ISRI Annual Convention: Traveling Toward RIOS

Speakers at ISRI’s National Convention, which was April 13-16, in New Orleans, La., explained the RIOS implementation process and fielded attendee’s questions about the program, which should be finalized and ready for implementation in October of this year.

John Hayworth, formerly with ISRI and now with Metal Management, based in Chicago, said the RIOS implementation package would provide recyclers with checklists, sample policies and procedures that can be implemented module by module by smaller companies or all at once by larger companies.

Hayworth said the RIOS program eliminates the conflicts that exist between ISO 9000 and ISO 14001 certification, which require some duplication of efforts. A company can also implement RIOS certification in less time and with less capital outlay than is needed for ISO, he said.

RIOS also promises intangible benefits to recyclers in the form of improved community relations.

“The image of the scrap recycling industry is, in fact, not a stellar image. It’s an image we all need to work together to change,” Hayworth said. 

“You don’t have to be perfect,” he added. “What you are striving for is to be perfect, but you’re doing it at your own pace,” Hayworth said of the RIOS process.

Tod Delany of First Environment, headquartered in Boonton, N.J., said the purpose of RIOS is to achieve measurable and continual improvements in occupational and environmental health and safety (OEH&S).

Delany said RIOS offers a company a single set of procedures, audits, records, management reviews and corrective actions, adding that RIOS does not employ a cookie-cutter approach, but allows companies to personalize the program for their specific needs.

Fred Cornell of Hugo Neu Schnitzer East and a co-chair of ISRI’s RIOS Task Force, said that ISRI would provide “train-the-trainer” workshops at the next operations forum, which is generally held in January or February, as well as throughout the country based on regional demand.          

Many of the recyclers in attendance at the two back-to-back RIOS educational sessions Thursday, April 14, were concerned about scrap consumers’ buy-in to the RIOS program, as a few of these companies currently require their suppliers to be ISO certified. 

Hayworth said that companies could invite auditors into their businesses to provide third-party verification, which will help to sell RIOS certification to consuming industries. He said such a buy-in was critical and at the heart of what ISRI and the RIOS Board are trying to do. Additionally, Nucor, a steel mini-mill based in, Charlotte, N.C., is participating in the development of RIOS.

An added benefit to such certification, according to sessions’ speakers, is that RIOS-certified companies will qualify for reduced insurance rates in time. 

ISRI’s RIOS Task Force expects the certification implementation package to be finalized in the next three to four months.

Sixty companies are currently signed up for the RIOS program, according Cornell. These charter members have helped to fund the development of the RIOS program and the implementation package.