Environmental Compliance Assessment System (USA ECAS)

Because of the growing number of environmental laws and regulations worldwide, the U.S. Army has adopted an environmental compliance program that includes a mechanism to identify compliance problems before they become notices of violation by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency USEPA. In 1985, Major Army Commands MACOMs were required to begin comprehensive environmental assessments at all installations on a 4-year cycle. In addition, the installations must perform an internal assessment mid-cycle. Since each MACOM was developing a separate assessment system, the Army decided to mandate, through Army Regulation 200-1, one unified assessment mechanism Army-wide. The concept was to combine Federal, Department of Defense, and Army environmental regulations, along with good management practices and risk management issues, into a series of checklists showing not only the legal requirements, but also what specific items or operations to review. In addition, each question or protocol would list a point of contact to help assessors review the protocols as easily as possible. The Environmental Compliance Assessment System ECAS manual was developed using existing checklists from the USEPA and private industry. It was tested at several Army installations. The ECAS manual continues to be updated to meet new environmental compliance laws and regulations.