Earlier this month, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign hosted the 2013 Railroad Environmental Conference. Featuring presentations by railroad engineers, academics and consultants, the discussions focused on a number of environmental topics including pollution prevention, environmental management systems, risk management, remediation and compliance.
Roger Well, COO at ENFOS, Inc., co-presented with Stella Karnis, Senior Manager Environmental Affairs at CN Rail. They delivered a presentation outlining the business case and implementation steps for modernizing the environmental liability management platform. CN implemented ENFOS to replace an Access database developed in 2000 and to generate cost savings and efficiencies by adopting a high impact technological solution integrated with SAP.
As Well explained in the presentation, some of the most important decisions these companies have to make involve identifying high-priority problems such as lack of transparency or remediation project financial controls and then taking real action with strong leadership support.
CN was one such company. As Well explained, ENFOS was the first SaaS cloud platform deployed at CN with IT SOX controls and compliance. Now, CN is expecting to adopt up to 175 other SaaS applications by 2016. As the acceptance of SaaS solutions continues to grow, companies like CN are instituting new IT standards and requirements targeted for cloud-based applications.
There were several benefits to the deployment of ENFOS. First, CN was able to reduce its transaction costs, as well as those for data administration for internal reporting costs, internal audits and supplier management. In addition, the company was able to increase "awareness opportunities" through improved data mining and reporting. Finally, the move to ENFOS was a strategic decision that helped boost CN's sustainability efforts.
Well concluded by highlighting how the right team and technology can help make environmental liability management a successful undertaking that leads to long-term improvements in a company's financial and operational performance.
