EPA's Strategy for Determining the Role of EMS in Regulatory Programs

On April 12, 2004, EPA's Deputy Administrator released a Strategy for Determining the Role of Environmental Management Systems in Regulatory Programs (EMS Strategy). The EMS Strategy encourages thoughtful, carefully designed EMS experimentation to determine whether EPA and our state partners can achieve better environmental results at less cost, improve compliance, use resources more effectively, and enhance public involvement by considering EMS in regulatory programs.

EPA emphasizes that it is making no judgments at this time about the implications of EMS for regulatory policy. Rather, the purpose of the EMS Strategy is to carefully assess those implications so that future policy decisions are well-informed. In particular, in releasing the strategy, EPA emphasized the following.

EPA has no intention of mandating the use of EMS; the ideas being tested in the strategy involve the development of alternative approaches for those organizations that choose to adopt an EMS.
Voluntary programs have been and will continue to be EPA's chief tool for promoting the use of EMS.

The EMS Strategy responds to increasing stakeholder interests in EMS use in permits and rules, and explains the issues and considerations of interest to EPA as we explore whether and how EMS can play a role in permitting and regulatory programs. EPA's National Center for Environmental Innovation will work with interested organizations to implement the EMS strategy.

Please view the following documents to learn more about the EMS Strategy.

Deputy Administrator's Announcement of EMS Strategy
EMS Strategy Fact Sheet
Strategy for Determining the Role of EMS in Regulatory Programs (full file, PDF, 20 pp., 168 KB, About PDF)
- Introduction (page 4)
- Principles to Guide Actions and Decisions (page 7)
  Expands upon the basic values EPA holds regarding EMS, and outlines the principles that regulators and the regulated community should consider in designing and evaluating EMS programs.
- EMS Policy Ideas to Test (page 9)
  Sets forth the policy areas in which EPA would like to experiment with EMS in the regulatory context.
- Action Plan for EMS Experimentation (page 11)
  Outlines the actions EPA will undertake to implement the EMS Strategy.
- Appendix 1 - Policy Ideas with Examples and Questions (page 12)
  Lists examples for each of the policy ideas and provides additional questions that should be addressed for each policy idea.
- Appendix 2 - Design Considerations (page 19)
  Contains design considerations, which EPA and other regulators should use to design and evaluate EMS projects.

EPA's Strategy for Determining the Role of EMS in Regulatory Programs

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