| How Will Federal Agency Sustainability be Achieved? |
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| Environment - Environment |
| Written by Daniel Stouffer |
| Sunday, 22 November 2009 10:12 |
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While we tend to think of large industrial complexes, the fact is that the federal government is in fact the largest carbon emitter and user of energy. There are so many individual departments, hundreds of thousands of employees, vehicles and buildings it is surprising the issue of agency sustainability has not achieved more focus in the popular press.
While we tend to think of large industrial complexes, the fact is that the federal government is in fact the largest carbon emitter and user of energy. There are so many individual departments, hundreds of thousands of employees, vehicles and buildings it is surprising the issue of agency sustainability has not achieved more focus in the popular press. Previous executive orders have covered environmental issues and energy matters but have never really focused on the core problem, that of carbon emissions attached to energy usage. President Obama's executive order-514 put this problem front and center as it called for Federal departments to take responsibility for its agency sustainability. Within 90 days, agency senior management has to develop a concerted plan and return this information to the executive branch. They will need to determine the size of their emissions and also report their targets for reductions and how they are going to go about achieving this. It may seem straightforward on paper, but this will be one of the biggest challenges they have ever faced. Within the private sector, large and distributed organizations have turned to individual companies that provide solutions and software products to help them address sustainability. These solutions focus on individual asset performance and correlate all this information to form the bigger picture. The federal government has such a reach into communities around the country but meaningful measures to address its greenhouse gas emissions and energy usage will undoubtedly have a very significant and unfolding, knock on effect. As each individual employee is impacted by the changes, he or she is certain to carry the mantra back into the community at large. The ultimate goal of an environmentalist should be to persuade each individual person to become "green." It is said that true change can only come from individual action, but as the federal government is responsible for so much intrusion into our lives on a daily basis, a widespread attempt to achieve agency sustainability may go a long way to achieving the goal. While carbon emissions is the biggest issue covered by Obama's executive order, agencies are also required to take stock of their waste production and disposal and consolidate the water resource usage. The order also dictates that new federal buildings are fully sustainable. The executive order issued by Obama will help to silence some of the critics of US inaction. It will be more difficult for Congress to pass legislation impacting companies in the private sector, but it seems certain that this will develop over time. About the Author: Daniel Stouffer has a lot of data about agency sustainability and how a visit to www.verisae.com will aid you. |