Health Safety Environment / HSE

Services for companies and private individuals in the areas of environmental protection, safety and occupational hygiene. The company, which operates throughout Switzerland from its base in Pratteln, BL was founded in 2014.

Occupational hygiene

Working and staying healthy

Occupational hygienists like Thomas Eiche assess work situations with regard to keep employees healthy. Through the certification of the Swiss Society for Occupational Hygiene SSOH, the assessments are recognized by authorities and accident insurers (Swiss Ordinance on the Prevention of Accidents and Occupational Diseases VUV).

Occupational diseases sometimes have a history of many years of exposure to sickening substances, radiation sources, vibration and other factors. Compared to accidents, they are often more serious. Occupational safety and risk management systems naturally focus on emergency situations to be avoided. Industrial hygiene provides a balance here.

Occupational hygiene uses a variety of methods to assess a situation. These include visits to the workplace, interviews and research into any hazards encountered. Measurements can provide a valuable basis for assessment and "objectification" in the case of uncertain situations, particularly high requirements or very low occupational hygiene limits (MAK values). A special field is the risk assessment of pregnancies, which, according to the Maternity Ordinance, must be carried out by occupational hygienists or occupational physicians if certain hazards are present.

Convictions

Working is in itself something healthy and may also be physically and psychologically demanding. Various factors - chemical, biological, physical and psychological - can influence health in the workplace; they can promote it or impair and damage it.
Good industrial hygiene is the basic requirement for any health promotion program, namely to optimize work areas from a hygienic, ergonomic and safety point of view.

Consulting services

Work area analyses
Occupational hygiene measurements (MAK value checks)
Risk assessment according to maternity protection regulations
Development of risk scenarios
Case analysis of occupational diseases and work-related health disorders
Individual counseling of affected persons.

Environmental protection

Acting effectively

Good management means operational environmental protection together with resource and energy efficiency; and pays off in every respect.

Achieving maximum energy efficiency and climate neutrality is the challenge of our time. Every single company can make a contribution. Every kilowatt hour of electricity, gas or oil saved also reduces costs and thus contributes directly to the company's profits. Efficiency measures earn the invested capital by themselves. Smart companies combine necessary replacement investments with efficiency and thus make them additionally profitable.

Convictions

The waste of energy and resources should be avoided as a matter of principle, both from an ecological point of view and for cost reasons.
The company should operate in the most environmentally compatible manner possible at all levels, so that consequential damage and costs are avoided.
The company or organization should act in accordance with the law.
A company that is geared toward sustainability ensures a good reputation, which in turn generates added value
Efficiency must not come at the expense of robustness, safety and health protection.

Consulting services

Operational environmental protection is multifaceted, challenge me
Excerpt of work carried out in the field of corporate environmental protection:

Environmental management system in accordance with ISO 14001: structure, further development, key figure systems, management review, annual report
Risk management: environmental, energy scenarios
Hazardous Incident Ordinance: preparation and adaptation of incident summary reports and quantitative risk assessment, incident report (chemical accident)
Soil protection/contaminated sites: waste concepts, planning and communication of adequate waste disposal, analysis of contaminated sites
Air hygiene: CO2 and energy efficiency programs, conclusion of target agreements, reimbursement of CO2 levy, trading in certificates
Noise protection: environmental noise analyses.

Risk management

Knowing and managing risks

Companies and organizations need robustness - resistance to disruption - while remaining agile. They can develop more freely and successfully if there are no unpleasant surprises.

What large corporations, banks and insurance companies have long done also serves SMEs, communities, foundations and other organizations.

In technical systems, robustness is achieved through inner control loops, buffers and fault tolerance. The principle is transferable: A robust organization has the ability to withstand an unforeseen disruption without active intervention. Process-oriented companies and organizations can already achieve a high degree of robustness. With a developed risk management system, further quantum leaps become possible. Those who control risks prevent economic losses and damage to their reputation.
ISO 14001 and 9001 certified companies must have a risk management system in place. Companies subject to the Swiss Code of Obligations are obliged to work with a financially oriented internal control system (ICS). Companies are generally subject to EKAS Guideline 6508, which requires a safety management system, especially for "special hazards". It makes sense to integrate all these requirements into a common system.

Components of risk management are: Conformity with laws and regulations (legal compliance), control of chronic risks and insidious developments, response to crises and emergencies, and rapid restart after failures (business continuity planning).
What good risk management can do.

The board of directors or company management receives important information for assessing and managing corporate risks
Management can make the right decisions and allocate resources
Marketing and sales benefit from the company's good reputation and are spared delivery problems and legal disputes
Production and warehouses remain able to deliver even in emergencies
All employees benefit from good working conditions
Authorities show confidence in reliable partners
Owners and investors can generate sustainable profits.

Convictions

Activities and inactivity are always accompanied by risks and, of course, opportunities. Those who take action and set things in motion should ensure that undesirable effects - operational risks - do not occur. But even those who do not move are subject to influences from outside, the structural risks.

Risk management brings structure, order and insight. By identifying and assessing risks, the company becomes confident in its decisions and sovereign in its actions.
Each and every one of us also carries out risk management in our everyday lives.
In our cars, for example, we use a wide range of risk indicators and protection systems, from tachometers and navigation systems to ABS and airbags.

Solutions must be adapted to the size and complexity of the organization. Less is often more, if the right thing is implemented.

A simple but effective system must

put findings and experience into a standardized language
enable the right conclusions to be drawn and corrective action to be taken
be able to document decisions and translate them into actions
be able to show results in a measurable way, and
enable budget and resource allocations.

Consulting services

Setting up and implementing a comprehensive risk management system tailored to your needs. Existing systems are further developed or supplemented
180°+90° scenario development
Risk portfolio for GL and BoD
Business continuity plan
Protective measures test bench, put useless measures out of operation

For entrepreneurs

How much HSE - Health Safety Environment is optimal for your company? Do you want to run your company in a "simple" legal and orderly way or do you want to gain more reputation, efficiency and value? Are you bothered by loss of efficiency and time because crises occur and you did not see the signs?

Is it about the minimum goal of "legal compliance" or would a more active strategy be more beneficial?

The answer is: build a risk management system in your company. Then the answers will reveal themselves. When it comes to safeguarding your corporate strategy and your day-to-day business, properly positioned risk management is the mother of your success.

In the following, three strategy designs that build on each other are shown.

1. Do what needs to be done

It may make sense to adopt a passive corporate strategy with regard to health, safety and environmental protection. This strategy is driven by the legal requirements, the necessary product safety, and the fulfillment of commitments made or existing to customers and other interested parties or to stakeholders.
Prerequisites for such a strategy are:

Manageable and rather small risks
Precise knowledge of legal requirements
Low raw material and energy costs
No other benefits sought apart from "compliance".

2. cost-oriented strategy

Building on the basics of the passive strategy, a great deal of benefit can be generated for the company in the HSE area. Instead of a cost block, a thoroughly profitable profit center can already be created in the direct costs.

Direct cost activities are in the following areas:

Energy
If expenditures for energy are high, it is worth taking a look at this area.

Identify unnecessary consumers and switch them off
Replace devices with poor consumption values with efficient devices
Optimize processes with high energy consumption
Use heat recovery
Exemption from CO2 and electricity taxes through target agreements and efficiency obligations
Sale of CO2 certificates
Professional energy procurement
Sale of active and passive control energy.

Raw materials and waste

Savings can be achieved and efficiency generated by optimizing the use of raw materials, reducing waste and wastage.

Occupational health and safety

Technical protection measures can reduce the ongoing costs of personal protective equipment
The insurance premium for accident insurance decreases with falling accident and occupational disease figures (e.g. in Suva's bonus-malus system).

3. Benefit optimized strategy

In the HSE area, much more benefit can be generated for the company. It must be recognized that so-called soft factors can generate enormous, unfortunately unquantifiable benefits.

Occupational safety reduces costs due to interruption of work in the event of accidents, uninsured machine damage and absences.
Health protection increases the performance and productivity of personnel, reduces absenteeism and insurance costs due to occupational diseases.
Health promotion improves employee motivation and helps to maintain performance
Noise reduction at the workplace improves the ability to concentrate and can thus uncover undreamt-of potentials
High reputation attracts better employees and improves their position in the market.