Greetings Ladies and Gentlemen. The Safety Shack Family and myself included, are extremely proud of the work done on this project. With the help of some eager researchers and a Safety Shack family member who is a Certified OSHA Compliance Inspector we are about to reveal some interesting facts about the environmental workplace impact of a particular manufacturing company who is well empowered and what they call responsible environmental workplace management. In the next few articles we will educate you about the environmental workplace impact of this particular manufacturing company which we will use as an example.
Now you say, “What makes you an expert” ?
Well, It’s simple. Safety Shack has been involved in the promotion of Environmentally Friendly Products and Services for the past 4 years and has serviced this particular company for over the last 10 years. Prior to that and for the better part of the past 3 decades the Safety Shack family has managed companies in the cooperage industry, recycling and reconditioning barrels and shipping containers. Like many other families who have history in this industry the roots date back over a century. The goal of this 3 part series is not to single out any individual company but to educate and inform Employee's, Consumers, Neighboring Residents and the General Public of how the products they purchase from retail merchants are produced and the manner in which they are produced and what is done with the residual waste material from the products processed, handled and disposed of by these comapnies and their empoyee's. I cannot stress to you the importance of this information and the negative impact it will have on not only our children’s future but the earth we curently live on now as well. Together we can change the standard’s for how these companies operate by becoming more environmentally aware through the FOIA. Although we could never fix every single problem out there we can at the very least become more aware of the issues out there and how we choose to purchase the products to use in our homes. Since it would not be fair to name any individual companies we have chosen to only refer to this company as a letter named X for the rest of this 3 part series.
OK. Here we go.Company X which has officials in their company bearing titles like “Global Environmental Affairs Officer”, “Director of Tech Services” "Quality Assurance Researcher's" etc. We found it hard to believe some of the facts revealed in our research. Company X produces mainstream cosmetic products available for sale through major marketing channels all over the country and their products are offered globally. To the naked eye most would find this facility above average but only the educated eye would find this facility just below the average of what is acceptable according to the modern day EPA Environmental or OSHA Safety Standards. Furthermore, sometimes it is the mundane that masks the actual problems within that the ordinary public is not privy too hence this articles purpose to educate everyone including the employee's who may not even understand what their Right To Know actually is.
In the world of industry there is terminology like SOP (Standard Operating Procedures) and for Company X the Standard Operating Procedure for handling residual materials deemed Hazardous and/or Non Hazardous is to have the waste removed in bulk by a certified waste hauler and our research has revealed that this procedure for the most part is in compliance with Federal, State and Local applicable laws, however there is always room for improvement. Company X maintains a very pristine and aesthetically pleasing exterior for the public to view however, I can only say to you their is an inept manner in which this company operates behind closed doors at this particular facility. Residual waste can be found in the shed’s of every manufacturer, on the tops of containers and sometimes even in the garbage of this company however it is how it is handled is what determines how dangerous it becomes to its employee’s and to the public. Company X has a number of residual waste problems which could be improved upon. The most prevalent of these problems is the manner in which they are disposing of their containers from the materials used for producing the products they sell. In our database, we have documentation showing empty container generation of an average of 1,250 to 1,500 containers per month and even at times higher than that. The problem with this is that each container contains a certain amount of residual waste and there is not only a process for disposing of that waste but there is a process of disposing of the container that houses this waste. The danger of this is that these containers often times are being handled by not only employee’s of Company X but it’s Supply and Service Vendor’s as well.
Samantha L. Barnes
Freelance Writer for Safety Shack Inc
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