You are an environmental engineer for one of the many local plants. That plant discharges effluents into a lake in a flourishing tourist area. Although all the plants are marginally profitable, they compete for the same customers. Your responsibilities are to monitor the water and air discharges at your plant and the periodic reporting to Dept. of Anti-pollution. You have just prepared a report that indicates that the level of pollution in the Plant’s water discharges slightly exceed the legal limits. Your supervisor says you should regard the excess as a mere ‘technicality’, and he asks you to ‘adjust’ the data so that the data appears to be in compliance. He says that slight excess is not going to endanger human or fish life any more than if the plant were actually in compliance. However, he says, solving the problem would require a very heavy investment. He explains, “We cannot afford new equipment. It might cost even a few jobs. It will put us behind our competitors. Besides, he says that many of the competitors are doing the same and the bad publicity we would get might scare off some of the tourist industry, making it worse for everybody
CASE STUDY
You are an environmental engineer for one of the many local plants. That plant discharges effluents
into a lake in a flourishing tourist area. Although all the plants are marginally profitable, they compete
for the same customers. Your responsibilities are to monitor the water and air discharges at your plant
and the periodic reporting to Dept. of Anti-pollution. You have just prepared a report that indicates that
the level of pollution in the Plant’s water discharges slightly exceed the legal limits. Your supervisor
says you should regard the excess as a mere ‘technicality’, and he asks you to ‘adjust’ the data so that
the data appears to be in compliance. He says that slight excess is not going to endanger human or fish
life any more than if the plant were actually in compliance. However, he says, solving the problem
would require a very heavy investment. He explains, “We cannot afford new equipment. It might cost
even a few jobs. It will put us behind our competitors. Besides, he says that many of the competitors are
doing the same and the bad publicity we would get might scare off some of the tourist industry, making
it worse for everybody”.
- What are your basic responsibilities as an environmental engineer in this plant? How should you respond to your supervisor’s requests? What are the ethical issues in this case?
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