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Sponsored Profile | ||||||||||||||
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An
Ounce of Prevention
Some
engineering firms excel at fixing environmental problems
after they’ve occurred. Aegis Environmental prefers to
steer its clients clear of trouble in the first place. | |||||||||||||
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All
it takes to bring down a giant, says Sandy Morse, is a
little bit of red tape. That’s what the $1.5 billion
White Oak Semiconductor plant in suburban In
the semiconductor market, “you have to be able to
change your processes fairly quickly to respond to
changes in technology,” Morse says. But under state rules
White Oak Semiconductor (which became Infineon
Technologies in 2001) potentially faced a lengthy
permit revision every time it wanted to bring out a new
product. “They didn’t have that kind of time,”
Morse says. Morse
and her Aegis colleagues came up with an idea: Create a
worst-case-scenario model for the plant’s air
emissions, and show the state’s Department of
Environmental Quality that no matter what production
changes the plant made, “it wouldn’t get any worse
than the worst-case scenario,” she says. It
was a new approach, but DEQ agreed. All the plant’s
operators have to do now is send state regulators a note
when new production processes are launched. “It
created maximum flexibility for them,” Morse says.
Getting involved early and helping a client avoid
problems “is the way we like to do it. And that helps
the client in the long run.” The
reason Aegis could come up with the innovative solution
is because senior management has worked both sides of
the fence. Before launching Aegis eight years ago with
co-principal Kelly Bonds, Morse was a specialist in
air-permitting and hazardous waste for the DEQ. Bonds
was with DEQ as well, in its air-modeling section. Aegis’
experience lets it help companies such as DuPont,
Infineon Technologies and Dominion Generation (formerly
Virginia Power) use Morse and the rest of
Aegis’ nine-member technical staff stay ahead of the
ever-shifting rules pumped out by state and federal
regulators. The firm’s main expertise is
environmental permitting, especially air permitting, and
compliance, although it also handles work in areas
including environmental training, auditing services and
environmental management systems. Morse
and Bonds are particularly proud of one low-cost tool
the firm has created. Using Microsoft’s Excel and
Access software, Aegis has come up with a mechanism for
clients to keep track of auditing and
compliance reporting. It’s a valuable tool in
preventing problems that might emerge if compliance
requirements aren’t met. They first developed it five
years ago for DuPont but soon realized it could be
adapted for any corporate or municipal client.
“You’ve got to have all these documents saying this
is what you’re going to do, and then you have to
actually demonstrate the compliance,” says Morse.
“This kind of computerized system allows you to do
that fairly easily.” That’s
also a lot cheaper than a custom-designed software
program with an open-ended support contract – the kind
of deal that clients often shy away from because they
can’t control the cost. Morse and Bonds would rather
that customers see them almost as adjunct staff. With
many clients they have multiyear service contracts,
“and then the clients can just pick up the phone and
call us with any questions,” she says. “When you
develop these relationships, you know their businesses
well, so when they call you know what they’re talking
about.” Besides
its two principals, the firm has a third person with DEQ
experience, Jeffrey Zehner, who has expertise in air and
groundwater monitoring. It also has two senior staff, Robert Wevodau Jr. and
Russell Wood, who
have decades of industry experience. Wevodau spent 30
years with DuPont and has expertise in air permitting,
and has done training for DEQ and the Environmental
Protection Agency. Wood comes from a 40-year career
working first for DuPont and then for Dominion
Generation. Aegis stays small by intent because it gives the firm
important advantages, like low overhead. Despite the
technical staff’s seniority -- 17 years experience on
average -- Aegis keeps its cost structure low. Says
Bonds: “Often we’re going up against some of the
bigger guys for these permitting jobs, but we can kill
them on price and beat them on experience.” Smaller
also means quicker. “We’re small enough that we can
be a bit more mobile,” Morse says. “And if we have
to, we’ll burn the Morse
and Bonds nurture relationships because that’s what
encourages clients to call them back. While much of the
environmental help that companies need comes from new
regulations churned out at the state and federal levels,
clients also call Aegis in as permitting experts when
planning major expansions or anything that would change
the terms of their existing permits. The
firm draws a range of public and private-sector clients.
It has handled projects such as air permitting and
storm-water pollution prevention planning for Dominion
Generation. It’s also done extensive work for the
city of Morse
and Bonds are confident their business will grow because
of a key trend in the relationship between regulators
and industries. Many manufacturers and other companies
with environmental issues are being encouraged by
regulators to exceed requirements established in the rules, because doing so buys
them a little wiggle room if they “stub their toe”
in another area, Morse says. That’s
what programs like But
Morse and Bonds say they aren’t rushing to grow their
firm and give up the advantage they feel they have over
bigger competitors. “We’ll get big in our own
time,” Bonds says. “We want to manage our growth in
a way that we can… give the highest value of service
to our clients.”
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