Pollution Prevention and TQM E X O I I I ~of~ P Paradigm S Shifts
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Alvin L. Alm
Now and then, new concepts have major impacts on attitudes and practices. These concepts, which replace traditional ways of viewing and doing things, are called paradigm shifts. Pollution prevention and Total Quality Management (TQM) are two such concepts, and they have striking conceptual similarities. Before discussing those similarities it is useful to describe what each concept means in practice. The TQM movement was initiated by William Deming, an American management visionary. Unable to sell his management concepts in the United States, Deming became the intellectual anchor of Japanese production management. His ideas were eventually exported back to the United States, but not until U S . firms were losing market share because of poorer quality products. Although many variants of TQM exist, there is a set of core principles: a commitment to zero defects, statistical methods to measure success, and empowerment of workers to make improvements. TQM is no longer an abstract management principle. Our competitors, particularly the Japanese, have been using it for years and have successfully attacked many major US. markets. There is scarcely any Fortune 500 company that has not installed some kind of TQM 452 Envimn. Sci. Technol., Vol. 26, No. 3, 1992
program, and more and more are bom different disciplines, and for competing for the highly prized different reasons, there are some Malcolm Baldrige Award. striking conceptual similarities. In Pollution prevention represents a both cases, the underlying princi%ore recent but no less profound ples were declared invalid. The Daradigm shift. The previous ”as- command-and-control supervisor iimilative capacity” paradigm as- became obsolete, just as commandsumed that the environment is an and-control environmental systems appropriate reservoir in which to began to strain against their limits. deposit society’s residuals, as long The new replacement systems reas the levels do not unduly damage quire much more creativity and parpublic health or the environment. ticipation to succeed. Both need In this paradigm, the burden of strong commitment at the highest proof is on the regulator to prove level of companies, but strong dethat the cost of reducing pollution is centralization of operations. Both justified by the benefits. The under- TQM and pollution prevention set lying premise is that assimilating absolute goals, either zero defects or human waste products is a major zero pollution, which require emfunction of the planet. ployee ingenuity and participation Pollution prevention is based on to achieve the goals. the opposite premise, namely, that Firms with established TQM prowaste generation should be limited grams should find pollution preas much as possible. Otherwise, it vention much easier, because they becomes extremely difficult to pre- have already defined processes to vent environmental degradation in approach zero defects. In fact, I prethe face of economic growth, partic- dict that major manufacturing firms ularly when land disposal is no will begin to integrate pollution longer acceptable. If pollution pre- prevention into their TQM systems. vention is not possible, then the Firms will find such integration denext step is to re-use or recycle the sirable to reduce costs, reduce liawaste. The last choice is end-of- bility, and minimize adverse compipe treatment of the waste. m u n i t y c o n c e r n s over t h e i r Pollution prevention requires a operations. Just as TQM has opened much different approach to product up new horizons for both quality production and disposal than that and cost cutting, pollution prevenof the old paradigm. In the not too tion can open new horizons for cost distant past, little thought was given savings and community acceptance. to ultimate environmental impact of The potential for low-cost or costthe product or ways to minimize or free pollution prevention, coupled prevent wastes. Plant engineers with TQM programs, could greatly usually designed treatment systems improve the competitive position of that would meet applicable stan- enlightened U S . firms. dards, with some margin of safety. Under a pollution prevention paradigm, companies need to consider the entire environmental impact of Alvin L. Alm is director and senior their products. They need to look vice-presidentfor energyand the envifor substitutes for inputs that are ronment for Science Applications Inhazardous and for processes that ternational Cop., a supplier of highcan reduce the generation of waste. technology products and services Even though TQM and pollution related to the environment, energy, prevention arose at different times, health, and national security 0013-936w92/0926-452$03.00/0 0 1992 American Chemical Society
