Goin' green: increasing DoD's environment-friendly practices

Defense AT&L, July-August, 2008 by Carol Scheina

As Kermit the Frog famously noted, "It's not easy bein' green." Especially in the world of the Department of Defense.

After all, look at what DoD has to take into account in order to keep its defense tools and systems operational and up to date: Cost, risks, planning and design, development, timelines, program reviews, testing, employee development and retention, knowledge sharing and collaboration--Whew! And the list goes on.

Of course, I don't want to tip the scales in everything that DoD oversees as part of its responsibility of providing for U.S. security and defense, but the fact is that the environment is not something DoD can ignore. The department is not only the federal government's largest consumer of energy, but also one of the world's leading consumers of energy per capita.

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Big Energy Consumption

DoD's energy use isn't a surprise considering its immense size and the amount of resources it uses. According to the General Services Administration's 2006 Federal Fleet Report, DoD has a total of 187, 493 non-tactical vehicles that gulped up 97 million gasoline gallon equivalents. DoD's worldwide operations, containing an estimated 577,000 buildings, consumed 1,100 trillion British thermal units. And according to its 2006 annual report, the Defense Energy Support Center sold more than $12 billion of energy to DoD.

The figures are rather ugly when you consider the negative effects this has on outdoor air quality and on greenhouse gas emissions and concentrations. The figures become downright scary when you consider that many energy sources, notably oil, reside in countries that are volatile or have governments that are not on the best relations with the United States.

"For too long our nation has been dependent on foreign oil. And this dependence leaves us more vulnerable to hostile regimes, and to terrorists--who could cause huge disruptions of oil shipments, raise the price of oil, and do great harm to our economy," said President George W. Bush in his January 2007 State of the Union Address.

"It's in our vital interest to diversify America's energy supply--the way forward is through technology. We must continue changing the way America generates electric power, by even greater use of clean coal technology, solar and wind energy, and clean, safe nuclear power. We need to press on with battery research for plug-in and hybrid vehicles, and expand the use of clean diesel vehicles and biodiesel fuel. We must continue investing in new methods of producing ethanol--using everything from wood chips to grasses, to agricultural wastes."

Bush's State of the Union Address was a call for the United States to change the way it does business. That doesn't mean simply placing more blue business. That doesn't mean siply placing more blue recycle bins throughout work buildings. For DoD, that means changing the way it buys, builds, and even works.

Changes in DoD's environmental practices affect everyone from program managers to engineers to human resources specialists. This article discusses a few green practices that DoD employees will see used increasingly in the coming years. While the article cannot cover all the department's environmental endeavors, it will hopefully make employees aware that as DoD continues to change the way it does business, some of those changes involve the environment.

Giving Greenbacks to Get Green Products

Part of developing an environmentally friendly framework for the way DoD does business means buying green. Let's look at a couple of items that affect how DoD purchases everything from computers to toilet paper.

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In 2004, DoD issued a new green procurement policy that aims to:

* Educate all appropriate DoD employees on the requirements of federal "green" procurement preference programs, their roles and responsibilities relevant to these programs and the DoD green procurement policy, and the opportunities to purchase green products and services

* Increase purchases of green products and services consistent with the demands of mission, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness, with continual improvement toward federally established procurement goals

* Reduce the amount of solid waste generated

* Reduce consumption of energy and natural resources

* Expand markets for green products and services.

There's accountability for that policy. In March 2008, all federal agencies reported to the Office of Management and Budget on how much recycled materials they are using for toilet paper, toner cartridges, engine lubricating oil, signage, park benches/picnic tables, and other items. OMB also asked agencies to report a strategy for buying energy-efficient and environmentally friendly products in the future.

In January 2007, President Bush signed Executive Order 13223, "Strengthening Federal Environmental, Energy, and Transportation Management." The order requires a government installation to develop an environmental management system, or EMS, which is a formal framework for integrating the consideration of environmental issues into the overall management structure. Agencies must also