Enablon, IHS and SAP have emerged as key application providers for forward-thinking businesses looking beyond compliance for ways energy and resource conservation can make them more competitive.
This past week, the East Coast experienced the strongest Atlantic tropical storm on record. Despite the chaos and devastation Hurricane Sandy brought with it, nuclear energy facilities in the northeast seem to have stood strong.
Due to strategic planning and preparation beforehand, such as securing equipment, making sure doors were weather-tight and emergency backup diesel generators were ready to go, 24 out of 34 facilities from South Carolina to Vermont continued to generate electricity during the storm. Even though not all facilities remained in operation, all 34 responded well. Of the 10 that were shut down only three closed because of storm conditions, and the remaining seven were already closed due to refueling or inspection.
This successful response was largely due to the actions of reactor operators and emergency response personnel. These workers ensured the power plants and areas around the facilities remained safe throughout the storm.
“Hurricane Sandy once again demonstrates the robust construction of nuclear energy facilities, which are built to withstand extreme flooding and hurricane-force winds that are beyond that historically reported for each area,” said Marvin S. Fertel, president and chief executive officer at the Nuclear Energy Institute.
This preparation for the unknown certainly paid off in the battle against Sandy. In addition, many of those reactors have installed Locus’ Cloud-based EIM system to manage their environmental data. Consequently, their access to key data, or ability to add new data, has been unaffected by the storm.
It is during tragic natural disasters like this that the value a Cloud-based system brings to critical infrastructure environmental information management is truly proven. The last location that an environmental information management system should be running from is within the plant itself. Both Fukushima and the BP Gulf spill disaster have shown that no critical software should run at the facility itself; that software and data could be destroyed (or become inaccessible )along with the facility, and the data that would have helped determine the cause of the disaster would be lost for all practical purposes. For these and other reasons, a Cloud-based alternative for environmental information management is the preferred way of managing such data. In the case of a disaster these Cloud-based systems can also be accessed from any location with Internet access, so data can be instantly accessible up until the disaster onset, and can continue to be remotely collected during and after the event.
Environmental, Energy, Emissions, and Compliance Management in the Cloud presented by Locus’ CEO, Neno Duplan.
RailTec, University of Illinois at Urban-Champaign
Abstract of Original 2012 Presentation Follows:
As they go about the lengthy, tedious, expensive and very often dirty job of decontaminating polluted industrial sites, environmental consultants bill their clients by the hour, capturing…and then completely controlling…the superabundance of project-related environmental data that underlies remediation strategies. As a result of this process, a “consultant-centric model” has dominated the field of corporate environmental data management. This is primarily because environmental data is not integral to the daily functioning of a company, and because the quantities and complexities of the data produced are enormous. So company managers are generally quite comfortable with letting their consultants do all the querying, analysis, reporting…and then storing the data.
And since the consultants derive increased billing hours from controlling their clients’ data, the ultimate incentive for them is a renewed or extended contract, an outcome which, though certainly not guaranteed, is optimized by their control of the data.
But change is coming. The environmental data management practices of corporations and their consultants are undergoing a profound transformation as new Web-based software provides a low-cost means of making available the critical information that organizational decision makers need not only to better understand and manage their overall environmental liabilities but also to improve their operations by analyzing the valuable data. While environmental data is collected primarily for compliance reporting, when mined with the right tools it can also be used to point to weaknesses in data gathering and processing operations and provide valuable information on how to eliminate or reduce these.
A new “company-centric” environmental data management model now offers a remote data repository situated in the Internet “Cloud” and equally accessible in real time to all, including both the client and its consultants.
Cloud computing is a software outsourcing model that offers great promise for managing environmental, energy, emissions, and compliance information of any type. It is slowly making its way into companies that have to manage large quantities of data and meet routine compliance requirements. The model fits the way environmental information needs to be managed through mashups (applications that integrate data or functionality from multiple sources or technologies), and has the potential to completely upend the way railroad industry organize, manage, and report their environmental and energy data and information. Companies that have large portfolios of sites and facilities can use Cloud computing as a very low-cost means to take control of their mission-critical environmental data and information, gain new functionality and capabilities, and at the same time circumvent the involvement of their IT department if they so desire.
Cloud-based data management can completely replace existing stand-alone data systems and reporting tools to provide a comprehensive integrated solution to the railroad industry’s one of the most vexing problems—the centralization and management of complex data pertaining to contaminated water, groundwater, soil, and air.
At many contaminated transportation sites or at facilities and other sites contaminated with hydrocarbons, Cloud-based information management systems already provide market-tested solutions that were rapidly deployed and provide a high level of functionality and data security, an extensive set of QA/QC standards, and scalability.
The Cloud provides a platform for the complete electronic processing of analytical data, emissions data, compliance activities, and sustainability data beginning with the upload of electronic data deliverables from labs, and terminating in state-mandated or federal regulatory exports and reporting. When companies use such Software as a Service (SaaS) models, they eliminate most of the difficulties associated with the management of complex data sets while offering the opportunity for more rapid customization of data reporting to meet the changing needs of the industry.
For utilities operating nuclear power plants, deploying a centralized environmental management system in the Cloud and housing all of their data in it is offering unprecedented opportunities for better monitoring, real-time analysis, and aggregating and reporting of data.
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., 7 May 2012 — Locus Technologies (Locus), the industry leader in Cloud-computing enterprise software for environmental, energy, air, water, and compliance management, has been awarded the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) General Purpose Commercial Information Technology Equipment, Software, and Services Schedule 70 Contract Number GS-35F-0370Y. Locus acquired the GSA contract to offer its award-winning EIM and ePortal software through a simplified acquisition channel to federal, state, and local government agencies across the country.
The GSA is responsible for improving the government’s workplace by managing assets, delivering maximum value in acquisitions, preserving historic property, and implementing technology solutions. The U.S. government has an urgent need for a centralized system to manage environmental data at its own sites (at agencies like the Department of Defense, Department of Energy, OSHA, or NRC), or to manage large environmental, sustainability, and compliance data streams submitted by private industry to regulating agencies such as the EPA, NRC, or DOT. Most environmental data are not submitted electronically under the legacy system, mostly due to technical limitations of the current platforms. Locus’ Environmental Information Management (EIM) will serve to help disparate government agencies to receive more data electronically and to manage and organize those huge environmental datasets that are currently scattered among many different systems.
Legacy systems have prevented government agencies from realizing cost savings through more efficient technologies; however, many governmental agencies, such as the EPA, DOE, and DOD, should see immediate benefits from implementing the Cloud-based software.
Locus environmental information management platforms have been deployed for more than 15 years by some of the world’s largest companies. Several DOE sites already use Locus software to manage their environmental data and have tested the scalability of the software within agency systems. Governmental agencies now can use the same system that has offered significant cost savings to organizations in the private sector by automating processes of data acquisition, management, and reporting. With the Locus system, governmental agencies will be able to focus time on actually reviewing incoming information for exceedances rather than on the laborious process of data input and analysis of spreadsheets and custom-built applications.
“Locus has been providing high-quality software solutions to the private sector for more than a decade, and has a demonstrated history of efficient and accurate software, excellent customer service, and a fair and transparent pricing structure. The time has come for governmental agencies to embrace Cloud computing and benefit from a centralized enterprise system,” said Neno Duplan, President and CEO of Locus. “Locus ePortal and EIM, offered in a multi-tenant government instance, will allow U.S. federal, state, and local agencies to rapidly deploy the latest environmental and energy management software.”
EPRI is happy to announce the third annual coordination of the EPRI Groundwater Protection Workshop with the NEI Radioactive Effluent Technical Specifications/Radiological Environmental Monitoring Programs(RETS/REMP) Workshop.
SAN FRANCISCO 19 April 2012 — Locus Technologies (Locus), the industry leader in web-based environmental compliance and information management software, has been accredited by the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to provide greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions verification services. Locus is one of a select few companies to obtain this accreditation.
Locus has provided verification services since 2010 for dozens of reporting entities. Recent amendments to the CARB regulation have prompted the regulators to retest and recertify all verifiers to ensure thorough understanding of the new regulations. Locus verifiers passed the first round of re-certification, in which less than half of previously certified verifiers were re-certified. Locus verifiers were also re-approved to complete verifications under all three specialty sectors, including transactions, oil and gas, and process emissions. Locus is approved to begin the verification process immediately for the 2011 reporting year. Verification of that data is due 1 September 2012.
The GHG verification services cover facilities in California that are regulated by the California Air Resources Board. Locus is accredited as a verification body through CARB and has lead verifiers certified in all reporting sectors. While verification is a requirement this year through AB 32, companies are also using third-party verification to promote their brands and the accuracy of their emissions information.
“We are very pleased to receive this confirmation that our verification staff are among the top experts in the field of greenhouse gases. Locus continues to expand its carbon practice at a rapid pace. Coupled with our carbon software services and domain expertise in all three key AB 32 reporting sectors in California, Locus is becoming a partner of choice for all companies wishing to be credible in their carbon reporting practices,” said Neno Duplan, President and CEO of Locus.
Companies using hydraulic fracturing technique will have until 2015 to comply with new rules designed to reduce air pollution. The Environmental Protection Agency released today long-awaited rules on hydraulic fracturing, in one of its first efforts to regulate the widely used technique of extracting oil and natural gas. There was no mention about groundwater protection.
The rules, first proposed in July 2011, would require drillers to capture the emissions resulting from drilling the wells. The oil and gas industry representatives last week told the EPA that controls on wells that have low amounts of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from drilling-related emissions won’t be cost-effective. American Petroleum Institute (API) opposed the rule and suggested that it should only apply only to wells whose gas stream is at least 10-percent volatile organic compounds.
“By ensuring the capture of gases that were previously released to pollute our air and threaten our climate, these updated standards will not only protect our health, but also lead to more product for fuel suppliers to bring to market,” EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said in a statement.
The DoD Environmental Data Quality Workgroup is pleased to announce the 9th annual DoD Environmental Monitoring & Data Quality (EMDQ) Workshop.
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Locus Technologies provides cloud-based environmental software and mobile solutions for EHS, sustainability management, GHG reporting, water quality management, risk management, and analytical, geologic, and ecologic environmental data management.