Keeping the Pulse of the Planet: Using Big Data to Monitor Our Environment

Big data has become a major buzzword in tech these days; the ability to gather, store and aggregate information about individuals has exploded in the last few years.

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Fukushima Water Cleanup Deadline Unlikely to be Met

According to recent calculations by Bloomberg News, Tokyo Electric Power Co. (Tepco) is unlikely to meet its March 2015 deadline to complete the filtering of cancer-causing radioactive isotopes at its wrecked nuclear plant in Fukushima.

Tepco’s President, Naomi Hirose, made a commitment to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in September of last year to remedy the contamination of groundwater their plant has caused. Bloomberg estimates suggested that filtering out the isotope strontium, which has been linked to leukemia, from the stored water will take more time than they have left with the set deadline.

Spokeswoman Mayumi Yoshida stated earlier this month that Tepco can, “only say we’ll make efforts to achieve that target” of reaching their goal of decontamination before the deadlines that are less than a year away.

The prolonging of the cleanup process has other implications as well, including an extension on a South Korean ban on Japanese seafood imports, and an increased demand in the U.S. for an international takeover of the cleanup process. While the implications of not completing the cleanup on time have not yet been discussed, Tepco is continually seeking ways to remedy the after effects of the March 11, 2011 accident.

The levels of toxic waters are continually rising at a rate of 400,000 liters per day, and as of July 29, the site was said to have more than 373,000,000 liters of radioactive water still needing treatment. With numerous failed attempts at reducing the amount of irradiated water released, Tepco’s ability to reach the deadline is looking incredibly bleak, but Yoshida reassures, “we are doing everything we can do.”

Years later we are once again being reminded of the Fukushima crisis and the magnitude of its effects. Just as it was discussed in the aftermath of the incident, the assistance of a cloud-based, centralized data management system could help to take action on the cleanup. With today’s technology it is possible to store relevant data in a system that is accessible to all stakeholders, supplies a way to continuously monitor and analyze levels of isotopes, and offers opportunities to make better decisions and improve safety at nuclear power plants.

Del Monte Plans & Cans its Way Toward a Sustainable Future

7 August 2014 — If you’ve ever opened a can of peaches or green beans, there’s a good chance it was marked with the red and yellow Del Monte Quality shield. After all, Del Monte Foods is one of the country’s largest and most well-known producers, distributors, and marketers of branded food products—namely canned fruits and vegetables—for the U.S. retail market.

These cans of produce eventually appear on the shelves of supermarkets across the country and end up in our shopping carts—but what happens before they make it there?

Today’s consumers are more invested than ever in discovering the details of how products come to be. This includes what natural resources are used, how much of each is expended, and what environmental impacts are a result of the production process. Curiosity seems to be especially piqued when it comes to the food and agriculture sector, and Del Monte is an example of a company who has chosen to address these questions, as well as offer a roadmap for future improvements.

 

The Sustainable Dream
Del Monte clearly states that its process of bringing food to our dinner tables is grounded in a deep respect for natural resources. The company works to ensure the delivery of its products is done in the most sustainable way possible, by striving to reduce its operational environmental footprint through the elimination of waste and minimization of materials, energy, and water used.

Toward what was arguably the beginning of the sustainability craze, Del Monte established a baseline year of 2007 with a target year of 2016 to effectively monitor its environmental key performance indicators (KPIs). The company made a commitment to corporate responsibility, and began to track energy, water and waste KPIs, conduct lifecycle assessments, practice LEAN techniques at their 14 facilities, and analyze their supply chain greenhouse gas footprint.

 

Software Lends a Helping Hand
In the beginning, Del Monte ran into a few challenges along the road to making sustainable improvements. At the time, the company’s sustainability program was experiencing problems with data validation, and was still manually creating reports by exporting data to spreadsheets.

In order to simplify reporting and ensure the quality of its data, Del Monte made the decision to use the latest advancements in technology to manage and report the metrics behind its sustainability goals, and implemented Locus’ sustainability software. Del Monte discovered that Locus’ cloud-based system was configurable, thus making it more relevant to the company’s business and providing closer access to its environmental data.

Locus helped Del Monte discover where errors existed in its historical data, which were then fixed and migrated to the software platform. Existing data validation steps and notifications were configured to fit Del Monte’s timelines and processes to ensure the quality of the data. Within the software, each user was given a dashboard that they could customize to their site’s sustainability needs, allowing them to see important data immediately upon login, and easily create standard reports. Users were also able to create graphs and tables across all sites within their business unit, and compare these to corporate trends—therefore achieving their goal of making data more transparent within the company.

Sometimes an essential aspect to achieving your sustainability goals is knowing when to enlist outside assistance. Important business decisions are based off of data collected and unfortunately, human error is usually inevitable. Taking advantage of the latest technology and built-in validation checks means attaining flawless data quality, and thus ensuring strong and accurate business decisions. Also, making data transparent—meaning easily searchable and accessible—is important to show you are meeting all expected regulations and business-specific goals. Doing all sustainability tracking, management, and reporting in one central, cloud-based system is a solid method for improving data transparency. From this system, it is possible to:

  • Track industry-specific and business-specific KPIs including GRI indicators
  • Review and approve data according to business-specific work flow requirements
  • Compare parameters across sites or against other related parameters
  • Generate trend charts on the web and create reports to track impact
  • Set periodic benchmark goals and track performance against these goals

 

From Dream to Reality: Visualizing Progress
Over the past seven years Del Monte has been continuously working to tackle its environmental sustainability goals across the various operational steps that result in bringing its products to consumers: from processing, to packaging, to distribution. With the assistance of Locus’ software, Del Monte has created uniform sustainability reports across all sites. Reporting and graphing capabilities help the company view trends in its data more quickly and reliably; data can be easily compared from month to month in order to view recent headway.

Del Monte currently uses Locus’ software for analysis of natural resource to cost, and to manage its various sustainability metrics in order to reach its objectives, such as conservation goals (water and electricity reduction), waste audits, and waste diversion goals. For example, in 2007, Del Monte was approximately 40 percent in waste diversion. With the use of Locus’ sustainability tracking, reporting, and charting functions, Del Monte was more equipped to better manage their progress and reach an 80 percent solid waste diversion rate.

One day at a time, with the help of Locus’ software tools, Del Monte is steadily charging ahead to achieve the sustainability goals it set seven years ago. So the next time you pick up a can of Del Monte produce from the shelf, take comfort in knowing it was produced with an unwavering appreciation for the environment and its resources.

Companies Make Strides Toward Enforcing Oil Spill Prevention Plans

In recent years, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has become much more vigilant about oil spill regulation—regardless of the spills origin. After a series of inspections over the past two years, the EPA announced seven New England companies who have all created or updated their spill prevention plans to be in compliance with federal oil pollution prevention laws.

The companies, who all store or distribute oil, agreed to pay fines under an expedited settlement program, their penalties ranging from $3,000 to $9,500. This expedited program allows companies to pay reduced penalties if they quickly correct violations against the Oil Pollution Prevention regulations. These companies also were required to have a certain minimum storage capacity with no accompanying spill in order to qualify for these reduced fines.

The EPA’s Spill Prevention, Control and Countermeasure (SPCC) rules designate certain requirements for oil spill prevention, preparedness, and response to prevent oil discharges into navigable waters and adjoining shorelines. These rules call for facilities to adhere to guidelines pertaining to their ability to prepare, amend and implement SPCC Plans.

For many companies, complying with these regulations created by the EPA requires an additional focus on detailed actions in SPCC procedures.  Often times tracking and reporting spills if and when they occur—along with the root causes and inspection findings—can be a significant challenge without the appropriate management tools. However, when properly prepared, abiding by these necessary SPCC rules will ensure that organizations stay within compliance, thus avoiding fines and penalties and any harsh effects on our environment.

Locus Recognized as a Top Environmental Firm in Silicon Valley

Read about the top environmental firms in Silicon Valley, ranked by the number of professionals in Silicon Valley. Learn more about their specialities, 2013 FY revenue and the number of employees each firm has locally and firm wide.

The Unclear Future of Carbon Capture

With the recent policy standards called for by President Obama, focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions has moved to the forefront of the sustainability initiative. Much of this concern circles the hazardous effects of carbon dioxide emissions on the atmosphere, and the longest standing contributors to its release: the smokestacks that are still problematic even in the most modern of coal plants.

Many scientists agree that the hope of deferring effects of climate change relies largely on our ability to capture, and lock away this carbon. This process, if implemented correctly, would greatly reduce the amount of carbon dioxide entering the atmosphere by removing much of it from the emissions released. It would then require formulating a secure method of permanent storage for this collected carbon.

Interestingly enough, we know how to carry out these carbon-capturing procedures, and we have for nearly a century, yet little movement has been made toward actually practicing these methods. The reason behind this lack of momentum, simply put, is cost.

The cost to implement carbon capture and storage is high enough that many companies would not consider it without a requirement made by the federal government. The process would require retrofitting old plants, alongside the energy required for the actual procedure- a large enough sum of energy that it downgrades the efficiency of the plant, making it an undesirable action business-wise sans any federal regulation.

If we find a way to improve the cost-effectiveness, storage concerns still plague the campaign for implementation. We know that injecting liquids underground has been linked to earthquakes, and there is still the possibility of the carbon dioxide tainting drinking water, or even escaping into the atmosphere- a reality that would negate the entire process. These concerns have called for pause on the entire movement.

Even while Obama is pushing to limit the emissions of U.S. power plants, there is little expectation of decreasing the amount of power we harness from coal in the near future. Our dependence on this source of energy, combined with the opposition against Obama’s policy aspirations, make that fact clear.

Though coal may be the largest producer of greenhouse gas emissions, other sources of energy are also subjected to scrutiny, including natural gas collected through fracking practices. According to geologist Stuart Haszeldine at the University of Edinburgh, “if you want to carry on using those fossil hydrocarbons that means cleaning up their emissions,” and capturing this carbon he states, “is the single best way of doing that.”

While the future of this process is still unclear, it is furthering the initiative toward sustainability. Climate change is becoming a stark reality, with implications we don’t even fully understand yet, and many are calling for progress in any way possible.

Corporate America is Leaning Toward Environmental Responsibility

Since the beginning of the movement toward climate activism, many changes affecting big corporations have been triggered by legislation and science. Environmental scientists continually uncover new complications caused by climate change, and while President Obama continues to call for regulatory changes—namely to cut carbon emissions—Congress has put these efforts on hold by working to overturn many of his requests to implement tougher restrictions.

This standstill may lead one to believe that efforts toward reaching a more environmentally-friendly future are stalled, yet that is not the case. In fact, corporate America is beginning to get ahead of these debates by reducing their emissions with or without the passing of Obama’s regulatory measures.

According to a study conducted by Calvert Investment, Ceres, David Gardiner & Associates, and the World Wildlife Fund, 43 percent of Fortune 500 companies have independently set goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, become more energy efficient, or secure greener energy to fuel their business- and many of these businesses report saving large sums of money due to their efforts.

Former governor of New Jersey and former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency Christine Todd Whitman stated, “These companies make it their mission to reduce their carbon footprint because it is making good business sense.”

However, what about the other 57 percent of the Fortune 500? For many, they are trapped by subsidies which are making fossil-fuel power sources cheaper, allowing them to focus on other needs within the corporation.

There is no denying that a decision by U.S. and state policymakers would push even more companies to more sustainable measures; however, the power of the public and shareholders should not go unnoticed. Many companies are creating benchmarks per the request of these shareholders who push the companies to lessen their environmental impact.

Even if environmental legislation remains unspecified, it is clear that big corporations are beginning to move toward environmental responsibility regardless.  Though tougher restrictions on emissions may push more corporations toward solutions faster, the trend has already begun, and continues to spread. Corporate America is blazing the trail, proving that being environmentally responsible and fiscally sound can happen simultaneously.

China and U.S. Sign Climate Change Deals

This past Tuesday, the United States and China signed eight partnership pacts in an effort to cut greenhouse gas emissions. These pacts involve multiple companies and research bodies and bring the world’s two largest carbon emitters into closer agreement on climate policy.

One memoranda of understanding (MOUs) calls for the sharing of information on clean coal power generation technology between Huaneng Clean Energy Research Institute in China and the Summit Power Group based in Washington. Huaneng is expected to share information with Summit as they begin to initiate a similar project in Texas in the near future. In turn, Summit will share information and technology for recovering oil from captured carbon.

According to Laura Miller, who currently manages Texas Clean Energy Project, “We will be sharing expertise, years of development experience and non-proprietary technology on both projects, all while making giant steps forward for the world’s environment.”

While some pacts were signed by both nations, negotiators on each side recognize the need for more communication between the two in order to come to an agreement in areas of technological cooperation, as well as domestic and international policies, among others. In a recent interview, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry stated that the two sides remained committed to continuing the “close dialogue” of negotiations on climate change.

China and the U.S. coming to agreement would majorly impact climate change policy across the globe. Both nations also confirm the need for policy decisions implementing aid for developing countries in controlling their emissions in order to create a significant global impact.

These ongoing discussions and changes in climate policy place an emphasis on the need for accurate emissions data collection and reporting. The implementation of new policy and regulations could also lead to an increased demand for emissions data processing and analysis, to which cloud-based, big data management technologies are now available to supply.

Grain Processing Corporation Selects Locus Technologies Software for Environmental Management

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., 8 July 2014  — As part of its environmental sustainability program, Grain Processing Corporation (GPC) has selected Locus Technologies’ (Locus’) software platform to manage a variety of environmental policies for two of its corn wet-milling facilities. GPC manufactures, distributes, and markets high quality, customer-specified food, pharmaceutical, and industrial grade products.

GPC will use Locus to identify, track, and respond to all environmental media affected by the operations of two of its facilities: one located in Muscatine, Iowa, and the other in Washington, Indiana. Both of these facilities have numerous air emission sources, wastewater treatment facilities, and both Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure (SPCC) and Stormwater Pollution Prevention Plan (SWPPP) requirements. With the assistance of Locus’ web-based software, GPC can manage all of its processes, such as tracking permit requirements and meeting recordkeeping and reporting deadlines, in one central, user-friendly platform.

“When we were searching for a software management system, we needed it to be able to manage all processes for our two facilities, with the expansion option of up to 20 additional locations with differing recordkeeping, schedules, and reporting needs,” said Mick Durham, Director of Environmental Services at GPC. “Locus met these specifications, and will allow us to manage our environmental data so that we can improve our environmental compliance and ensure that our company’s business practices remain sustainable in the long term.”

“Our recent success in deploying our software to several customers in food and agricultural industries proves its versatile nature: Locus’ software goes beyond mission-critical compliance activities and provides a system for broader sustainability and resource management that ultimately leads to operating cost reduction,” said Neno Duplan, President and CEO of Locus Technologies. “Locus provides a simple, integrated system, similar to ERP that manages all environmental, energy, water, and other sustainability needs under a single portal infrastructure and single sign-on online.”

 

ABOUT GRAIN PROCESSING CORPORATION
Founded in 1943, GPC is a privately owned company with a solid history of innovation and a vision for continued success in the future. Its mission is to manufacture, distribute and market customer-specified food, pharmaceutical and industrial-grade products of uncompromising quality. GPC’s substantial investment in the finest people, facilities, technology and customer support services reflects the seriousness of that commitment to quality. For more information about Grain Processing Corporation, visit www.grainprocessing.com.

Predicting the Big Data Boom: Hazardous Data Explosion

In 1989, 25 years before the technologically advanced world we currently live in, Locus’ founding members were busy publishing an article about the challenges of managing massive amounts of data produced from testing and long-term monitoring at hazardous waste sites.

The article, “Hazardous Data Explosion“, published in the December 1989 issue of the ASCE Civil Engineering Magazine was among the first of its kind to discuss these issues within the environmental space, and placed Locus securely at the forefront of the big data craze.  This article was followed by a sequel article, titled “Taming Environmental Data“, published in 1992 in the same magazine.

Today, the term ‘big data’ has become a staple across various industries to describe the enormity and complexity of data sets that need to be captured, stored, analyzed, visualized and reported. Although the concept may have gained public popularity fairly recently, big data has been a formidable opponent for decades.

“It seems unavoidable that new or improved automated data processing techniques will be needed as the hazardous waste industry evolves. Automation can provide tools that help shorten the time it takes to obtain specific test results, extract the most significant finds, produce reports and display information graphically,” Buckle and Duplan stated.

They also claimed that “expert systems” and artificial intelligence (AI) could be a possible solution—technology that has been a long time coming but still has a promising future when dealing with big data.  “Currently used in other technical fields, expert systems employ methods of artificial intelligence for interpreting and processing large bodies of information,” the authors explained.

For more information on AI, see the CBS 60 Minutes episode titled “Artificial Intelligence, Real-Life Applications” from 9 October 2016.

Almost 30 years later, cloud technologies combined with other advancements in big data processing are rising to the challenge of successfully processing and analyzing big environmental and sustainability data.

Access the entire 1989 article “Hazardous Data Explosion” here.