Meeting Regulatory challenges - In testing times

Dear Friends,

A recent market report suggested that nearly sixty percent of the companies they surveyed are not satisfied with their current IT systems. In another report it also highlighted that nearly half of user community will be dissatisfied with the slow rate of IT change in their enterprises. There is likelihood of this dissatisfaction to increase as companies may not invest hugely to change their current IT landscape. On the other side of the coin, organizations are reminded to fulfill or to meet the business requirements, regulatory requirements, and stakeholders’ expectations. Under these testing times, Business process management / Reengineering provide a framework, where organizations can improve the agility and regulatory and sustainable performance.

The typical challenges, an organization a face when it comes to this sphere of business is, more often EH&S / Sustainability need localized execution to meet the regional requirements. The principle steps to reach out to there is i) Assess the company footprint in the world of regulatory compliance / Sustainability, ii) Establish end – end business processes for meeting regulatory / compliance requirements, iii) Standardize the core processes that are stable, like 3rd party data services to manage and automatic processing of information, iv) Look for business process changes and identify localized business processes and adapt global solution and finally v) Migrate to new process, in a planned and systematic way involving key business users.

Thanks

SAP EH&S Learning Thread

Dear Friends,

Few days back I got a mail asking if I take a step by step sessions on how to get into SAP EHS coverinpg important concepts and information. This thread is for that purpose. I will be periodically updating this thread with new information.

Thanks
jak

Learning EH&S – Session 1: What is Specification Database ?

Specification is the central database for EH&S. These data often referred to as Product data. This data includes regulations and laws concerning the products and ingredients. Example of specificaiton data include handling requirements, storage requirements and transport requirements, physical chemical characteristics, safety information and hazardous information. These specifications data are of different types based on the nature of the data they handle and also based on their close association with sub modules of EH&S like Hazard – related to Industrial Hygiene and safety, Waste Code – Related to Waste Management, Dangerous Goods Classification – Related to Dangeorous Goods Management and Substance – for Product Safety. So we can use the same concept to separate the specification database into Different specification Categories based on the broad category of data they contain or in EHS Sub module where they are used like i) Substances ii) Agent (Hazard) iii) Dangerous Goods Data iv) Waste Code.

Substance database contains header information and position data – often called value assignment information containing actual property information. For EH&S to work and function, these data needs to be created, used and updated at a regular intervels of time. It is possible to crate and update specificaiton information in SAP EHS, while for automated updating of the Specification database, 3rd party sources are used. The tools for updating the specification can be EH&S Expert - Open Content Connector – which uses xml format for updating the specification database – which will be covered separately in other session.

Specficiation database is closely linked as a specification model – which is related to Product Structure which we want to map into SAP EHS and at times its useful to sub – divide the broad specification category into small components to handle the data appropriately. For example It makes sense to separate Substance Specification into different Types based on exact piece of information they contain like Real Substances, Listed Substances, Un Listed Substances etc.

To create a specification in SAP EH&S access the T – Code, CG02BD, if you want to specifically create a specification database then CG02 (product Safety), CBIH92 (Industrial Hygiene and Safety), WAO02 (Waste Management).


Thanks

REACh Use and Exposure mapping using SAP EH&S– Industrial Hygiene and Safety

Dear Friends,

Few days back I got a request asking if I write something on Use and Exposure in REACh and How SAP EHS is supported and also about eSDS and GHS. I try to write some high level information. This goes like this –

REACH legislation requires an understanding of how chemical substances are used, specifically, how they are handled throughout their life cycle from manufacture to disposal. For those substances that are hazardous, a risk assessment is required to be performed for each use to demonstrate that it is safe Expsoure scenarios needs to be preparated for hazardous substances tha are produced or imported > 10 t/a. Use and Exposure categories provide specific information tailored to the various user groups about what has to be borne in mind when the substances are used. For REACh Use & Exposure Scenario – Exposure assessment and Risk rating are carried out with Sophisticated 3rd party tools like ECETOC or yet to released CHESAR, for which the current system only the output is stored for reference.

Access the following url to see the Google Presentation on mapping of Use and Exposure in SAP EHS - IH&S Componenet.

http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B37ZjPJIaBcONTNiYWVjZDUtZmFiNy00MGNiLTk4ZjUtYWUwMTJhYjBjNWU5&hl=en

Advantages of the model is i) Simplified model taking data from existing systems and proposed REACh – which reduces work effort ii) Mapping multiple substances to one work area – for maintaining Use & Exposure Information further reduces the implementation and reporting effort which can make the system available in shortest possible time period . iii) Existing properties and data is used, as much as possible, such as the existing Use properties from REACh and EH&S.

Some of the classes that can be used without any problem for preparation of eSDS and GHS include– Data maintenance in Exposure Scenario, customer exposure and GHS LABELING. The GHS classification data almost all the data is existing except for some supplementary hazard statement and M-Factors information.

Thanks