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ОглавлениеComing together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.
Henry Ford
Why there’s never been a better time to do environmental training
When times are good, you should train and develop. When times are bad, you must train and develop.
Source unknown
There’s never been a better time to do environmental training. Why? Because there is a rapidly growing body of evidence that ‘green jobs’ can boost employment at the same time as improving social, economic and environmental outcomes.
Yet the counter-factual myths persist: in recessions, governments say ‘Let’s boost the economy first and reduce public debt next, then this will give us the money to invest in sustainability later’; and businesses say ‘I can’t afford to save the planet – I have to save my business first!’ At the same time, people are urged both to buy more ‘stuff’ to keep the economy going, while increasingly disillusioned with empty consumerism – and are simultaneously urged to save more in order to reduce private debt. Of course, they also want some of the increasingly scarce jobs. And everyone’s worried about how to transition to a more sustainable economy that’s less dependent on fossil-fuelled growth and kinder to both people and the environment.
Macroeconomist Josh Bivens investigated the employment effects of the December 2011 US law approving environmental regulations to reduce emissions of mercury, arsenic and other toxic metals1. It could prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths each year and deliver many other health benefits, but pre-passage, a lot of people were concerned it would ‘kill jobs’. When Bivens investigated it in detail2 he found that far from killing jobs, the ‘toxics rule’ could create over 100,000 jobs in the US by 2015.
Bivens’ message is ‘going green won’t kill jobs during hard times’: when the economy is doing well, environmental regulation has no effect on job growth; but when it isn’t, such regulation is very likely to create jobs. These days, we need more jobs – and green jobs most of all.
Globally, the transition to a ‘green economy’ could yield 15-60 million jobs by 2032, according to the International Labour Organisation (ILO)3, lifting tens of millions of workers out of poverty while improving social and environmental outcomes.
The report says ‘the growth model of the past few decades has been inefficient, not only economically, but also from environmental, employment and social perspectives. It overuses natural resources, is environmentally unsustainable and has failed to meet the aspirations of a large proportion of society seeking productive, decent work and dignified lives.’ Just some of its many findings about how green jobs could start to redress these issues are:
in the EU alone, 14.6 million direct and indirect jobs exist in the protection of biodiversity and rehabilitation of natural resources and forests
targeted international investments of US$ 30 billion/year into reduced deforestation and degradation of forests could sustain up to 8 million additional full-time workers in developing countries
experiences from Colombia, Brazil and other countries show that the formalization and organisation of some 15-20 million informal waste pickers could have significant economic, social and environmental benefits
Germany’s building renovation program for energy efficiency is an example of the possible win-win-win outcomes: it has mobilized €100 billion in investments and is reducing energy bills, avoiding emissions and creating around 300,000 direct jobs per year.
A ‘qualified and well-informed workforce is the key to ensure the industry’s responsible use of our planet’s resources’, according to UNESCO-UNEVOC4, UNESCO’s specialized centre for technical and vocational education and training.
There is a skills gap here – and environmental training can bridge it. More and more organisations, conferences and training courses are focusing on professional development for people, old and young, to provide the green skills that every sector of the economy needs.
The ILO says that green jobs summarize the ‘transformation of economies, enterprises, workplaces and labour markets into a sustainable, low-carbon economy providing decent work.’ It defines5 green jobs as decent jobs that:
reduce consumption of energy and raw materials
limit greenhouse gas emissions
minimize waste and pollution
protect and restore ecosystems.
A 2012 China-Australia Green Skills Conference6 defined the skills needed by workers in those green jobs as:
the skills for sustainable development, including the required technical skills, knowledge and values for industries and future workers in terms of social, economic and environmental development. Sustainable development skills relate to all facets of the society, not only including renewable energy, reuse and recycle of waste, utilization level of resources, green housing and sustainable planning, but also including wider areas, such as commerce, tourism, hospitality, information technology and finance and more.
Another green skills conference, this time in the UK7, noted that the ‘breadth and depth of skills we need is vast. Just within the energy sector itself we estimate that there is a need for up to 100,000 new workers by 2015 for the Green Deal; 70,000 more workers in off-shore wind by 2020 and around 10,000 jobs for new nuclear builds. Across the whole economy we need leaders and managers who understand the green economy and are planning for it. And we need workers of all kinds who understand green issues, have the necessary specialised skills, and react accordingly.’ Many of the speakers focused on the need for good jobs for young people that build skills and restore environments for a more secure and sustainable national future.
Interestingly, on the very day I published the first edition of this book, I came across an article8 saying that such is the drive for more sustainable retail in the UK that retail companies are recruiting entire sustainability teams – building a workforce of sustainability professionals in the retail sector. This was exactly in line with the experience of erosion and sediment control training that led me to write this book: we ended up creating a whole new profession – environmental managers on large construction sites. Every sector in a global sustainable economy needs its own environmental professionals, and they will add tremendous value to businesses and communities.
In the more specific context of the training industry, training is increasingly being seen as a way of building workforce and organizational capacity. A US paper9 predicted that total spending for in-house and external training services would increase by 8-10% in 2011, and that learning leaders will be more focused on relevancy of information. A 2011 summary of European research10 found that training is delivering good outcomes, and is increasingly demand-driven – that is, people are identifying their own workplace training needs and pathways. Environmental skills are increasingly among those in demand. Given increasing concern about matters environmental and economic, this trend is also likely to continue11, with ‘green learning’ consuming a larger proportion of corporate social responsibility budgets, and trainers who are knowledgeable about environmental matters and sustainability likely to be in greater demand12.
As the ILO says, a ‘new development model – one which puts people, fairness and the planet at the core of policy-making – is urgently needed, and is eminently achievable’. And not only is it achievable – it’s happening already.
Storm Cunningham calls it the ‘restoration economy’. He says13 that restoration of built and natural environments already constitutes a major but overlooked part of global economic activity and will soon account for the vast majority of development.
And the economic need is great. Ecosystem services are good things the natural world does for us for free, and a 1997 study14 estimated their value to business equated to at least US$33 trillion a year. A 2008 study15 estimated the annual economic cost of loss of ecosystem services by biodiversity and ecosystem degradation at 3.3-7.5% of global GDP, or US$2-4.5 trillion. Green jobs can transform these huge and avoidable economic losses into health, social, environmental and economic gains.
In Storm Cunningham’s restoration economy, eight ‘giant, fast-growing industries are renewing our natural and built environments’ – and creating vibrant businesses as they revitalize communities. He sees future economic growth being based on renewing our natural, built and socio-economic assets:
restoring our natural environments – ecosystems, watersheds, fisheries and farms
restoring our built environments – brownfields, infrastructure, heritage and places affected by natural or human-induced misfortunes such as natural disasters and war.
It’s such a wonderful alternative to the empty growth-based consumerism that has left so many of us stranded on the shores of the current recession. The emerging focus on adult vocational training as a positive force for employment gains and environmental change brings together the knowledge-based and the restoration economies.
With this inspiring vision in mind, let’s see who can become part of this gathering economic wave.
Who is environmental training for?
The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.
Alvin Toffler, author of Future Shock and The Third Wave
This book is for environmental experts delivering training and training experts supporting them.
It’s also for people in the process of becoming environmental experts in their own workplaces or for their own sectors.
It’s needed by people in both the developed and developing worlds:
in rapidly developing economies such as China, India, some other parts of Asia and parts of South Africa and South America, the accelerating pace of urbanization and rural-urban migration poses a serious threat to environmental quality and community amenity. In 2007 the World Bank16 conservatively estimated the cost of China’s pollution at 5.8% of its GDP; then valued at about 3.43 trillion U.S. dollars. This loss equates to 200 US billion dollars
in stagnating economies in the developed world, where people are focusing more and more on a more meaningful life and healthier natural environments. Here, a new economy based on restoration of built and natural environments has major potential to leverage the environmental skills emerging in many sectors, to restore and revitalize people and places.
It’s needed by people in every occupation:
Businesses and utilities: use this book to help set up environmental training for your own staff and subcontractors. You can also have input to government-sponsored environmental training programs for businesses in order to make sure that your needs and constraints are well understood. In this way you will strengthen the relevance and effectiveness of the training for all parties – and enjoy the increased staff engagement, productivity and profitability that will result.
Professional, trades and industry associations and workplace unions: take the initiative for the professional learning and development of your members with regard to the environment – with the associated benefits in skills and engagement.
Tertiary educators: this book will help you develop your students’ capacity to make a difference in their chosen workplaces and communities.
Human resources personnel: HR specialists, especially those involved with learning and development, can use this book to offer support to environmental experts developing and delivering training programs
Professional trainers: companies or institutions that deliver environmental training and education can build up specialist environmental expertise or partnerships with environmental specialists to help them deliver excellent training
Supply chain managers: this book will help you encourage and require good environmental practice in your supply chains and procurement policies. It will help you take a training approach to building the environmental capacity of your existing and prospective service providers.
Environmental regulators: councils and government environmental agencies – use this book to develop and enhance the education and training programs you run or support, and to work constructively with your community stakeholders.
Government agencies and not-for-profit groups: use this book to set up your own environmental training programs for specific target audiences, such as people doing on-the-ground environmental work.
Environmental community groups, first (indigenous) peoples with environmental objectives and other environmental and not-for-profit groups: these groups have always played a major role in environmental improvement. They are a great example of the skills and capacity-building that result from well-run environmental initiatives, and the associated flow-on economic benefits.
People in these groups are adult learners: they have left their formal schooling and are working or looking for work. There are case studies of environmental training in some of these sectors in Chapter 3.
| You don’t have to be an environmental expert to start with. Just start and your expertise will grow over time. |
If you want or need to set up environmental training, you don’t have to be an environmental expert to start with. The people who set up the training that is the major case study for this book were experts at rural soil conservation – but they had to learn about urban soil conservation on big, fast-moving and temporary construction sites, a field where they were novices. They understood soil and water, and in writing their guidelines, learned a great deal about erosion and sediment control on construction sites. But it took probably five or six years before people working with those sites really became experts – and they’re still learning. Real experts never stop learning!
Figure 1 shows how becoming a genuine expert is a personal as well as a professional journey of life-long – and, as Jost Reichsmann says – life-wide, learning. It doesn’t matter where you start – with the right support anyone can become one of the environmental experts that every sector needs.
Focused as it is on work-based performance training, this book is not for school teachers and their pupils – though the partnership principle and other elements of the seven-step model will certainly help teachers make a strong case for introducing, or continuing, school-based environmental education programs.
However, many environmental regulators and not-for-profit groups deliver excellent environmental education programs in schools. If your organisation runs any school programs or if you are aware of any in your locality, ask the people involved if you can interview them about what’s working well and what they’d do differently next time: the findings may be applicable to your training program. And there is much useful research into professional learning and development emerging from schools which people involved in vocational training can learn from.
And, of course, boys love diggers! So using a local erosion and sediment control guideline can be a wonderful way of getting boys interested in class. Boys and girls alike will be intrigued by the physics and mathematics of erosion and sediment control, and the biology of impacts on water bodies of accelerated sedimentation and the benefits of its control. Longer term, this can also help address the critical shortage of engineering and environmental professionals in the workforce.
Figure 1 Becoming an environmental expert in your sector
There is a growing body of environmental resources for teachers of many other subjects, and they can also make good use of information from environmental management and research agencies; many provide curriculum-related material for schools. Some examples are listed in ‘How to find out more’.
We’ll come back to how adults learn and why it’s important to know this in Chapter 7.
I keep waiting for the guillotine to fall on paper-based notebooks, but, thankfully, it has yet to happen.
Ed Bernacki
This book is designed to be used with the free downloadable Action Planner that accompanies it – follow the instructions at the very front of this book to download it.
The Action Planner asks leading questions and provides note sheets and mindmaps that will prompt reflection, research and action for your environmental training program. You don’t need to use every action sheet – there are over 50 – just pick the ones you need most, based on the content of the chapters.
There will be regular prompts to use particular action sheets throughout this book. Make sure you capture all the information, ideas and learnings you generate as you set up, run and review your program. This will be your gift to posterity!
Inspira[c]tion, n. A sudden happy idea that makes you draw in your breath with excitement and gets you out there doing great things (with apologies to the Concise Oxford Dictionary17).
When you’ve gone through each chapter of the book and used the action sheets you want, fill out the Inspira[c]tion Sheet at the front of the Action Planner for your priority chapters, choosing the option that works best for translating your inspirations into actions.
Oh, and about getting yourself to inspirac[t]ion – that action sheet includes some tips from Ed Bernacki18 to capture the different types of knowledge you’ll create as you go:
1.Insights: capture your ‘aha!’ moments.
2.Ideas: when you hear, read or say something that gives you an idea, write it down immediately!
3.Questions: capture insightful and exploring questions that you can think about later.
4.Quotes: when you hear, read or say something that’s worth repeating, write it down.
5.Actions: what can you do as a result of using the book and Action Planner?
Linda McDermott19, one of the most colorful people I know, uses symbols in the margin to color-code her responses to conference speakers in a way that is similar to Ed’s list; she puts a heart, a light bulb or an exclamation mark to highlight the best things she hears. She uses the letters TD for “To Do afterwards”, and quotation marks so she can attribute quotes to speakers who said something great – or that she herself thought of for later use. As a dancer, she uses a musical note in the margin, to tell her there is a tune she might use, or lyrics from a song that help her remember something. And she’ll write a dollar sign in the margin to denote an opportunity to make or save money. Linda also takes a day after the conference to review them all and make sure she does something with the best ones.
The last sheet in the Action Planner is a work program planning sheet that will help you focus on ‘first things first’. Once you’ve identified your priorities, you can go back to work in more detail on the chapters you need – inspira[c]tion in practice!
Every topic in this book could be expanded into another book: this book is a high-level overview so you can see what you are getting into! There are countless print and online resources for each topic, so I’ve provided links for the main headings in ‘How to find out more’ at the end of the book.
You may have realized already that there are seven steps to successful environmental training – and nine chapters in this book. Table 1 shows how they relate to each other.
Table 1 How the seven steps relate to the chapter headings of this book
| The nine chapters | The seven steps |
| 1: About this book / how to use this bookYou are here! Chapter 1 also contains a potted history of the evolution of Auckland’s erosion and sediment control program, because my long association with this program helped me identify the seven elements that made the program so successful for so long – and will make yours a success, too. | 1: Partnership: the fundamental platformEvery chapter refers to partnership in some way – it’s the must-have element of successful environmental training! |
| 2: The 7-step modelA six-page overview of each of the seven steps, which emerged from my analysis of the factors that contributed to the success of Auckland’s program. | 2: Research: building a robust caseEnvironmental research gets an honorable mention in Chapters 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 8 and 9, but doesn’t have its own chapter: this is because you know your research needs better than I do. Training-focused research is in Chapter 5. |
| 3: Case studies of different environmental training programsA detailed description of the six elements of the US City of Charlotte’s successful erosion and sediment control program is followed by seven case studies of training programs on different environmental issues. You can analyze each of these in terms of my seven steps and the City of Charlotte’s six steps in order to develop your own series of steps to success. | 3: Monitoring, evaluation and reviewThis topic is so important that it has a chapter of its own – Chapter 6, Measuring success.It also has an honorable mention in Chapters 2 and 8. |
| 4: Dimensions of successAn attempt to capture some of the outcomes of Auckland’s program that indicated its success, along with some theorizing about the importance of regulation and enforcement in contributing to these. | 4: Policy, regulation and enforcement: a management frameworkThis doesn’t have its own chapter, as, again, you know your legal context and powers better than I do. But it gets an honorable mention in Chapters 1, 2 and 8 and a short analysis in Chapter 4. |
| 5: Setting up your environmental training programAn overview of the preliminary scoping you need to do before you invest too much time and money investigating a training program that may not be the solution to your environmental problem, or not right now, anyway. | 5: Technical guidelines: a performance benchmarkThis doesn’t have its own chapter. You will need to do your own research to develop a technical guideline that works for your environmental issue and desired outcomes. However it gets an honorable mention in various chapters, especially in Step 5 of Chapter 2. |
| 6: Measuring successA summary of seven levels of evaluation of the effectiveness of training (I prefer this terminology to the word ‘success’, which to my mind is a rather vague and loaded term). It shows how you can link these outcomes to the environmental and other outcomes of your wider environmental, social and cultural monitoring programs. | 6: Training and capacity-buildingYes, training does have a chapter of its own – Chapter 7 – but, if you are setting up a new program, development of training materials and delivery comes after a substantial amount of preliminary scoping! If you are already delivering environmental training, then this chapter may help you to stay on the sometimes bumpy path of continuous improvement. Training delivery also has an honorable mention in several other chapters. |
| 7: At last! The training itself!Overviews who you will be training, how you will be training them and who will deliver the training. Also looks at potential fishhooks such as sponsorship and who owns the intellectual property. | 7: Program resourcing and supportThis is such an important – though often overlooked – aspect of a training program that it has a chapter of its own – Chapter 8. And it gets an honorable mention in Chapters 2, 6 and 7. |
| 8: Ongoing program supportMore on the the seven steps and fostering partnerships within and beyond your organization, with some helpful logistical suggestions. This chapter also relates to the seventh of the seven steps. | |
| 9: Beyond successAnother look at research and partnership for navigating complex problems in a complex world. Keep looking out for new partners, research, monitoring data, policy and other methods, technical information and new developments in training. All these will help keep your program vibrant, responsive and proactive. |
A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.
C S Lewis
Stories are the best way to explain the concepts behind the seven steps, so I’ll start by summarising the journey of the Auckland Region’s erosion and sediment control program, of which environmental training is just a small part. I will also give examples from the manufacturing, utility and primary production sectors.
Then, I’ll go through the core elements of a successful environmental training program and link to an Action Sheet where you’ll have space to do some thinking about each one.
Finally, I look to the future. Ways of learning are diversifying all the time, and much attention is on learning as the linchpin of the knowledge economy. We are also understanding more and more about the complex ecosystem processes of which we are part. So, in the final chapter, I present some ideas about what these trends may mean for environmental managers in any sector.
But first – a word about training.
What I hear, I forget, what I see I remember, but what I do, I understand.
Confucius, circa 500 BCE
The words ‘training’, ‘learning’, awareness’ and ‘education’ are often used interchangeably. Other terms like ‘professional development’ or ‘training and development’ are also common.
In this book, I use the term ‘training’ in a very specific way, as shown in the box below.
Training is the acquisition of work-related knowledge, skills and practices that will improve a specified aspect of on-the-job performance in measurable ways, ideally as defined in a clear statement of performance standards and/ or outcomes. This book focuses on environmental performance in the workplace.
Throughout this book, the term ‘training’ implies the existence of a measurable performance standard, benchmark or outcomes specified by an appropriate authority such as an environmental regulator, industry or professional association or similar body, in terms that enable the defined environmental practices to be:
performed to the required standard by the people who must meet it
transparently and consistently assessed against that standard by the specifier or their agents
supported by prompts and management systems that allow the new learning to be practiced and improved in the workplace. As we’ll see in later chapters, it’s no use sending staff to training workshops where they are not provided with the encouragement, time, budget and resources they need to put what they have learned to good effect.
Good training will provide the required workplace competencies and may or may not be supported by other statutory and non-statutory measures to encourage, require or enforce the performance standard. More on that later.
And yet training can also be so much more than this. The truth of the old adage ‘the best way to learn is to teach’ has been demonstrated by robust research20 describing the contents of the ‘black box’ of student learning and explaining it in the context of the ‘twin black boxes of teacher and student learning’.
The shift from ‘professional development’ (mere participation) to ‘professional learning’ (a serious engagement with our own learning)21 testifies to the transformational power of training. Successful training changes us as trainers and it changes our trainees, turning us all into lifelong learners who have ‘learned to learn – and it’s the holy grail of education’22. This ability, to know how to learn, and how to transfer that ability to applying learning to broader tasks (transferable knowledge), is what enables us to get out there and change the world – in measurable ways.
With this inspiration in mind, let’s look at the experience of Auckland, New Zealand.
Auckland’s erosion and sediment control program – telling the story
Developers must look at integrated impacts that do not stop at the boundary lines of their properties.
George Carl
When Auckland’s erosion and sediment control training program first started, Brian Handyside (my co-trainer) and I thought there might be two or three years of training to deliver, then everyone would be trained and we could stop. What actually happened turned out to be quite different: 15 years later, the program is still going and has been endorsed by major government agencies that require their service providers to attend. Moreover this highly successful program has – like the programs we looked at when starting out – inspired a number of similar programs. We’ve even had people from other countries attend our workshops to find out what we do.
So successful was the program that we ended up creating a whole new profession: environmental managers on large construction sites. These highly skilled people move freely between development, engineering design and contracting companies, as well as environmental regulatory agencies and specialist consulting firms. Over the years I’ve seen how this exchange of knowledge and perspective adds tremendous value to each of these organizations.
How did it all begin?
Figure 2 Auckland and New Zealand
The Auckland Regional Council (ARC) was one of the 14 regional agencies with environmental responsibilities in New Zealand, shown in Figure 2. In 2010, the ARC and the region’s seven local councils were amalgamated into a new Auckland Council that now combines all the previous councils and their functions.
Straddling three of the northern North Island’s biggest estuaries and any number of smaller ones, Auckland is home to the country’s biggest urban area and more than 1.5 million people (over a third of the country’s population).
The region will continue to grow to around two million people by 203623 – only 25 years from the date of writing. By 2050, 75% of all the world’s people will live in cities – and 2.6 million of them will live in Auckland24. All this new development will take place in an already heavily developed area that occupies a mere 2% of New Zealand’s land area.
It’s a ‘perfect storm’ of growth-related risks and environmental vulnerability for the beautiful harbors that the 1999-2000 America’s Cup yacht races showcased to the world.
Rapid population growth in the late 1970s highlighted the environmental risks posed by development, including:
large areal extent of exposed soils on land undergoing development
mostly clay soils with particles that, once eroded, are very easily transported and difficult to settle
dense drainage pattern of small contributing streams
comparatively steep slopes in rapidly urbanizing watersheds
intense cyclonic storms in the summer construction season
three major and several smaller estuaries forming low-energy depositional areas in which much sediment was dumped.
To the consternation of the public and agencies alike, these risks contributed to big, unsightly plumes of sediment in streams and harbors, clogged streams and stormwater systems, localized flooding and deposition of sticky yellow clay on popular beaches.
A number of erosion and sediment control guidelines had been produced in the USA in the early 1970s, and a national New Zealand equivalent was published in 197525. The Auckland Regional Water Board, a department of the ARC’s predecessor, the Auckland Regional Authority, then produced a guideline specifically for the Auckland Region in early 197926.
Widespread concern about sedimentation and other development-related issues led to the setting up of the three-year Upper Waitemata Harbour Catchment [watershed] Study, also in 1979. The Study was a collaborative research project between the University of Auckland and the Water Board. Concerned about the area’s vulnerability to uncoordinated development, the research team hoped that understanding of environmental processes would inform land and water management practices to reduce environmental harm.
By 1983, the Study had produced many guidelines, reviews and technical reports to guide the conservation and wise use of land and water resources during development of that catchment and other similarly vulnerable catchments in the country. Scientific reviews were prepared on stream and harbor ecology, ecosystem energy patterns, freshwater and land resources, land and water use, stormwater control, harbor sediments, tidal flushing and legal aspects of land and water management.
To help with land and water use planning and development, the study also produced eight practical guidelines on:
comprehensive catchment [watershed] planning
land use suitability assessment
urban stormflow and floodplain management
earthworks [construction] erosion management
urban stream quality management
rural catchment management
riparian zone management
estuarine resource management.
Despite having only 13 pages of technical content, the 1983 Earthworks erosion management guideline27 was remarkably prescient, highlighting as it did the need for good land use planning and urban design, comprehensive catchment planning, low-impact development and minimum earthworks, prevention of stream bank erosion, financial benefits to developers of good controls; and how developers, local councils and the then Auckland Regional Authority, could work together. However, it had very little detail on the design, construction, operation and maintenance of erosion and sediment controls. Moreover, it was not backed by legislation, so had very little in the way of ‘teeth’.
By March 1992, following the passage in 1991 of the Resource Management Act (New Zealand’s main piece of environmental legislation), more detailed Auckland-specific environmental research had been carried out. This research, together with an investigation of overseas best practice, especially from North America, led to the publication of ‘TP2’, the region’s second Technical Publication on erosion and sediment control28. The guideline set out the principles and processes of erosion and sediment control, advised on general sediment control design considerations, and spelled out detailed designs for runoff (erosion) control, sediment control and revegetation. It also defined when legal authorisation to carry out land-disturbing activities would be required. This was the all-important mechanism by which the Auckland Regional Authority (which had by then become part of a new Auckland Regional Council, or ARC) could require the use of the controls in the TP2 guideline.
A steep learning curve ensued for regulators and regulated alike, and it was soon evident that not all of these elements were strong enough to ensure adequate control.
By June 1995, accelerating development, poor standards of preparation of applications for environmental authorization (including erosion and sediment control plans and assessments of environmental effects), and poor site management, indicated the need for technical training.
In September 1995, the ARC notified its Proposed Regional Plan: Sediment Control29. Regional plans in New Zealand have the force of law, and this plan prescribed when developers would need environmental authorizations for land-disturbing activities, and set out stringent performance requirements based on criteria such as slope and area of works and proximity to water.
The need for training to support compliance
Anticipating the need for training to promote compliance with the new plan, the ARC set up a formal industry registration and training program in June 1995.
Again, this was based on extensive research in which staff closely examined the already very successful erosion and sediment control and associated training programs in Delaware and Maryland in the USA. (Links to these programs are in ‘How to find out more’.) On two occasions the ARC also brought Earl Shaver to New Zealand. Earl is an expert who had worked with both programs, to talk over the issues with staff and industry representatives. They were very successful visits – the program took off and Earl now lives and works in Auckland.
In keeping with the ARC’s philosophy that good environmental management is a responsibility shared between the Council and the community, the new training program aimed to:
develop a high professional standard in the erosion and sediment control industry
give operators the skills and motivation to operate voluntarily to that standard
identify responsible operators on a regular basis
enable operators to show evidence of their technical ability to meet the new standards
ultimately (perhaps) to create a qualification in erosion and sediment control.
Industry engagement was seen as crucial to the success of the training. A focus group, comprising representatives from the indigenous Maori people of New Zealand, consultants, contractors, developers, environmental interest groups and local councils in the region, was set up to assess the options for upskilling the industry.
On the focus group’s advice, and with their input, an introductory seminar and two training workshops were developed for the ARC by two external consultants, of whom I was one. Brian Handyside, who is still my co-trainer, was the other.
The introductory seminar launched the training program to senior managers in the development, consulting and contracting sectors. It aimed to raise their awareness of the need for better environmental performance and the availability of training to help deliver it, in the hope that they would encourage senior management to release their staff to attend the workshops.
In June 1996, together with key staff from the ARC and the focus group, we trialled the content and delivery of a one-day workshop for contractors (constructors) and a two-day workshop for consultants (designers) and selected a study site for the two-day workshop. The pilot was a lot of fun, and generated immensely helpful feedback. It allowed key players to promote the training to their constituencies, and improved both content and delivery before the first workshops began in July 1996.
The training objectives were to improve:
understanding of the vulnerability of Auckland’s waterways to accelerated sedimentation from development activities, as well as the benefits to the region of a healthy environment
understanding of the principles and practices of erosion and sediment control
the preparation and implementation of erosion and sediment control plans
consultation with affected parties and the quality of assessments of environmental effects
awareness of the legal liabilities of developers, consultants and contractors for poor erosion and sediment control.
As a result of this, the ARC hoped that:
plan preparers (usually consultants, the designers of developments and their environmental controls) would submit a higher standard of information in support of their applications for environmental authorizations
plan implementers (usually contractors) would better understand the importance of a high standard of construction of erosion and sediment controls and good attention to design detail
informed dialogue would take place among consultants, contractors and the ARC to ensure that controls were adapted to changing conditions on site.
In March 1999, the ARC released a new technical publication, ‘TP90’, a much more comprehensive erosion and sediment control guideline. TP9030 was a significant step change for the industry and gave an added boost to the training program.
The industry was widely consulted during the preparation of the TP90 guideline. The ARC gave notice that it had made a significant investment in helping the industry meet the new standards by preparing a new guideline, delivering training and providing ongoing annual workshops and newsletters – and that it would be up to the industry to perform, or appropriate enforcement would follow. Over the following years, vigorous enforcement action by the Council sent a clear signal to the industry about the desired performance standard.
Several thousand contractors and consultants have now attended their respective one- and two-day workshops since TP90 training began in 1995.
By the time Auckland’s TP2 erosion and sediment control guideline had been published in 1992, a number of key elements of today’s program had developed – not with 20:20 foresight and a detailed plan, but as a natural development over the years.
The key elements were:
scientific research that had defined the nature and scale of the erosion and sediment control problem; subsequently, small applied research projects began to evaluate the effectiveness of existing and new control measures
a policy framework that set out how the ARC, as the environmental regulator, would manage erosion and sediment control
a regulatory framework that required land developers to apply for environmental authorizations, thus enabling the ARC to impose a legal requirement for developers and their agents to install erosion and sediment controls
a technical guideline in the form of TP2, prepared to help contractors on big construction sites to build the measures required to control erosion and sediment runoff
an education program to address the lack of industry awareness of the new technical standards for erosion and sediment control. Although informal, it consisted of several newsletters and one or two seminars every year, involving service providers, councils, consultants and contractors, and these were well received by the industry
an industry liaison group, initially comprising the original focus group, that provided a forum for airing issues between regulators and regulated and that enabled other issues and opportunities to be discussed informally.
With the introduction in 1999 of TP90, the more detailed technical guideline to help people comply with the policy and regulations, the Auckland erosion and sediment control program progressively added new elements, including:
the provision of regular training workshops on erosion and sediment control:
a two-day workshop for plan preparers: these are the project design consultants who prepare erosion and sediment control plans, apply for resource consents for the works, and instruct contractors on behalf of the client
a one-day workshop for plan implementers: these are the contractors who do the work on site and build, maintain and decommission the erosion and sediment controls
the provision of a number of related training workshops (more on these in Chapter 4)
an annual stormwater and sediment field day and a separate annual forestry field day where new technologies are demonstrated and both the ARC and industry present new findings
production of regular electronic newsletters, information leaflets and posters
the engagement of external independent consultants to support the specialist team at the ARC by carrying out on-site inspections of erosion and sediment controls
strong enforcement in cases of non-compliance with environmental requirements.
All these elements had evolved within a context of informal on-site engagement and more formal forums of engagement with the construction industry.
Together over time, they were to build the capacity of the wider industry in Auckland and other parts of New Zealand in a way that exceeded the wildest hopes of the erosion and sediment control program’s original founders.
| Go to Action Sheets 1.1 and 1.2 to start looking at the training programs you already have or want to create, and to start building your creative ideas. |
