Environmental Stewardship
Bethlehem continued its active participation in EPA's Common Sense Initiative, which focuses on pollution prevention, regulation, reporting, compliance, permitting and environmental technology. Its goal is to bring all stakeholders — industry, government, community, environmental groups — together to examine “cleaner, cheaper and smarter” ways to provide environmental protection in specific industry sectors, including iron and steel.
In EPA's Waste Wi$e program, of which Bethlehem Steel is a charter member, we continued to make significant progress in reducing wastes. Under WasteWi$e, EPA is working with American companies to reduce their generation of solid wastes. Charter members are companies that have been successful in preventing waste by recycling and buying or manufacturing recycled products.
Bethlehem has been reducing its municipal waste for several years by a variety of methods that include recycling paper, cans and wood, and purchasing different products. Some of the office-type waste we recycled or reused at our business divisions and/or the Corporate Office in 1996 included: paper and cardboard (950,000 pounds), aluminum cans (600 pounds) and glass (700 pounds).
In September 1995, Bethlehem Steel became the first steelmaker to endorse the CERES Principles as a guide to ensuring continuous improvement in environmental performance and sustainability in manufacturing. In December 1996, Hank Barnette, Bethlehem's chairman and CEO, and Bob Campbell, CEO of the Sun Company, co-hosted a meeting at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School in Philadelphia of 22 companies that are prospective CERES endorsers.
Community Outreach
We have always been and will continue to be concerned about the communities in which we operate our facilities. To improve communication with members of the community, our two major business divisions, Burns Harbor and Sparrows Point, established formal community outreach programs with broad representation in 1996.
As an outgrowth of its objective to be the “neighbor of choice” in its community, Burns Harbor established a Community Advisory Council made up of about 20 representatives from a broad spectrum of interested citizen groups and employees, the first of its kind in the steel industry. The council's mission is “to facilitate improved environmental performance... resulting in the enhancement of our community through... open discussion and free exchange of ideas.” The council is currently working on a project that may create a 150-acre wildlife refuge on a site that was once used to store nontoxic “filter cake, “ which is dried sludge from Bethlehem's wastewater treatment plant. EPA staff is monitoring the activities of the council as a pilot project for the agency's Common Sense Initiative.
Sparrows Point began a commitment to community outreach by holding the first of a planned series of public meetings and a tour of plant facilities for community residents. Several employees visited a local high school where they explained environmental control techniques to students. The division also donated funds to the North Point State Park Volunteers so that collectable forest ranger cards with information about conservation and the environment could be printed for distribution by the rangers. The division has recently created a formal Community Commitment Initiative to provide a structure for ongoing communication with community members on our recent Multi-Media Consent Decree and other environmental and business matters.
Our Coke Oven Division in Bethlehem, Pa., offers tours to employees' families and to college classes, and participates in Earth Day and other community activities. In November, the Division hosted a group of managers and superintendents representing numerous steel companies from the Ukraine.
Pennsylvania Steel Technologies continues to respond to questions and concerns from the surrounding community.
In Franklin Borough, Pa., Bethlehem donated 28 acres of land for a baseball field near our former Johnstown Bar, Rod and Wire facility.
A donation was made by the Bethlehem Steel Foundation on behalf of BethEnergy Mines to the Central Cambria Middle School in Cambria, Pa., to fund a computerized science laboratory that will allow students to test water, air and weather conditions.
Employee Communication and Training
The Burns Harbor Division introduced a new communication tool — The Green Sheet — to keep employees informed in key areas of performance including safety and the environment.
In 1996, the corporate safety, health and environment department began publishing a quarterly newsletter, Focus, to report relevant company news in those areas to employees and issued the company's first annual Environmental Progress Report. Externally, we were the first U.S. steel company to publish our annual environmental report on the World Wide Web. In addition to issuing its first environmental progress report in 1996, Bethlehem Steel also produced its first annual CERES report.
Environmental awareness and stewardship training was begun in 1995 and continued into 1996 to give employees a common understanding of the company's environmental performance and responsibilities. The first phase of our program, a four-hour presentation, was made to business division management and other leadership groups (including managers, superintendents and union officers) on basic environmental issues and laws with which the company must comply. Phases II and III will begin in 1997 and conclude in 1998. Over the course of four years, all of Bethlehem's employees will have received the training as directed by the corporate environmental plan issued in 1994.
Product Stewardship
Bethlehem Steel continued its participation in a worldwide life cycle inventory study with 39 other steel plant members of the International Iron and Steel Institute (IISI). This study will develop a worldwide database to illustrate the sustainable nature and potential environmental impacts of raw materials used to produce steel products. Data has been submitted to the IISI on several steel products.
Working with our key customers and suppliers, we will continue to assess the environmental impact of steel production from a total life cycle standpoint — from mining of raw materials to recycling of end products — so that steel will become the environmental material of choice.
Global Environmental Issues
Bethlehem Steel closely monitors national and global environmental issues. We are concerned about global climate change policy because the steel industry is energy intensive and largely coal-based, either through its direct use as a chemical reactant to convert iron ore to iron or its indirect use for electricity generation. Since coal usage affects carbon dioxide emissions, one of the so-called greenhouse gases, we are working with various industry coalitions to promote voluntary, cost-effective initiatives to reduce the generation of such greenhouse gases. Since 1990, Bethlehem has reduced its carbon dioxide emissions, largely through investment in new technologies, restructuring of operations and ongoing implementation of energy efficiency measures.
Sustainable Development
Since the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, the world community has become more concerned about sustainable development and “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” For Bethlehem, sustainability means contributing to the needs and prosperity of society through the production of steel while achieving a high standard of environmental performance. Sustainability is a function of how well we manage our natural resources. At Bethlehem, we are focusing our efforts on waste minimization and pollution prevention programs, which have produced substantial results over the past several years.
Safety, Health and Environment Department
1170 Eighth Avenue, Martin Tower, 12th Floor, Bethlehem, PA 18016-7699.
For further information, send mail to [email protected]
1996 Environmental Report Table of Contents
