Dow Chemical Leverages Unified Sustainability Platform to Save $2 Million

September 3rd, 2008

The enterprise is not known for frivolous initiatives. Not to take anything away from the “green” movement, but it wouldn’t last long if it didn’t result in lower operating costs in addition to meeting regulatory compliance mandates.

That’s why I’m delighted to tell you that one of our best clients, Dow Chemical, is using ESS’ unified platform for EHS sustainability as the foundation for its Environmental Reporting Project, which was launched in 2004 to promote regulatory compliance. I mentioned the company’s success in a previous blog post a few months ago when ESS announced that Dow was the “Best of the Best” winner of the ESS Excellence Award program. Now I want to share why the project was so successful.

The project’s innovative new work processes and unified software platform enabled Dow to eliminate more than $2 million in redundant legacy reporting systems and they leveraged existing enterprise information systems that interoperate with ESS enterprise software across all implemented sites. The new platform improves reporting efficiency and accuracy, and enables all of the company’s U.S. facilities to use a common reporting process. Dow’s integrated software platform has the potential to save an additional $2 million over time by eliminating redundant work processes and supporting resources.

The project delivered a standardized solution for Dow’s U.S. sites through the implementation of ESS’ enterprise platform, with applications for chemical inventory management, waste, air and water emissions management, on time and on budget. Dow’s Environmental Reporting Project work processes, procedures and training are housed and accessible on a single Web site. Standard business rules, work processes, material properties, calculations and tools allow for consistency and standardization of multimedia reporting results across the sites and businesses.

To safeguard Dow’s investment, a centralized support organization has been institutionalized. Leveraging centralized resources eliminated the need for a support organization at each site. Use of the global Management of Change process across all reporting sites ensures that the standard configuration is maintained and adapted consistently. A control plan has been put in place to further ensure compliance with the system standardization and work processes.

Tags: dow chemical ehs environmental reporting project software sustainability

Entry Filed under: Operational Risk Management, Sustainability, ESS, EHS/HSE Technology, Environmental Compliance