This week, we are taking time out to acknowledge a significant accomplishment – Four Years without a lost-time/recordable injury at Genera Energy.  Zero!  In the business of biomass feedstock supply, not a day goes by without hazards popping up in the workplace – from our production fields with a sorghum or miscanthus harvest to processing operations where we mill a variety of energy crops.  It takes a deliberate, daily effort to constantly identify hazards and plan our work to eliminate exposure to these hazards.

We passed the four year mark in November and are now 1,532 days and counting since we unloaded the first bale of switchgrass at our facility.  For Genera Energy, that is more than 130,000 labor hours.  It’s important to acknowledge the hard work it took to get here, but our group understands that it is the road ahead that is critical to our success throughout the supply chain.

How did we get here?  What happens next?

Like I said, it took four years of everyone paying attention and deliberately thinking about safety to get this far.  To help us along the way (especially as our operations grow in size), we implemented effective training and safety programs.

  • Weekly Safety Audits
  • Safety Incentive Programs
  • Near-Miss Reporting
  • Department Safety Committees
  • Continuing Education
  • Monthly Safety Training
  • Required Employee Training
  • Hazard Assessments

Today, the critical key to our success is the fact that each employee is directly involved—this not only improves communication and provides useful feedback, but builds a team of professionals who take pride in their efforts and genuinely care about each other’s safety and the success of the team.  Workers from the field, plant and front office all participate and have identified potential concerns allowing us to make repairs, engineer controls or improve procedures effectively stopping accidents before they happen.

While we take a moment to recognize the hard work, we don’t stop and we don’t take this for granted.  All around us every day, accidents are waiting to happen.  By building on our lessons learned, we can continue driving on to the next milestone and beyond.

 By Clay Dye, Project Manager