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19 Jan 09. Protecting the environment: DCNS wins Group-wide certification to ISO 14001. For over ten years now DCNS has been managing its industrial activities on environment-friendly lines. Today, the Group became the first major European defence contractor to win ISO 14001 certification to a single environmental management system for all shipyards and facilities, demonstrating both vitality as an industry leader and commitment to environmental protection. All DCNS facilities and activities – specifically the design, production and maintenance of integrated warships – are now certified to ISO 14001. Compliance was achieved in just 18 months. It reflects DCNS’s sense of corporate responsibility and concern for the impact its facilities and activities have on the ports and cities where they are located. This Group-wide effort is part of a broader strategy to deliver solutions that are on budget and meet customer expectations while preserving the environment – not least the sea, home to our products. DCNS’s sense of environmental responsibility extends to warships based on eco-design principles. “The main challenge was to meet the standard’s exhaustive requirements covering all activities from product design and production to maintenance and functional services. In winning Group-wide certification in just 18 months, we have achieved a key goal in the best DCNS tradition, demonstrating yet again teamwork, commitment to an ambitious goal and timely delivery,” said Executive Vice President & COO Bernard Planchais. Certification to ISO 14001 is the result of a Group-wide effort by the full spectrum of employees to implement an environmental management system in line with a long-term strategy to improve DCNS’s environmental performance. The Lorient shipyard, which specialises in the design and construction of surface combatants, launched an ISO 14001 effort in 2004 resulting in certification in 2006, making it the first DCNS facility to complete the process. The Saint-Tropez facility followed suit in 2008 after demonstrating due control over the environmental impact of all its activities. ISO 14001 is an internationally recognised standard to help organisations improve their environmental performance in areas ranging from energy and risk management to waste recycling and processing. DCNS was certified to ISO 14001 by AFAQ Afnor Certification, a leading certification body in France and worldwide and widely acclaimed for its code of ethics and experience.
19 Jan 09. San Diego-based General Atomics (GA) was awarded a contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop scalable processes for the cost-effective large-scale production of algae triglyceride oil and an algae-derived JP-8 jet fuel surrogate. The contract has a total value of up to $43M if all phases of the development program are completed. GA will lead a team of university and industrial partners that will examine all aspects of the algae to JP-8 production process. From a technical perspective, algae oil can be produced and converted to JP-8. The goal of this 36 month program is to reduce the cost of doing so to a level that will offer DOD an affordable, reliable long term supply of JP-8. This will involve identifying key cost drivers and investigating multiple approaches to increasing productivity and reducing operating and/or capital costs. The program will address algae selection and growth; water, carbon dioxide and nutrient supply; algae harvesting; oil extraction; and conversion to JP-8 – all in the context of an overall JP-8 life-cycle cost model. The contract will conclude with a pre-pilot scale demonstration. (Source: ASD Network)