The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has deployed to 83 percent of the organization a system that uses lean principles to achieve continuous process improvement.
The EPA Lean Management System (ELMS) has six components and those are visual management, problem solving, cascading performance measures, standard process, leader behaviors and business reviews and huddles., the agency said Wednesday.
“Utilizing ELMS shortened the State Implementation Plans review timetable thereby enabling state and local agencies to implement emission control strategies sooner,” said Mary Walker, administrator of EPA Region 4.
Aside from surpassing the implementation target of 80 percent, EPA was able to improve over 500 processes using ELMS, exceeding its goal of 250 improved processes. Thirty-one of those process improvements were attributed to Region 4.
EPA Region 4 Air and Radiation Division, for instance, achieved a 68 percent reduction in SIP backlog.
