ISO 14001 Environmental Management System

ISO 14001 is an internationally accepted standard that sets out a framework of essential elements for putting an effective Environmental Management System (EMS) in place. The standard is designed to address the balance between maintaining profitability and reducing environmental impact.

What’s in ISO 14001?

  • General requirements
  • Environmental policy
  • Planning implementation and operation
  • Checking and corrective action
  • Management review

This means you can identify aspects of your business that impact on the environment and understand those environmental laws that are relevant to your situation. The next step is to produce objectives for improvement and a management programme to achieve them, with regular reviews for continual improvement.

Who is it relevant to?

Everybody and every organisation in some way has an impact of the environment.

ISO 14001 is relevant to every organization, including:

ISO 14001 Environmental Management System

BS8555

British Standard BS 8555:2003 – ‘Guidance to the phased implementation of an environmental management system including the use of environmental performance indicators’ provides a series of phases for the implementation of an environmental management system leading to readiness for certification against ISO 14001.

The six phases of BS 8555 are:

  • Commitment and establishing the baseline
  • Identifying and ensuring compliance with legal and other requirements
  • Developing objectives, targets and programmes
  • Implementation and operation of the EMS
  • Checking, auditing and review
  • EMS acknowledgement:- An ISO 14001 certificate is issued as the final step.

A copy of BS8555 can be purchased from BSI

FSC - Forest Stewardship Council

FSC was created to address concerns about deforestation in the tropics. It is an independent, non-governmental, not for profit organization. Products carrying the FSC label are independently certified to assure consumers that they come from forests that are managed to meet the social, economic and ecological needs of present and future generations.

A printer must be certified to be able to use the FSC logo. It is not compliant if the paper is certified and the printer is not. The use of the FSC logo can not be displayed on the product unless the entire chain of custody including the printer is certified.

For more information visit the FSC website.

PEFC - Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification Schemes

This is the world’s largest forest certification organisation. It is an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organisation, founded in 1999 which promotes sustainably managed forests through independent third party certification.

PEFC account for more than 200 million hectares of certified forests producing millions of tonnes of certified timber to the market place. It arose as an alternative to FSC for the forests of Europe.

For more information visit the PEFC website.

EMAS - Eco-Management and Audit Scheme

This is a voluntary EU initiative designed to improve a company's environmental performance. It is a management tool for companies and other organisations to evaluate, report and improve their environmental performance. EMAS acknowledges organizations that improve their environmental performance on a continuous basis.

To achieve EMAS, organizations need to be legally compliant, run an environmental management system and report on their environmental performance through the publication of an independently verified environmental statement.

To receive EMAS registration an organisation must comply with the following steps:

  • Conduct an environmental review
  • Following the results of the review, establish an effective environmental management system aimed at achieving the organisation’s environmental policy defined by the top management.
  • Carry out an environmental audit assessing in particular the management system in place and conformity with the organisation’s policy and programme as well as compliance environmental regulatory requirements.
  • Provide a statement of its environmental performance which lays down the results achieved against the environmental objectives and the future steps to be undertaken in order to continuously improve the organisation’s environmental performance.

The steps above must be accredited by a qualifed EMAS verifier and the validated statement needs to be sent to the EMAS Competent Body for registration and made publicly available before an organisation can use the EMAS logo.

For more information visit the EMAS website.

ISO 9001

ISO 9000 is a set of standards for quality management systems. ISO 9000 is maintained by ISO, the International Organization for Standardisation and is administered by accreditation and certification bodies. Some of the requirements in ISO 9001 include:

  • A set of procedures to cover all key processes in the business;
  • Monitoring processes to ensure they are effective;
  • Keeping adequate records
  • Checking output for defects, with appropriate and corrective action where necessary
  • Regularly reviewing individual processes and the quality system itself for effectiveness and continual improvement

A company or organization that has been independently audited and certified to be in conformance with ISO 9001 may state that it is "ISO 9001 certified" or "ISO 9001 registered". Certification to an ISO 9000 standard does not guarantee any quality of end products and services, it certifies that formalised business processes are being applied.

For more information visit the ISO 9001 website.

 

ISO 9001