evaluation", March 1997

This report draws together the results of several efforts: Three studies conducted by independent contractors, An inventory and assessment of the programs and activities undertaken by the TURA agencies in fulfillment of the mandates of the Toxics Use Reduction Act, and Analysis of the TURA data

Findings include:

When adjusted for changes in production, the normalized percent change (reduction) in products was 30%, from 1992 to 1995 67 percent of study respondents identified cost savings due to program implementation 66 percent of study respondents identified worker health and safety improvements About half of the firms studied in-depth stated that planning was a major factor in driving them to consider and implement toxics use reduction Toxics use reduction planner training and Office of Technical Assistance site visits were regarded as the most useful TURA agency resources From 1990-1997, total monetized TURA costs were $76.6 million; total monetized benefits were $90.5 million (not including unquantifiable benefits such as decreased risk for workers, increased revenue from improvements in processes and products, value of data to public data users, etc.)

5. "Oregon's Toxic Use Reduction Program--How Well is it Working?" presentation by Sandy Gurkewitz, Toxics Use Reduction Program Coordinator, 11/1/96

Oregon's evaluation study showed that waste decreased by 12,000 tons from 1992 to 1994. Individual waste streams show a reduction trend, while other waste streams have reduced, but not enough data exist to show trends.

"Initial" planners have shown a slight shift from SQG to CEG. "Second wave" planners have shown a dramatic shift from SQG to CEG. LQGs in both groups have stayed about the same.

Planning has led to a reduction in the use of certain toxic chemicals, and TUR planning has helped focus environmental management practices.

For more information, contact Sandy Gurkewitz at (503) 229-5918.

6. "Report by the State Auditor of California--Review of the California Department of Toxic Substances Control's Implementation of the Hazardous Waste Source Reduction and Management Review Act of 1989", 1993

In a majority of cases for generators that complied with the planning requirements, the process motivated implementation of hazardous waste reduction measures over and above what otherwise would have been implemented; and contributed in most cases to a net reduction in the generation of hazardous waste over and above what otherwise would have been achieved.

A separate survey conducted in 1995 by program staff surveyed 1102 companies. Findings included:

82% of the hazardous waste generators reported that they had found waste minimization opportunities (reduced their generation of hazardous waste) over the last three years. 71% reduced waste generation up to 25 tons during this period. 5% reported a reduction of 25-50 tons; 5% reported a reduction of more than 100 tons. 89% of the generators reported cost savings during the last three years. 66% reported savings up to $25,000. 5% reported savings of greater than $100,000 during the same period. Additional data evaluations conducted by state staff indicate that the universe of generators subject to source reduction planning requirements has decreased, due to the implementation of source reduction measures coupled with decreased production in the state. The number of generators subject to the law has decreased by 31% from 1990 to 1994.

An evaluation of the state's largest waste-generating industry, the petroleum industry, indicates that this industry achieved nearly a 33% decrease in generated wastes comparing 1990 to 1994. Annual savings for the industry range from $11,000,000 to $67,000,000. Preliminary findings from the 1994 facility planning document reviews indicate a potential further reduction of an additional 25% (36,000 tons) during the next several years. If realized, this achievement will create additional annual waste disposal cost savings of between $4,500,000 and $27,000,000.

For more information, contact Kathryn Barwick at (916) 323-9560.

7. Washington State "Evaluation of Participant Feedback", Washington State Department of Ecology Pollution prevention Planning Program, Martha Prothro, R. Marc Steiner, Ross & Associates, December 1995

Almost all (96%) of facilities surveyed identified pollution prevention opportunities in their required plans and are currently implementing or have fully implemented those opportunities. Although some facilities reported that some of these activities were underway before 1990, the evidence is very strong that the planning process did result in more and quicker hazardous substance use and waste generation reductions than would have occurred without the law. The majority of facilities reported that they are generating less waste (91%), using less or fewer hazardous chemicals (89%), and recycling more waste (79%) as a result of implementing measures identified in their plans. The planning process has contributed to improved environmental management (including pollution prevention) at many facilities, but additional progress can be made. A substantial majority of survey respondents (74%) said that the planning process has elevated the visibility of environmental considerations in business operations or management decisions. Although a majority (61%) of facilities expect to continue to identify pollution prevention opportunities, many believe they have identified the more obvious and, in some cases, their most significant prevention opportunities through the early planning process. However, there is also evidence that only a few have established continuous, rigorous evaluation programs that will reveal the less obvious or more complex opportunities and the true costs associated with treatment and disposal alternatives to pollution prevention measures. An ongoing requirement or incentive to adopt systematic pollution prevention planning can be expected to produce additional improvements in overall environmental management at more facilities in the future. Facilities found many components of the planning process to be useful, but criticized the detailed requirements for some of these components and wanted more flexibility in carrying out the planning process. Facilities are most likely to implement pollution prevention measures that they expect to benefit their own operations through improved worker health and safety, reduced costs, and/or reduced regulatory requirements. The assistance provided to facilities by Department of Ecology staff was excellent and helped contribute to an improved relationship between the regulated communities and the Department of Ecology. Most facilities either have experienced or expect to experience benefits as a result of the pollution prevention planning process. 89% found that the planning process led to improved communications with Ecology. To a lesser extent, planning also led to improved communications among employees at the facility, between employees and managers and between facilities and suppliers. Improved materials management and improved understanding of other regulatory requirements were the other most frequently cited indirect benefits of the planning process. 83% of the facilities reported they have experienced or expect to experience improved worker health and safety. 79% have realized direct cost savings. 62% have realized reduced regulatory requirements. 58% have improved process efficiency as a result of implementing their pollution prevention plans. While it is not possible to attribute all of these benefits to the required planning process because other factors were motivating facilities to move toward pollution prevention at the same time, the process clearly contributed to these benefits and, for some facilities, likely caused them to occur.

The Washington State study made the following recommendations:

The program should increase its overall emphasis on systematic environmental management. The upcoming requirement to repeat the planning process in five years should be careful evaluated and the planning process improved to account for legitimate facility concerns. (Facilities were generally quite negative about having to repeat the planning exercise.) Accommodating these concerns may lead to the development of an "exit" strategy to reward good performers.

For more information, contact Lynn Helbrecht at (360) 407-6760.

8. Draft "Study of Industry Motivation for Pollution prevention", U.S. EPA Pollution prevention Policy Office, April 23, 1997

Two groups of businesses were surveyed to determine pollution prevention motivators. Representing smaller businesses were approximately 500 lithographers; representing larger businesses were approximately 500 facilities required to report under the TRI program. Selected findings:

Almost half the printers and two thirds of the larger businesses reported conducting their pollution prevention evaluations as part of government-required pollution prevention plans. Production managers in Massachusetts and New Jersey--the states with the most detailed planning requirements--answered several questions differently than similar firms in the rest of the country. Such respondents from smaller firms were more likely to report that state pollution prevention planning requirements were very important in first getting them to consider environmental issues in their jobs. Traditional regulatory programs were almost unrivaled in bringing the attention of business decision-makers to their environmental obligations. For large manufacturers, contact with enforcement personnel was associated with reductions in TRI waste normalized for production. In addition, for this group's managers, environmental regulatory requirements ranked near the top of issues considered very important in their jobs. Government publications and assistance providers did not rank high among reported sources of environmental information about alternative practices or technologies. However, contact with assistance and enforcement organizations increased the reported importance of government publications and assistance providers as sources of environmental information. Such contact also increased the reported influence of government employees. Total Quality Management plans ranked just behind government-required pollution prevention plans in connection with evaluations of alternative practices and technologies.

For more information, contact Sheila Canavan, U.S. EPA, at (202) 260-8616.

9. Draft report, "Survey of Industrial Pollution Prevention Planning Practices", January 1997, The Business Roundtable Industrial Pollution prevention Council

On behalf of the Business Roundtable, the Waste Reduction Institute for Training and Applications Research (WRITAR) and the Center for Economic Development at Carnegie Mellon University surveyed small/medium enterprises (SME) and large manufacturing facilities (Business Roundtable members) to gain information on how manufacturing facilities conduct and administer facility level pollution prevention planning efforts. The study objectives were to determine whether planning laws create good plans, and to determine whether good plans create good results. Among the draft findings:

mandated planning requirements were more significant for the small and medium enterprises(SME) than for the larger, Business Roundtable (BRT), members as a motivator for pollution prevention planning. 7% of the BRT member facilities, and 42% of the SME facilities, conducted planning as a result of mandatory planning requirements. for the BRT member facilities, 80% believe existing pollution prevention opportunities are yet to be discovered. SMEs were more likely than the BRT facilities to agree with the following statements: "mandatory planning strengthened our management commitment to pollution prevention" "mandatory planning made us focus on issues that would not otherwise be environmental management priorities" "mandatory planning made us investigate materials uses in more detail"

Further work for this study will investigate the link between pollution prevention planning and results.

Appendix 3
National Pollution Prevention Roundtable

The National Pollution Prevention Roundtable (the Roundtable) is the largest membership organization in the United States devoted solely to pollution prevention (P2). The Roundtable provides a national forum for promoting the development, implementation, and evaluation of efforts to avoid, eliminate, or reduce pollution at the source.

The Roundtable's voting membership include state, local, and tribal government pollution prevention programs. Affiliate members include representatives from federal agencies, non-profit groups, and private industry. Public sector members located in every state and internationally, operate programs that provide pollution prevention information and technical assistance to thousands of industrial, commercial, and agricultural facilities each year. This information helps many of these facilities reduce the cost of both production and environmental compliance. The result is improved efficiency, increased competitiveness and a better environment.

The Roundtable hosts annual conferences which provide members a forum for exchanging the latest in pollution prevention (P2) research, policy funding opportunities, and technical expertise. The last conference in Denver, Colorado in April, 1997 attracted over 600 representatives from the public, private and government sectors.

Roundtable Workgroups, List Servers and Web Site Information Roundtable members may participate in Roundtable workgroups which focus on special cutting edge issues related to pollution prevention. The following are the Roundtable workgroups: 1) Regulatory Integration, 2) Local Government, 3) Facility Planning and Measurement, 4) Technology and Research, 5) Information/Technology Transfer, 6) Education, Training, and Learning, 7) ISO 14000, 8) International, and 9) Small business.

The Roundtable has four electronic list servers, P2 Tech, P2 Reg, P2 Trainer, and NPPR within its network that function as forums for sharing P2 information. A list server acts as a message redirector for a group of subscribers. A message posted by any member automatically transmits to every other subscriber. The service is free but you must contact the Roundtable office to subscribe. To subscribe to any of these list servers, e-mail the Roundtable: Tyronefoster@compuserve.com

The Roundtable's home page is located at: http://www.p2.org

For any further information about the Roundtable or to become a member please contact the Roundtable office:

2000 P Street NW Suite 708
Washington D.C. 20036
Phone: 202/466-P2P2
Fax: 202/466-7964

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