Environmental Management Systems and DOE

1
Environmental Management Systems and DOEs
Office of Site Closure

• Presented to the
• Environmental Management Summit
• for Government Facilities
• by
• James J. Fiore
• Deputy Assistant Secretary for Site Closure
• Office of Environmental Management, Department of
  Energy
• July 19, 2000

2
DOE Responsibility for EO 13148

• The Department of Energys Office of
  Environment, Safety, and Health has the lead for
  implementing Executive Order 13148, Greening the
  Government Through Leadership in Environmental
  Management

3
DOEs EO 13148 Implementation

• Implementation will be through incorporation into
  the Integrated Safety Management System
  emphasizing roles and responsibilities,
  programmatic functions, and performance measures
• EMS, a key part of ISMS, provides a systematic
  way of evaluating work and ensuring it is
  performed in a safe and environmentally compliant
  manner

4
DOEs Environmental Cleanup Program

• DOE has an Office of Environmental Management
  where we address the legacy of the Cold War
• EM is responsible for 113 sites
• These sites range from a few acres to 1350 square
  miles
• EM must address radioactive materials, hazardous
  wastes, and soil and groundwater contamination

5
EMs Scope

• What does this responsibility include?
• Treating, storing, and disposing of radioactive,
  hazardous, and mixed waste
• Cleaning up or stabilizing contamination
• Managing nuclear materials
• Decommissioning, dismantling, and disposing of
  facilities no longer of use to DOE

6
The Office of Site Closures Scope

• The Office of Site Closure (OSC) is responsible
  for 109 of EMs 113 sites
• OSC addresses sites that can be closed, or where
  EMs responsibilities can be completed, in the
  near term
• Rocky Flats - Fernald - Los Alamos
• Nevada Test Site - Mound - Oak Ridge
• OSC is responsible for 40 (2.3B) of EMs
  budget

7
OSCs Vision

• Our vision helps us focus on environmental
  management systems, and ensures we implement our
  program in an environmentally responsible manner
• Set the standard for safe, cost-effective closure
  of nuclear facilities
• Be the model for transitioning Government
  activities from operations to closure

8
OSCs Vision

• Achieve end-states that are safe now and enable
  protective, effective stewardship for the future
• Deploy new technologies to help the drive toward
  closure
• Focus on closing sites under our responsibility
  by 2006

9
OSCs Approach

• Continue progress in cleaning up sites while
  maintaining emphasis on environmental management
  systems
• Continue environmental management reviews and
  information sharing/lessons learned
• ENVIRONMENTAL COMPLIANCE IS A GIVEN
• EMS helps us be smarter and more efficient

10
OSCs Focus

• Minimizing generation of wastes requiring future
  treatment or disposal
• Ensuring efficient operations
• Increasing worker safety
• Reducing worker exposures
• Saving time and money

11
OSCs Near Term Goals

• Learn from other agencies and countries and apply
  those lessons to our program
• See our OSC web site at http//www.em.doe.gov/clos
  ure
• See our Lessons Learned web site at
  http//www.em.doe.gov/lessons
• Improve environmental cleanup practices to yield
  safer, better, faster results
• New/improved technologies

12
OSCs Near Term Goals

• Work with other agencies to establish the Federal
  Facility Closure Council to focus on issues
  associated with site closure
• Information sharing leads to operational
  improvements
• Incorporate more environmental management reviews
  into our operations to ensure and document
  environmentally responsible cleanups
• Waste minimization and pollution prevention

13
An OSC-EMS Example

• Each DOE site has a pollution prevention/
• waste minimization (P2/WMin) coordinator
• These P2/WMin coordinators have invited off-site
  experts to review operations
• Opportunities identified at LEHR may result in
  51 reduction in LLW volumes and save over 1M
• Other P2/WMin opportunities identified at Rocky
  Flats and Brookhaven

14
Another OSC-EMS Example

• Groundwater sampling generates 3-5 well volumes
  of waste purge water per sampling event
• Purge Water Management System wells eliminate
  these waste volumes
• Deployment at Livermore and other sites is
  expected to save 1300/well per year

15
Conclusion

• DOEs EM Program has already applied many of EO
  13148s concepts
• P2/WMin activities and other green concepts
  produce win-win results
• Less waste is better for the environment and also
  saves money
• We look forward to continuing to apply the EMS
  approach to our challenges