October 4, 2007
(Rock Island, IL) -- An 11-member "Green Team" of city employees is finding ways to reduce the city's negative impact on the environment. Part of those efforts is a program launched in 2005, when the Rock Island and Moline public works departments hired the Illinois Waste Management and Research Center.
The center trained employees on the Environmental Management System (EMS), an offshoot of standards most Fortune 500 companies have adopted, said Rock Island public works director Bob Hawes.
Under EMS, environmental stewardship becomes part of daily responsibilities for employees, he said. The system evaluates how operations impact the environment; establishes targets for improved performance; develops a plan to provide needed resources, and defines ways to verify that changes made had a positive environmental impact.
One issue the Green Team is tackling is acquiring hybrid and/or electric vehicles, as well as fueling city vehicles with E-85 and/or compressed natural gas (CNG). MetroLINK has some buses that run on cleaner-burning CNG and the city may cooperate with them, Mayor Mark Schwiebert said.
Nineteen cities have made a commitment to stop global warming by signing the U.S. Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement and taking other steps to conserve energy and improve the environment.
Read More: http://qconline.com/archives/qco/display.php?id=356803.