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PR INNOVATIVE ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGOY INITIATIVES

Release Date: 12/13/94
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PR INNOVATIVE ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGOY INITIATIVES

FOR RELEASE: MONDAY, DECEMBER 12, 1994

INNOVATIVE ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY INITIATIVES

ANNOUNCED AT WHITE HOUSE CONFERENCE


EPA Administrator Carol M. Browner today announced four initiatives to spur the development and use of innovative environmental technologies, especially those that measure pollution levels and support sensible and cost-effective environmental policies.

Speaking at the White House Conference on Technologies for a Sustainable Future, Browner said, "We are changing EPA policies to encourage the development of new environmental technologies that better protect public health and the environment, while creating jobs and boosting the American economy."

Browner said that the promotion of innovative technologies was a core element in her Common Sense Initiative, a major effort to design "cleaner, cheaper, smarter" approaches to environmental protection and regulatory effectiveness in six selected industries. She stressed the need to support environmental technology inventors and developers, as well as the visionary companies that are making in-house investments in new technological solutions.

"Environmental technologies" include technologies, products and services whose development is triggered primarily by environmental improvement and pollution prevention objectives.

The initiatives announced by Browner are

° improved monitoring technologies initiative: Browner is requiring streamlining procedures for approval of monitoring technologies and analytical methods used to certify compliance with EPA's hazardous waste regulations, a process which will be dramatically quicker and will improve the market for innovative methods; secondly, she has called for developing a basis for multimedia approvals of monitoring technologies so that innovators do not have to seek individual program (i.e., water, air, waste, etc.) approval for each application. Browner said that this initiative will reduce unnecessary public and private administrative costs, strengthen the nation's capacity to measure pollution, and create a larger, more lucrative market for developers of monitoring technologies;
° innovative technology verification initiative, a new program to verify the performance and cost of innovative environmental technologies so that potential purchasers are provided with an independent and credible assessment of what they are buying. The agency's Environmental Technology Innovation, Commercialization and Enhancement Program will select public and private entities, including federal laboratories, states, universities and private sector facilities to perform the verifications based on testing and quality assurance protocols developed by the agency;
° Climate Wise recognition awards presented to six large industrial companies pledging to voluntarily reduce greenhouse gas emissions under a joint EPA/Department of Energy program including: AT&T, DuPont, Fetzer Vineyards, Johnson & Johnson, Martin Marietta and Quad/Graphics; 
° the George Washington University "Green University" initiative: a landmark agreement was signed by Browner and Stephen Joel Trachtenberg, President of George Washington University, located in Washington, D.C., establishing the university as a national model for ways of benefiting environmental, economic and energy goals in five areas---administrative, management and support services; education, training and outreach programs; research activities, whether conducted in the field, in laboraties or other settings; health care services and the management of facilities, grounds and infrastructure.