Environmental Manager

Imagine you are standing at the front of a large boardroom introducing yourself to 15 environmental experts. You are an environmental manager and this is your new team. You have been hired by one of the country’s largest oil and gas companies to create an environmental management strategy for a new refinery it proposes to build next year.

Your job is to ensure that the proposed refinery complies with all provincial and federal environmental regulations, both in construction and operation. Your management strategy will act as a step-by-step guide for how compliance will be achieved and maintained. As an environmental manager, you are not only an expert on environmental policy and legislation, but also a skilled manager of staff.

You begin this project with research, coordinating each team member and assigning some to examine provincial and federal legislation, others to study similar refineries and their strategies for complying with regulations, and another group to prepare an Environmental Impact Assessment. You also consult with project stakeholders, for example, area residents, government officials, and the company’s executives.

All this research and consultation will give you an idea of what must be done to ensure compliance, as well as identify any constraints that might affect your management strategy, for example, time or budget constraints. With this information, you can determine the scope of work required and the kinds of resources needed, including how many people and with what expertise. From there, you put together your environmental strategy action plan, which will be presented to all stakeholders and will detail what the company wants to achieve, how it will do it, how long it will take, and how performance will be measured.

Once all concerned parties approve the action plan, you can begin implementation. When fully realized, your environmental management strategy will ensure that the construction and operation of the refinery satisfy all environmental requirements and comply with regulations.

To learn more about Environmental Managers, check out our Day in the Life video below!