EMS

Fred Weber, Inc. is leading the industry with our commitment to environmental responsibility.

In 2006 we started an Environmental Management System at the North Office, Service Facility, North Quarry, North Asphalt, and Landfill. An Environmental Management System (EMS) is a continual improvement process. It is a system "used to continually plan, implement, review and improve an organization’s response to its environmental responsibility." A company undertakes an EMS to demonstrate environmental stewardship and pro-activity, thereby improving its image within the community and with government regulators such as US EPA, Missouri Department of Natural Resources, or St. Louis County Health Department. The EMS has its roots in the International Standards Organization (ISO), such as ISO 9000 or ISO 14001 Management Systems used in many manufacturing industries. These systems use a cycle of Plan > Do > Check > Act to set goals and evaluate how well the goals are being met.

The process of starting the EMS began with first forming a Team who would be responsible for analyzing the operations and looking for improvement areas. The Team's responsibilities would include meeting periodically to evaluate current goals, to set new goals, and to report the progress to the community. The Team first met in December 2005 to examine Fred Weber Inc.'s impact on its environment at North. After reviewing all the aspects of the operations at North, the team set specific goals for 2006. These included: creating an External Advisory Committee, training 100 percent of the work force at this location on the EMS, launching recycling programs (target paper and fluorescent bulbs), and reducing energy consumption (natural gas at the asphalt plant and diesel on the quarry gensets). The External Advisory Committee is a group of neighbors who give feedback to the Team about areas that may need improvement and suggestions for future projects that would benefit the community.

The benefits of an EMS to a company are substantial, including improving our neighbor relations, improving compliance, and becoming an industry leader.