Environmental due diligence for industrial mergers and acquisitions
has traditionally been viewed as ensuring that environmental
liabilities associated with on-site contamination and regulatory
compliance issues are fully accounted for in the transaction.
However, this focus fails to obtain information on a
number of potential strategic risk issues, nor does it provide for
the type of proactive business planning that can add tremendous
value to the overall due diligence process for industrial mergers
and acquisitions. To eliminate these critical shortcomings, strategic
environmental management (SEM) concepts need to be incorporated
into the environmental due diligence process. This paper
provides guidance on the incorporation and implementation of
SEM reviews in these types of projects. This guidance includes examples
of the types of objectives that SEM reviews can encompass
to better ensure the integration of environmental issues with
overall business planning efforts conducted during the due diligence
process, in order to obtain a competitive advantage.