EPA New England: Greening Our Operations

Environmental Management Systems

Processes and procedures that help us analyze, control and reduce the environmental impacts from our operations

At EPA New England, we have an Environmental Management System (EMS) for our Boston office and Chelmsford laboratory.  These are helping us reach a higher level of environmental excellence – preventing pollution and complying (or going beyond compliance) with our regulatory requirements.  The EMS also ensures environmental accountability is built into both our day-to-day activities and our long term strategies, helping us continually improve performance.

Through the EMS structure, we evaluate and prioritize the full range of our environmental impacts.  We’re identifying ways to reduce water and energy usage, improve tracking of waste management, and, overall, reduce the pollutants we emit into the environment.  Our environmental policies commit us to lead by example to ensure that we do in our own operations what we’re asking of others.

We’ve adopted an innovative implementation approach, coordinating and integrating our EMS with our regional Green Team.  To learn more about the successes at our Boston and Chelmsford facilities:

One Congress Street, Boston, Massachusetts
An EMS for an office environment

New England Regional Laboratory, Chelmsford, Massachusetts
An EMS for a laboratory

EPA is promoting and encouraging the use of an EMS for both public and private sector facilities. If you’re thinking about developing an EMS for your organization, or just want to learn what the buzz is all about, check out these links for resources, case studies and more:

New England Environmental Management Systems
Contacts, projects, resources and other information about EMS in New England

Environmental Management Systems, HQ
National EPA site for EMS implementation and resources for specific sectors including businesses, state and federal agencies. Benefits, costs, FAQs, and lots more.

Regional Snapshot Both EPA New England facilities, Boston office and Chelmsford laboratory, have received EMS certification from headquarters.