ENVIRONMENTAL AUDITING -- OVERVIEW

In the past, environmental control and compliance have been reactive, responding only to crises, violations, or excess discharges. Scant attention was given to any self-appraisal of an ongoing environmental program, if one existed at all, or to a preventive compliance strategy. Using concepts from the financial world, environmental auditing has emerged as an effective management tool to guide a facility through the maze of regulatory requirements. A team of auditors, whose collective expertise covers all applicable environmental areas, probe and scrutinize the facility's program and potential risks. These people can insure management that procedures are correct or raise a red flag if necessary. Utilizing the team's recommendations, management can then make adjustments to their program as needed to improve environmental performance and avoid crises in the future. Audit reports can provide a compressive status of existing programs and guidance as to where future expenditures can best be spent. Auditing has opened up lines of communications within a company, sensitized a facility to environmental obligations, and provided professional growth to the individual auditors. Environmental auditing has also become a tool to help engineers better serve their constituency.

• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/oclc/8675387
• Corporate Authors:

  American Society of Civil Engineers

  345 East 47th Street
  New York, NY  United States  10017-2398
• Publication Date: 1986-8

Media Info

• Pagination: p. 638-646
• Serial:
  • Journal of Environmental Engineering
  • Volume: 112
  • Issue Number: 4
  • Publisher: American Society of Civil Engineers
  • ISSN: 0733-9372
  • Serial URL: http://ojps.aip.org/eeo

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Auditing; Environmental engineering; Environmental protection; Risk assessment
• Subject Areas: Administration and Management; Environment; Highways; Safety and Human Factors; I10: Economics and Administration;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00460058
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: ASCE Paper 20825
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Nov 30 1986 12:00AM