National Data Portal for Recycling Industry
Rod
Welford (Chief Executive: Australian Council of Recycling) presented at the
Enviro2012 Conference in Adelaide recently, on the need for a national data
portal for recycling industry data to enable better policy design and industry
development.
This
data could be filtered to provide performance benchmarking for recycling
businesses industry profile data, to help government understand the scale and
benefits of the industry and a one stop shop for State EPA-type bodies to
deliver licensing reporting requirements.
Greentape Reduction
The Qld Parliament has passed laws to
cut green-tape for Queensland businesses.
The Greentape Reduction Bill is the most significant reform to licensing
processes in over a decade.
Recently Laurie Wade – the Manager of
the Reform and Innovation Branch within the Department of Environment and
Heritage Protection spoke at an Environment Practitioner’s Workshop, organised
by ASBG. Laurie has been working on
Green Tape reduction programmes for a few years.
The program was commenced in January
2010, driven by the Qld Treasury in response to community consultation and an
identified need to reduce “Red Tape” and reduce the cost of doing
business. Greentape reduction will save
businesses $1,000’s and contributes to the Qld Government’s target of reducing
red tape and regulation by 20%.
The Bill reduces the Environmental
Protection Act by 90 pages by taking out duplicated provisions.
A standard application will save on
average $20k in costs, 150 pages in paper work and 68 days in processing time. The
environmental approval process will be changed to ensure greater flexibility
for operators delivers a saving in government administrative costs of
$12.5million.
The Bill streamlines approvals by
combining mining and petroleum and other industrial into one system. It clarifies the application process by removing
the need for administrative transfers while ensuring communities are consulted
earlier in the process.
The Qld Government is looking at other
options including removing the need for small business environmental risk
assessments to obtain an environmental authority at all. This could include
motor vehicle workshops, small chemical storage and boiler making businesses.
The Bill potentially represents a
positive step in improving the efficiency of Qld’s environmental regulatory
framework. However, the efficiency of the framework relies on the ability of Government
departments to deliver on the intent of the legislation, with fewer staff and
reduced resources.
The new framework is intended to
commence in March 2013 to allow time for more detailed information to be made
available to industry and the wider community.
ecoBiz to be Outsourced to Private Sector Partners
Minister for Environment and Heritage
Protection Andrew Powell this afternoon announced his Department would seek
expressions of interest to establish a partnership with the ecoBiz program.
Mr Powell said that: “ecoBiz was
established in 1999 at a time when sustainable industries were in their infancy
and needed high levels of Government assistance.” Mr Powell believes that the Newman Government is still committed to the ecoBiz program but it is apparent that the current
levels of Government support and assistance will be cut back.
Reading between the lines, It appears
to be the intent of the Newman Government to leave it up to private sector
service providers and the State Government will pull back funding and
resources.
A gap in the market is appearing to
address the sustainability needs of small to medium businesses across the
State. The Department of Environment
& Heritage Protection will soon call for expressions of interest to
establish a collaborative service delivery model to continue the work of
ecoBiz.
Sustainability
Assessment Training
The Society of Sustainability and Environmental Engineering
are running a Two Day Course on the 29
- 30 August 2012.
Sustainability assessment is an emerging tool to direct
decision making towards sustainability and deliver better outcomes for business
and the community as a whole. In this course you will learn about the use of
sustainability assessment as both a regulatory tool that goes beyond
traditional impact assessment and an internal planning tool to transform
organisational decision making and subsequent operations.
The aim of the training is to introduce participants to
current thinking and understanding of sustainability assessment concepts,
procedures and techniques. This includes:
·
Sustainability
assessment principles, processes and issues
·
Sustainability as a
tool for approval of new development proposals
·
Sustainability
assessment to inform planning and discussion making within an organisation
·
A generic 7 step
process framework for sustainability assessment of any proposals ranging from
physical projects to plans and policy change
·
Various tools and
techniques that can be usefully applied in sustainability assessments.
·
How to develop a
sustainability decision-making protocol appropriate to a particular context, by
drawing on relevant strategies and standards.
To register
please go to the event listing on the
SSEE website.
