Call to action: Environment among NEMA chairman’s top efforts

By Control Engineering Staff December 19, 2006

Rosslyn, VA —Environmentally sound manufacturing immediately was named among top priorities for the new chairman of the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA), S&C Electric president and CEO, John Estey. Environmental issues, along with workforce education and U.S. manufacturing competitiveness, have been among important topics at S&C, a Chicago-based manufacturer of electric power control, switch protection, and related control components. On Nov. 30, NEMA named Estey as the chairman of its Board of Governors, said to include executives of the world’s largest electrical manufacturers.

NEMA noted that it recently adopted a call to action that will push NEMA and its member companies to the forefront of the movement to control hazardous materials in products and to design products in a manner that will help the environment. NEMA’s call to action will establish global hazardous substance restrictions for virtually all relevant NEMA products, within the limits of technical achievability, and observing the need to ensure safety and performance, by July 1, 2014. By 2010, NEMA manufacturers will have met standards set forth for certain products by the European Union Directive on the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment (RoHS). NEMA says this call to action is one of its most ambitious policy undertakings in recent years, in addition to its promotion of energy efficiency and an upgrade of the nation’s electrical infrastructure.

“NEMA has long recognized the need for sound energy and environmental policies,” said Estey in a statement from NEMA. “What we are attempting to do is get ahead of those who would institute well intentioned, but ill-advised, scientifically unsound, and anti-competitive policies and practices.”

Estey’s election as chairman through 2007 accompanied the election of other industry leaders to three-year terms on the NEMA board, including William Boehm, chief executive officer and chairman of the board of Connector Manufacturing Co.; James Campbell, president and chief executive officer of GE Consumer & Industrial; Randy Carson, group president of Eaton Corp.; Richard Couch, chief executive officer of Hypertherm Inc.; Gregory Kenny, president and chief executive officer of General Cable; John Longenderfer, president and chief executive officer of Lutron Electronics Co. Inc.; Joseph W. McClanathan, president and chief executive officer of Energizer Battery; John Morgan, president and chief executive officer of Acuity Lighting Group; John Selldorf, president and chief executive officer of Legrand North America; and Gordon Thursfield, president of Nexans Canada Inc.

Elected to fill one-year terms to fill vacancies on the board were James Davis, vice president of U.S. diagnostic imaging sales and marketing for GE Healthcare and Theodore Crandall, senior vice president of Rockwell Automation’s components & packaged applications group. Donald Hendler, president of Leviton Manufacturing, was elected for a two-year term to fill another vacancy.

NEMA was founded 1926 and is headquartered near Washington, DC, in Rosslyn, VA. It has 430 member companies manufacture products used in the generation, transmission and distribution, control, and end-use of electricity. The association says U.S. production of electrical products sold worldwide exceeds $120 billion. In addition to its headquarters NEMA also has offices in Beijing, São Paulo, and Mexico City.

—Control Engineering Daily News Desk Mark T. Hoske , editor in chief