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What is SQRC?


Barbara Kanegsberg
Ed Kanegsberg


Surface Quality Resource Center, SQRC, is a not for profit, 501c3 organization. We established SQRC as a separate entity from our consultancy to utilize our decades of experience in chemistry, clinical chemistry, physics, and process development for productive, environmentally-preferred projects. Industrial activities are reality of contemporary life; the need to protect our environment is also a reality.


The SQRC charter encompasses two basic areas:


•Education and outreach to industry and to communities
•Developing and implementing practical, environmentally-preferred processes


The world is complex and multifaceted; we are convinced that education is crucial to environmental improvement. Certainly, we continue to educate ourselves. Education is important for industry, including fabrication and rework, in order to understand the benefits and limitations of environmentally-preferred processes and also to enable such processes to be adopted.


We consider education of communities impacted by industrial activities to be crucial. Communities near industrial sites may find either a complete lack of information, or they may be deluged by weighty, incomprehensible reports. In order for communities to respond effectively industry and governmental reports, community members need a working understanding of the basics of industrial activities.

Our activities also include worker safety issues, because, while regulations typically distinguish environmental problems from worker safety problems, industry has to consider both worker safety and environmental requirements before adopting a new process.


Practical, environmentally-preferred processes
SQRC fosters the development and use of practical, environmentally-preferred processes through education, developmental research, and direct partnering/demonstration projects with manufacturers. We are concerned that all too many “environmental” processes don’t actually get used. The process may be ignored ( using the “if it’s green, it can’t be any good” rationale), inappropriately utilized, or inadequately adopted. An inefficient process that is labeled as “environmental” but wastes resources is likely to have a negative net impact on both the environment and on the manufacturer’s product line. Many “environmental” processes could be adopted with a bit more development and education.

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