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The following is a copy of the brief Executive Summary of a draft
document NPPR has been working on in preparation for the World Summit on
Sustainable Development. The NPPR would like feedback from the P2 community on this important
"work in progress."
NPPR's goal is to complete the document by NPPR's spring conference, to
be held in The full document is available on NPPR's website. Go to http://www.p2.org/talk
and click on the sustainability workgroup section. The world summit on SD draft
paper is currently the first post.
We will also be putting it on the international section as well, so
people can have easy access. Thanks in advance for your input! Natalie Roy National Pollution Prevention Roundtable phone 202-299-9701 fax 202-299-9704 BLUEPRINT FOR POLLUTION PREVENTION & SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT A WORK IN PROGRESS MEETING THE ENVIRONMENTAL CHALLENGES OF THE 21ST CENTURY: PREVENTION-FIRST August 2002 NATIONAL POLLUTION PREVENTION ROUNDTABLE (NPPR) staff@p2.org /www.p2.org/copyright NPPR 2002 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This paper is a draft in progress.
NPPR welcomes all comments, suggestions and additions to any
section. The organization intends
to complete the final document for release during its annual national
conference, being held in The sustainable development agenda evolving from the World Summit on
Sustainable Development (WSSD) in P2 is key to all issues of sustainable development -- economic,
environmental and social. Since the
1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro,
various gaps have emerged in the anticipated progress of pollution prevention,
also called cleaner production or production and consumption, as defined in
Agenda 21. This paper outlines key
issues and recommendations by the broader P2 community to maximize the
effectiveness of pollution prevention for future sustainable development
policies. Sustainable development
will not succeed in any significant way without considerable application of the
proven tools of pollution prevention.
Pollution prevention should be a central component of all the sustainability
discussions, as its application contributes significant steps toward all major
sustainability issues. The opportunity is ripe for P2 to be infused into sustainability
discussions worldwide and the associated health, regulatory and economic
benefits of P2 are immense. This
paper focuses attention on the positive alternatives that P2 offers. The World Summit is presenting the P2
community an exciting chance to get involved in the sustainability dialogue on
a global scale. OVERVIEW Pollution prevention (P2) is a cornerstone for sustainable development,
and provides significant potential input into redefining where the
sustainability agenda is focused.
P2's effectiveness lies in the fact that it is a holistic, multi-media
approach, with practical tools, such as Environmental Management Systems (EMS),
environmentally preferable purchasing, multi-media inspections, and materials
accounting practices that can be tailored to any industrial or community
sector. The wide-ranging P2 tool
kit has the potential to tackle the daunting environmental challenges of the
21st century including energy and water shortages, global climate change and
chemical safety issues. Pollution
Prevention is the only mechanism to provide concrete steps and identify
quantifiable targets for better implementation of sustainable development. NPPR and our partners firmly believe that pollution prevention is
critical to the success of sustainable development. This paper outlines a number of bold
policy recommendations to promote prevention efforts globally that will help
lead us down the path of sustainability. These policy recommendations are
being gathered through an inclusive, collaborative process and include input
from NPPR Members and staff as well as input from other non-governmental
organizations (NGO's), government organizations (including EPA's Office of
Pollution Prevention and Office of International Affairs and the Council on
Environmental Quality), and our International Roundtable partners in Canada,
Mexico, Europe, Africa and Asia. In
order to further refine the recommendations and improve upon the paper, NPPR
will continue to entertain comments and suggestions throughout this next
year. From this prolonged comment
period NPPR anticipates producing a resource rich document that contains a
strong acti This paper has four purposes: (1) Promote pollution prevention as one of
the key components to the economic, environmental and
social components of sustainable development; (2) Review Agenda 21's chapter on
consumption and production, to reveal opportunities for
maximizing the effectiveness of P2 after WSSD; (3) Share the strength and results of P2
goals, tools and collaborative partnerships; and (4) Outline a bold action P2 action plan
with recommendations for the future. As a result of this effort, NPPR hopes to draw attention to P2
technologies and practices that should be included in policies emerging from
the World Summit. Effective,
international collaboration and cooperation built into an international
pollution prevention protocol is necessary to assure sustainable development on
a global scale. DRAFT PAPER RECOMMENDATIONS The main recommendation of this paper is to produce an official
directive to be signed by the world community, committing signatories to adopt
a pollution prevention-first agenda.
This agenda would adopt the following Pollution Prevention Principles
(JohannesburgP3): (1) Promote pollution prevention as the first step to protecting the
global environment. This includes: i. Reducing the toxicity of products; ii. Reducing the quantity of waste through prevention; iii. Helping to eliminate the quantity and use of products that are
inherently toxic; iv. Encouraging environmental preferable purchasing and product
stewardship. This comprises promoting
a green supply chain as well as designing products that are
environmentally-sound; v. Conserving and protecting natural resources to promote a smart
growth philosophy; vi. Adopting comprehensive energy efficiency policies to help deal with
the threat of global climate change. For example these policies would embrace
more wide spread use of renewable energy sources such as wind and solar as
opposed to conventional energy sources, such as coal, that produce greenhouse
gases and other air pollution; and vii. Changing current consumer practices to embrace a prevention
ethic. This includes advocating
better transportation choices to use more fuel-efficient vehicles and improve
public transportation systems as well as change consumption habits, promoting
reuse and less packaged goods. (2) Establish ambitious and quantifiable reduction targets on a country
and regional level worldwide through legislative action or through executive
orders or directives; (3) Set up a corresponding timeline to meet those reduction goals; (4) Participate in a global electronic information network to help
promote regulatory and technical assistance on innovative pollution prevention
practices; (5) Conduct extensive education and public awareness activities to both
the public and private sector on pollution prevention. These activities include private-public
partnerships to promote voluntary P2 efforts, school curriculum development,
public forums, seminars and training programs and publications. (6) Expand and enhance the current network of Pollution Prevention
Roundtables globally to further disseminate information on P2 in areas where it
is not being promoted and where resources are lacking; and (7) Commit adequate resources to the directive encompassing the
Johannesburg P3 effort, which will assist in the dissemination and expansion of
P2 and cleaner production tools and technologies worldwide. |