Implementing Proactive Environmental Management. Lessons Learned from Best Commercial Practice
Abstract
From 1990 to 1995, as the total defense budget fell from $315 to 291 billion a year, DoD environmental spending rose to $5.2 billion a year. At the same time, increasingly tight environmental regulations constrained training and vessel mobility in DoD, potentially limiting military readiness. These trends brought environmental management into high focus. Was DoD making appropriate trade-offs among (1) its military mission, (2) its environmental obligations, and (3) constraints on its budget and other resources? Were there opportunities- to increase military performance without compromising environmental obligations or resource constraints? During the 1980s and early 1990s, many U.S. firms found themselves in a similar situation. Even as their environmental obligations were rising in the face of increasingly demanding regulations and threats of liability, increasingly effective global competition squeezed their profit margins, forcing these firms to think about environmental management in a different way. The Office of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Environmental Security asked RAND to study the environmental management practices of commercial firms recognized as having the best practices of this kind. Such practices should provide lessons that DoD could use to improve its own environmental management practices-. This report summarizes the findings of the study that resulted from this request.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- ADA399305
Entities
People
- Beth E. Lachman
- Frank A. Camm
- Jeffrey A. Drezner
- Susan A. Resetar
Organizations
- RAND Corporation