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Significant and Quantifiable Results
Darren Wong from the Office of Management and Budget and Julie Pollitt from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration testify to the leadership of EPA in using performance management in research and development programs. *This video is not yet captioned. Captioning is forthcoming. Go to our contact us page for assistance.
- Integrated Management Systems
- Ensuring that Partners and the Public have Critical Information
- Learning by Doing
- Culture and Language
EPA has steadfastly embraced an integrated performance management culture that delivers results. The creation of EPAStat provides the Agency a unifying and reinforcing philosophy that integrates management systems, makes information available to managers and staff in consistent and meaningful ways, informs decisions in a structured manner, and promotes understanding and common language around a culture of performance management. As a result of this commitment, EPA is delivering environmental results, incorporating the expertise, experience and perspectives of strategic partners into its "clear line of sight," and improving its operations. EPA is proud of its accomplishments and is gladly sharing its best practices and lessons learned with the broader Federal Government.
Some of these accomplishments include:
- 2007 marked the 20th Anniversary of the Montreal Protocol. Since signing in 1987, the United States has achieved a 90% reduction in the production and consumption of ozone-depleting substances, ending the production and import of more than 1.7 billion pounds of these chemicals per year.
- The 12 most significant enforcement actions taken in 2007 result in an estimated 507 million pounds of reduced, treated, or eliminated sulfur oxides (SOx), and particulate matter (PM), with an estimated $3.8 billion human health benefit from emissions reductions that will result in fewer premature deaths, non-fatal heart attacks and reduced incidence of bronchitis and asthma attacks.
- EPA's Brownfield's and Land Revitalization Program assessed 2,139 properties, cleaned up 91 properties, leveraged 5,504 jobs and $1.4 billion in cleanup and redevelopment funding, and made 1,269 acres ready for reuse through site assessment or property cleanup.
- Under EPA's national Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, permits implementing standards for industrial sources, municipal treatment plants, and stormwater prevented discharge of 37 billion pounds of pollutants into waterways.
- EPA met its FY 2007 goals by keeping coastal and Great Lakes beaches open 95% of beach season days during the past year's swimming season.
- EPA made fully operational the first water security contamination warning system pilot to quickly detect and respond to contamination incidents and threats to drinking water distribution systems.
- Through Energy Star, consumers saved more than $14 billion on their energy bills by purchasing more than 300 million labeled products, constructing almost 200,000 Energy Star new homes, using EPA's performance rating system to track and improve energy use of over 30,000 commercial buildings, and reducing energy use at hundreds of industrial facilities.
The following examples highlight specific EPA results from integrating management systems, providing critical information to partners and the public, using performance data to make decisions, and cultivating a culture of performance management.
1. Integrated Management Systems
EPA Recognized as a Leader for the Performance Improvement Initiative
In February 2008, EPA submitted the Agency's Implementation Plan in response to the Executive Order 13450 on Improving Government Program Performance, part of the Performance Improvement Initiative, to the Office of Management of Budget (OMB). While successful integration of management systems is hard to quantify, EPA's Implementation Plan was selected as a model for other federal agencies developing implementation plans for the executive order. OMB declared EPA's Implementation Plan demonstrated progress in strengthening its performance management system by increasing reliance on performance data in Agency planning, budgeting, and accountability processes. The Implementation Plan also laid out the next steps the Agency would take to advance program performance.
EPA Streamlines Permitting for Endangered Species Act Using Best Practice
In June 2006, EPA surveyed its regional offices to determine the resources expended on consulting with stakeholders on water quality issues under the Endangered Species Act. The survey showed significant expenditures. From 2001-2006, 4 regions conducted 34 consultations, requiring approximately $4 million dollars in FTEs, and yet the regions thought only two of these consultations led to standards that would better protect a species.
EPA identified the Kaizen process as a "best practice" and has provided Kaizen process trainings to streamline EPA's work to reduce costs and resources and work better with federal partners. The EPA sponsored an ESA Kaizen process workshop in May 2008 with participants from all federal agencies involved in the ESA consultation process. The scope of the workshop was to review the entire formal ESA consultation process culminating in a biological opinion. This streamlined process will significantly reduce costs and resources for the Federal Government, while ensuring that the approval of new and revised State and Tribal water quality standards (WQS) will not jeopardize threatened or endangered species.
Environmental Indicators Show the Way
The U.S. Mexico Border Indicators Taskforce, co-chaired by EPA, has developed a border indicator opportunity table that takes a logic-model-based approach to assess existing measures and indicators, relating them directly to specific bi-national Border 2012 objectives, and identifying future indicator priorities. The method has helped break down the artificial division between performance measures and environmental indicators by making clear that both exist on a interconnected continuum of performance measures. As a result, reducing scrap tires in piles along the Border is one example of the performance measures that have been incorporated into the EPAStat process. This has resulted in the removal of approximately 3 million tires.
2. Ensuring that Partners and the Public have Critical Information
EPA Provides Air Quality Data on Weather Channel and Google Earth©
Poor air quality is a problem difficult for the public to sense and measure. The EPA changed all that when it created the AIRNow program in 1998. AIRNow provides managers, scientists, and the public with important real time data, forecasts, and maps. In 2007, AIRNow developed a Google Earth© display allowing air quality data to be easily and seamlessly displayed. Prior to the AIRNow system, data was difficult to get and was often months old. Now, that data can be accessed within an hour after it is measured. Now, managers can "spot check" how ozone readings look for a particular summer month and the public can get a current air forecasts to avoid exposure or even reduce emissions. The media including USA Today, CNN, The Weather Channel, and major Weather Service Providers (WSP) get this data on an hourly basis and use it to inform their constituents. AIRNow has also been used in emergency response, during wildfires in California and Hurricane Katrina.
Environmental Indicators Gateway
Although EPA has been engaged in its Report on the Environment work since 2001, many indicator projects underway in EPA's many program and regional offices were unknown to others in EPA's indicators community. EPA publicly launched the Environmental Indicators Gateway in 2008 as an integrated system for EPA staff, management, or the public to find EPA indicator projects.EPA's Use of New Technology (Wikis and Blogs) to Improve Access Environmental Information
Providing effective information access to the public and partners for sound decision-making, the increasing demand for timely information and the exploding resources on the Internet means that EPA must find ways to organize our vast information resources for better access and sharing. We must leverage technologies to support these activities. This means treating environmental information as a strategic asset. The National Dialogue on Access to Environmental Information is EPA's approach to examining how we can better meet our internal and external customers' needs for environmental information.
To include our stakeholders in the National Dialogue, EPA holds listening sessions and utilizes Web 2.0 tools such as blogs and wikis to solicit input on how EPA can best provide access to environmental information. For example, EPA also organized the Puget Sound Information Challenge - a two day challenge to gather information on the Puget Sound through Web 2.0 technolgies - to further engage our partners. This resulted in more than over 130 registered users contributing over 176 pages of material, 2,456 page edits, and 67 uploaded files.
Cleaning Up Waste Sites
EPA has made significant progress in cleaning up waste sites in 2008. For example, in FY 2007, the Superfund program met its target for completing the construction phase at 24 sites across the country for a cumulative total of 1,030 (65%) of the sites on the National Priorities List (NPL). In addition, EPA determined that 64 Superfund sites were ready for anticipated use, exceeding the target of 30. In FY08, EPA exceeded last year's achievement with 61 Superfund sites ready for anticipated use. One way the Agency has achieved this is by sharing the best practice of focusing on environmental and energy (footprints) of site remediation and reuse. EPA developed a guide for managers on the different environmental impacts of environmental remediation options.
3. Learning by Doing
Two examples of how EPA's performance measures have evolved illustrate how the Agency is becoming more data-driven and outcome-focused. The two examples are: improvements related to diesel engine related emissions, and measuring energy efficiency.
EPAStat Results in Outcome-based Diesel Emission Reduction Measure to Show Environmental Impact of Diesel Programs
Old diesel engines are a major source of air pollution. EPA works collaboratively across regions and with States and other external parties to address this imporant source of pollution. Through 2007, EPA monitored performance by tracking the number of projects and number of diesel engines that had been modified or replaced. These measures provide a picture of performance but no information related to our desired outcome - clean air. So, through discussion in EPAStat meetings, the EPA's air office develops emission reduction measures.
The Office of Air now tracks the amount of particulate matter (PM), nitrous oxide (NOx), and hydrocarbon (HC) emissions reductions associated with the clean diesel projects implemented in the Regions rather than just the number of projects reducing diesel emissions. By calculating the amount of emissions reduced from the retrofitting, replacement and/or retirement of heavy-duty diesel engines, EPA can better assess its progress towards clean air and protecting human health.
New EPAStat Energy Star Measure Shows Better Environmental Results
The quarterly EPAStat report is one of several performance measurement efforts within the Agency's performance management system. The quarterly EPAStat report has been a driving force in highlighting the need to align performance measures across these activities. The quarterly EPAStat report has also led to more measures becoming outcome-based. For example, prior to 2008, the Office of Air benchmarked the number of buildings that completed energy reviews. Energy Star buildings measure. EPA is now reporting the square footage of those buildings. Previously, an area of a few hundred feet was equivalent to a building of several hundred thousand feet or more. The new measure provides a better sense of the environmental impact of EPA's Energy Star efforts.
4. Culture and Language
Balanced Scorecard
One illustration of EPA's improved culture of performance is ORD's Balanced Scorecard initiative. Rather than a top-down management decision to improve performance, this effort was initiated bottom-up as a result management training. In September 2007,ORD developed a balanced scorecard to unify and create clarity surrounding the numerous strategic and management-oriented research goals, multi-year research plans, and performance measures. The scorecard focused around four common goals: 1) Customers-impacting decisions and science, 2) Financial-increasing resources for the core mission, 3) Internal-improving management of operations, and 4) Learning/Growth-improving staff effectiveness. Each ORD Lab, Center, and Office provided input on the scorecard alignment.
In the past, intiatives such as these may have been seen as a distraction. ORD senior management recognized this as another opportunity to inspire performance.