11.

Discuss the steps involved concerning the development and implementation of a

pollution prevention plan for a large three shift manufacturing operation that employs over
300 people and has multiple operating units such as shipping/receiving, administrative
offices, raw/finished product storage, warehouse facilities, quality control laboratories, and
manufacturing.
Answer
The initial step will involve identifying the specific goals envisioned for the pollution
prevention plan. For this case, possible goals would include:
a. Reduction of the release and use of toxic and hazardous chemicals in the manufacturing
b.
c.
d.
e.

sector
Reduction of contamination in the raw materials and the finished products
Reduction in the pollution caused by use of toxic and hazardous laboratory chemicals
Affirmative procurement to ensure proper recycling of industry and office wastes
Ensuring proper consumption of consumable materials like water and power

After identifying the goals of the pollution prevention plan, the next step is to convince the
top management of the company on the viability of the proposal. Present the goals to the
management with supportive reasons, and the need for urgent solution to the environmental
challenges within the company. This will ensure smooth flow of the plan and also enable the
management to make better decisions on the plan.
Once you are assured of the management support, the next step is to constitute staff that will
oversee the development and implementation of the prevention plan. This can be made up of the
company employees or external personnel. The team should be led by environmental specialist
personnel. Every member must be briefed of his responsibility in the plan. Proper training can be

conducted. The duties and responsibility of each staff must be in line with the goals of the
program.
After having the staff in place, the baseline of the pollution prevention plan needs to be
developed. A comprehensive overview of the company pollutants, their associated causal
activities and their impacts on the environment should be outlined. Collecting relevant
information from different departments in the company is necessary to give factual support to the
claims.
The next step would be to identify the pollution prevention activities and access the available
opportunities. The collected and sampled scenarios in the baseline data would be useful in
identifying the activities and discover the opportunities that can lead to the solution of the
mentioned pollution sources in the company.
With the activities and opportunities identified, the next step is to prioritize the activities in
terms of urgency, cost and ease to solve. Usually focus on the most urgent cases, and match them
to the associated opportunities identified. This will help in the implementation phase.
The next and final step of planning process is to get management reassurance of support
before the implementation begins. This is necessary so that the project is not crippled once
implementation is initiated due to management issues. Let the company management be
convinced that all requirements are in place.
Finally, the plan is implemented. The staff takes onto their duties and the team leader
supervises the progress of every activity in the implementation. Here, reference must be made to
the stated goals to ensure the objectives are met.Every deliverables need to be documented, and
relevant management authorities informed on progress.

References
(n.d.) Retrieved from http://www.labtrain.noaa.gov/ppguide/ffpp_14.html
Walter, N. (2012) Pollution prevention guide. N.Y, New York: United States. Workman
publishers