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16 June 2010

Never Forget Compliance

When I put together my model of the business case for sustainability (below), I um'd and ahh'd for a long time whether to include "compliance" in the model. My argument for putting it in is that compliance underpins the whole rest of the pyramid - if you miss compliance, it doesn't matter how well everything else goes, the whole pyramid will collapse. With BP's share value plummeting and Union Carbide staff getting jail sentences for the 1984 Bhopal disaster, I'm now glad I put it in there.

The Business Case for Sustainability

No matter how much we preach going "beyond compliance", many businesses will only move when they are forced to. With legislation like the UK's CRC Energy Efficiency scheme and the EU's WEEE directive, businesses who traditionally thought they were outside the compliance net are finding they have to get their act sorted out PDQ.

Going "beyond compliance" does not mean ignoring compliance issues. It can mean insulating a business from certain compliance issues by, say, eliminating toxic materials from production processes. As legislation moves from limiting the worst instances (eg Bhopal, Gulf of Mexico) to driving all businesses towards a greener future (eg CRC, WEEE), everyone is in the net. I got a nice quote from Paula Widdowson of Northern Foods in an interview for my forthcoming second book, The Green Executive: "Legislation will never lead you, but it will push you."

So the lesson is: "never forget compliance".

Tags: beyond compliance, bp, compliance, crc, weee

Posted by Gareth Kane no responses

7 March 2008

A WEEE thing to be aware of...

This week I've dealt with my second large company, another major household name, who hasn't fully understood their responsibilities under the Waste Electrical & Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive. The Directive has been developed to ensure that those who produce or sell electronic and electrical equipment make a financial contribution to its recycling.

But the Directive also requires all businesses to ensure that their own WEEE (ie computers, fluorescent tubes) is collected and disposed of properly. The two companies have been so focussed on getting the producer responsibility side of their commitment right, they haven't realised this further requirement applies to their own waste.

Be warned...

Tags: legislation, weee

Posted by Gareth Kane no responses

5 October 2007

SME awareness of legislation still poor, but improving

This year's NetRegs survey of UK Small and Medium Enterprises has shown a sudden jump in awareness of environmental issues and legislation - but the overall result is still poor. Only one in four small business owners can name one piece of environmental legislation that applies to them - despite the fact that all businesses have a duty of care for their waste and all are expected to recycle their Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE). The only good news is that this is up from one in seven last year.

Something I have come across this year is unscrupulous companies trying use this lack of awareness to scare people into accepting their services. One lady, who ran a jewellers' shop, had been told by a waste company that the Landfill Directive now meant that all waste had to be pre-treated before it is landfilled - the implication being only this company could provide a legal landfill service. Pre-treatment is indeed required, but the Environment Agency expects the waste management industry to deal with this requirement - not small businesses and retailers.

So there is a double imperative to understand environmental legislation - to make sure your business is neither hauled up in court by the Environment Agency nor ripped off by the sharks.

Tags: environment agency, landfill directive, legislation, SMEs, weee

Posted by Gareth Kane no responses

27 June 2007

Legislation bites

It is a busy time on the legislation front with the Registration, Evaluation and Authorisation of Chemicals (REACH) directive coming into force on 1st June and the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive's latter stages coming into force in the UK on 1st July.

I've been pretty impressed with the businesses I have visited over the last few months - most of them have understood the implications of both and have action plans in motion. I did however speak to one major highstreet retail chain who had an unrelated query about some electrical devices. The end of the conversation went:

Me: "You do realise they come under the WEEE directive."
Client: "Ah, but, we're not selling them."
Me: "Doesn't matter, you still need to dispose of them via an approved facility."
Client: (long silence) "Oh."

I'm not surprised he hadn't grasped this as most of the focus on the legislation has been on domestic WEEE and it is more difficult to find information on industrial WEEE. The moral of the story is to make sure you do understand exactly what the implications are for your business. Trade bodies are a good source of information and your regulator can help (certainly in England & Wales, the Environment Agency tries to be a coach as well as a policeman).

UK businesses can also contact Envirowise on any environmental issue relating to your business - the phone number is 0800 585794. The NetRegs website is also good, but seems to have become a little harder to navigate in the last couple of years.

Tags: legislation, reach, weee

Posted by Gareth Kane no responses

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