17290_Authority_February_2024

22 The Authority | FEBRUARY 2024 Mifflin County Municipal Authority Starting its Sustainability Journey Nicole Stika, North American Head – Sustainability Advisory, World Kinect Energy Services A sharper focus on the bottom line and increasing community pressure for ‘greener,’ more sustainable practices are the top two factors driving the water and wastewater industry to reduce its environmental impact. Sustainability and resiliency are becoming critical issues for municipal authorities. With water and wastewater infrastructure aging out, utilities now have the responsibility to replace their graying pipes with newer, more resilient alternatives while also embracing lower-carbon energy solutions, supporting the need for municipal authorities to have sustainability goals in place. Climate change poses challenges to water and wastewater utilities through impacts such as extreme weather events, shifting precipitation and runoff patterns, and temperature changes. To protect and secure facilities, authorities must implement real and often costly measures to mitigate and adapt to these challenges. Municipal water and sewer authorities can address climate change by reducing their carbon footprint through energy efficiency measures, and by reducing the direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions related to wastewater treatment and discharge. Setting goals and targets is the easy part of a plan. What’s far more complex is building an actionable, step-by-step plan that will guide your organization toward those goals incrementally. For these reasons, organizations seeking to make a significant environmental impact must do more than create a static plan. Instead, they should commit to creating a comprehensive, living decarbonization program that’s realistic, measurable, and adaptable. Such a plan will help prioritize mitigation and adaptation strategies, identify potential risks proactively, and align internal departments. The Mifflin County Municipal Authority (MCMA) has begun to take proactive steps to ensure resiliency and do what’s right on behalf of their community and the greater good. MCMA is a public utility that serves drinking water and fire protection to customers in Mifflin County, Pennsylvania, from the Laurel Creek Reservoir. PMAA has had a long- standing partnership with World Kinect Corporation and MCMA has been leveraging the electric and natural gas services for strategic procurement. MCMA is beginning to analyze its carbon emissions, develop a roadmap that evaluates various climate-related scenarios based on feasibility and economics, and create a long-term plan that will be integrated into its capital investment plan to preserve the future of its drinking water. To drive the success of the Mifflin County Municipal Authority sustainability program, they will include these five key considerations: 1 Internal Alignment It is important to have a cross- functional group of employees who come together to educate, inspire, and empower employees around sustainability, incorporating all levels of the organization. In the instance of MCMA, senior management is already involved and driving the need to develop its first sustainability plan which will build a culture of sustainability. Often the “green” group as they are often called, is led by a champion who encourages a sense of open communication and collaboration across levels and departments, and not always a senior management person. It is important for any organization to consciously engage grassroots teammembers to ensure the plan is implemented, the organization is held accountable for its goals and the plan maintains momentum. Understanding the impact of climate change on authorities may require a new set of commitments, strategies, policies, procedures, systems, and behaviors that support integrated decision-making and Continued on page 58.