As environmental performance becomes central to business value, it also creates new legal and operational risks. Companies in asset- and resource-intensive sectors such as chemicals, energy, mining, manufacturing and waste can reduce those risks by bringing in legal and environmental expertise early on in their decision-making. This approach strengthens internal coordination and turns environmental performance into a strategic business advantage.
Environmental performance is business-critical
Our recent report, The Onterris Outlook: Why Environmental Performance Is Business-Critical, shows that environmental performance now affects companies’ access to capital, operational efficiency and reputational standing among investors, customers and regulators. For businesses in high-impact industries, it has gone from being a technical necessity to a core legal and strategic issue.
But management of environmental programs is often fragmented, which creates friction and delays and exposes organizations to serious risk. This is where external environmental support and outside legal counsel can help.
Beyond silos: Aligning teams across the organization
Companies often struggle to align their internal functions. Sustainability teams set targets and collect performance data. Operations teams carry out remediation, monitoring and technical interventions. Legal teams handle compliance and risk mitigation.
When these functions operate independently, environmental claims can be overstated, disclosures can be inconsistent and targets can be unrealistic. This exposes the organization to legal and reputational risk. External environmental firms, working closely with legal teams, act as strategic bridges: they bring technical expertise and regulatory knowledge, ensuring that sustainability ambitions align with compliance, risk management and operational realities.
Legal insight and environmental expertise: A powerful partnership
Mark Bowers, a remediation manager at Bayer with four decades of chemical industry experience, recognizes the value of integrated expertise.
Skilled external partners act as bridges between our team, operations and the legal function. They help us navigate regulatory complexity while staying ahead of emerging risks.
Regulations evolve rapidly, especially in emerging areas such as Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions and new contaminants. External environmental experts can monitor these changes, provide actionable guidance and help legal teams translate complex rules into practical, defensible decisions.
We work closely with internal and external legal counsel across a range of issues. They help assess jurisdictional risks, clarify complex compliance requirements and ensure the right statutory language is used, especially in areas like permitting reform. Consulting legal counsel is essential before advancing any policy or disclosure initiative.
What effective support looks like
The best partnerships integrate environmental firms and legal teams from the start, instead of just at the compliance or litigation stages.
External support can help companies tackle:
Kyle Lapic, solid waste sector leader at Onterris, explains how environmental and legal support work hand in hand.
For companies that operate internationally, cross-border expertise is essential because what is compliant in one market could be misleading in another. Coordinated environmental and legal insight helps companies to navigate global complexity confidently.
Moving beyond compliance to strategic value
By aligning environmental ambition with legal and operational realities, companies in high-impact industries can enhance their operational efficiency by preventing downtime, avoiding fines and optimizing remediation efforts. They can also boost their credibility with investors, regulators and the public while increasing access to capital by demonstrating proactive risk management and strong environmental performance. They will also be in a better position to anticipate challenges before they become crises, which will make their decision-making more agile.
Treating environmental and legal partnerships as strategic capabilities allows general counsel to turn regulatory obligations into business advantage.
How to make environmental strategy a legal and strategic priority
For high-impact industries, environmental performance is no longer optional. General counsel who embed legal insight early and coordinate with specialized environmental experts will be in a position to manage risk, protect reputation and generate tangible business value. And by turning environmental programs into a strategic lever, companies can transform compliance and remediation into measurable operational, financial and reputational gains.
Explore the Outlook report to see how aligning legal and environmental strategies can drive measurable business gains.
Read the full Outlook report.
Strengthen Your Environmental Strategy
Partner with Onterris to turn environmental performance into a strategic advantage. Our global teams of scientists, engineers and consultants combine technical expertise, data-driven insight and practical solutions to help companies manage risk, enhance operational resilience and protect the environment, while advancing business performance and long-term value.