Abstract |
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reported that from 1999 through 2009, the number of National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permittees increased over 200 percent, from 372,700 to more than 950,000, due to court decisions and new regulations. Further, while expanding in number, permits have also become more complex. Because of the increased workload associated with these permits and the tightening of federal and state budgets, the states in Region 7 requested that EPA hold a Kaizen event to determine whether opportunities existed to improve NPDES program efficiency. We conducted an audit of the Kaizen event to determine: What improvements identified at the Region 7 event can be applied on a wider scale What barriers existed in the development and implementation of improvements identified from event results and what lessons can be learned from the event |