It was my experience with the challenges of keeping up with environmental monitoring and compliance that led me to DECA Environmental 18 years ago. Small, straightforward operations and large, complex facilities all struggle with creating efficient and accurate processes to keep them in compliance. There was and still is a need in the marketplace for outsourced experts. One of our long-time clients, Phil Williamson, Director Environmental Health and Safety for Autoneum North America Inc., recently spoke with me about the value he finds in the outsourced environmental compliance services we provide to his complex, multi-national organization.
“We are a Swiss-owned company with a corporate office located in South West Michigan, nine locations in North America, two in Canada, and three in Mexico. We manufacture acoustical and thermal products for the auto industry, focused on pretty much anything that protects cars against heat and noise. When I took over the environmental portion of our business in 2005, I went looking for legal compliance help. Internally, monitoring and reporting for all of our facilities was an impossible task. We looked to DECA Environmental to manage our air and storm water permitting, Tier 2 and Form R reporting, and ISO 14001 health and safety requirements.
Does this situation sound familiar to your business: With every update in our manufacturing process comes a potential air permit headache. Every piece of new equipment must be evaluated and permitted prior to installation. Any changes to the chemicals we use have to be analyzed for their effects on air emissions, potential new hazardous or general waste streams, and proper disposal methods. DECA serves as our environmental consultant for any manufacturing activities that are regulated. And while I have a strong relationship with Jim Euler built over the years, he has also taken the time to get to know my people as well, so he can work directly with them and leave me to fulfill other priorities.
DECA’s work has also helped with our ISO 140001 certification by performing internal audits, uncovering and correcting inefficiencies, and helping the plants implement better systems. All this work is done with the goal of ensuring every one of our facilities is in compliance, while finding cost-saving opportunities like waste reduction and streamlined monitoring and reporting processes.
DECA’s Online SDS System may be the most impactful service they provide us, at least on a daily basis. Their system was exactly what we needed, and we love it. SDS sheets are one of the hardest things to maintain in a plant environment. You buy a material or chemical and give your safety person the SDS sheet, who puts it into a book. The sheet or the book then gets lost or isn’t updated. With DECA’s Online SDS System, we scan the SDS and send it to DECA, who then uploads it to the cloud-based system. Now we can always find it and easily print labels across the whole company. We use the system throughout all of our plants in North America and truly appreciate the ease of use and hands-off nature of the system.
Jim is very familiar with our organization and plants, and has contacts at each of the facilities that he deals with directly. This relationship makes using DECA for our environmental reporting even more valuable. He has access to the reports from our SAP system, and transposes any information needed for our permits. He goes directly to the source for proper signatures at the plant level, and sends the final report to the regulating bodies. His involvement takes a big load off of me, and he is diligent about keeping me informed. We just certified one of our plants with the new ISO 14001 standards. We were able to do this because our time is not being spent directly managing our environmental monitoring and compliance. We have DECA for that! Jim and his team are knowledgeable and they share their expertise generously, to the benefit of our business.”
Does Phil’s experience have you thinking about the value outsourced environmental compliance services could bring to your company? Send us an email or give us a call at (317)575-0095 for more information on how DECA Environmental can help.