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APPENDIX E

Environmental Protection

Protection of natural resources has become an ever-increasing concern. It is the responsibility of all unit leaders to decrease, and if possible eliminate, damage to the environment when conducting all types of operations. This appendix focuses on measures the scout platoon must understand and implement to accomplish that objective.

Environmental risk management parallels safety risk management and is based on the same philosophy and principles. (NOTE: Refer to the discussion of safety risk management in Appendix F of this manual.) The environmental risk assessment and management process consists of the six steps outlined in the following paragraphs.

STEP 1 - IDENTIFY HAZARDS

The platoon leader must identify potential sources of environmental degradation during his analysis of METT-TC factors. These environmental hazards are conditions with the potential for polluting air, soil, or water and/or destroying cultural or historical structures, sites, or artifacts.

STEP 2 - ASSESS THE HAZARDS

Leaders of the scout platoon can use the environmental risk assessment worksheet shown in Figure E-1 to analyze the potential severity of environmental degradation for each training activity. The worksheet allows them to quantify the risk to the environment as extremely high, high, medium, or low. The risk impact value is an indicator of these levels of severity.

Figure E-1. Figure E-1. Environmental risk assessment worksheet.

STEP 3 - MAKE ENVIRONMENTAL RISK DECISIONS

Based on the results of the risk assessment, the scout platoon leader makes decisions and develops measures to reduce significant environmental risks. Risk decisions are made at a level of command that corresponds to the degree of risk.

STEP 4 - BRIEF THE CHAIN OF COMMAND

Leaders should brief all responsible individuals and agencies (to include the installation environmental office, if applicable) on the proposed operational and training plans and on pertinent high-risk environmental factors.

STEP 5 - IMPLEMENT CONTROLS

The scout platoon leader and subordinate leaders implement environmental protection measures at all stages of operational planning, preparation, and execution. They integrate these measures into plans, orders, SOPs, training performance standards, and rehearsals.

STEP 6 - SUPERVISE

The platoon leader must enforce environmental protection standards during supervision of all training activities.

To use the environmental risk assessment worksheet (see Figure E-1) for a specific operation or training event, the scout platoon leader and subordinate leaders first determine the impact level for each of five operational factors. These activities, listed in the top part of the worksheet, are movement of heavy vehicles and equipment; movement of personnel and light vehicles and equipment; assembly area activities; field maintenance activities; and garrison maintenance activities. The risk impact is assigned a value from 0 (lowest risk) to 5 (highest risk) for each activity.

The second part of the worksheet allows leaders to assess the risk impact of the platoon's activities in seven critical areas of environmental concern. The leaders determine which of the five operational activities will affect each critical area and enter the corresponding risk impact value. For example, the platoon leader determines that movement of heavy vehicles (which he has assigned a risk value of 5), "light" movement (a value of 2), and assembly area activities (a value of 4) will affect air pollution during the platoon's upcoming training exercise. He enters those values in the appropriate columns, then adds them together for a total risk impact value of 11 for air pollution. He repeats this process for the other environmental areas of concern.

The total of the risk impact values for the seven environmental areas is the overall risk impact value for the operation or exercise. As noted, the overall point total serves as an indicator of risk impact in four categories: low, medium, high, and extremely high. The worksheet summarizes the environmental damage risk for these categories.

The worksheet also lists the level at which environmental protection decisions are made for each risk impact category. As with other types of risk assessment, such decisions must be made, and appropriate controls implemented, at the proper level of command. The decision-maker (whether it is the platoon leader, a subordinate leader, or a higher commander) uses the risk impact values as a guide in ensuring that the environment in the operational area is protected and preserved.