Thanks to all Bethlehem employees, through implementation of the Employee Safety Process, for making the corporation's safety and health performance in 1997 the best ever. Our improvement in 1997 was significant and continuous and our performance thus far in 1998 shows a continuing downward trend in all incidence rates. While our progress is encouraging, the only acceptable safety goal is zero as established by our chairman Hank Barnette.
Our employees are an integral part of our environmental compliance programs. We continue to implement an environmental awareness and stewardship training program to give all of our employees the necessary knowledge and tools to enable us to meet our environmental policy and objectives. We are putting environmental management systems in place at all business divisions to ensure that environment is included in our business plans and related decisions.
Although the training program has not been completed, we are already seeing the benefits of increased awareness and stewardship among our employees. Bethlehem's environmental performance has improved significantly in the past several years, and we expect that trend to continue as we strive to achieve the goal of zero environmental exceedances/incidents.
In the past four years, Bethlehem has formed numerous partnerships that have enhanced our efforts to be better stewards of the environment. Most recently, we formed two new relationships. First, in March 1998, Bethlehem joined Climate Wise, a voluntary program to enhance energy efficiency sponsored by the Environmental Protection Agency and supported by the U.S. Department of Energy.
Second, we formed an environmental services partnership in July 1998 with three core environmental consulting companies — to provide most of Bethlehem's environmental services. We expect the latter partnership will result in continuous improvement in total costs, enhance our competitive position and achieve Bethlehem's environmental policies and objectives.
Our partnerships with government organizations include participation in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's 21st Century Environment Commission to provide a better environment for future generations without inhibiting their ability to prosper.
Our relationship with the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies, established in September 1995 with our endorsement of the CERES Principles, continues to grow. Bethlehem recently became a founding member of the CERES Council of Advisors. Our third annual report to CERES will be published later this year to describe our progress toward meeting the 10 CERES Principles.
From a statistical basis, 1997 was a very successful year relative to Bethlehem's safety, health and environmental performance and the results for the first half of 1998 are very encouraging. We are working toward achieving our goal of excellence in safety, health and environment in concert with our Corporate Vision to Be the Premier Steel Company. With the continued support of our employees and through the partnerships we have developed, excellence in safety, health and environment is a step closer to reality.
Dr. Augustine E. Moffitt, Jr.
Senior Vice President & Chief Administrative Officer
Safety, Health and Environment Department
1170 Eighth Avenue, Martin Tower, 12th Floor, Bethlehem, PA 18016-7699.
For further information, send mail to [email protected]
1997/98 Environmental Report Table of Contents
