Why think about ISO 14001 or EMAS (Eco-Management and Auditing Scheme)?
Your organisation may be becoming concerned about the environmental impact of its activities, products and services, and the rising costs associated with issues such as waste management and energy conservation. This concern is reflected in the amount of increasingly stringent legislation related to environmental protection.
Many organisations not only wish to achieve compliance with environmental legislation, but they want to demonstrate sound environmental performance. As a consequence they will implement an environmental management system to help control its impacts and meet their requirements of relevant legislation.
The two main standards for environmental management are ISO 14001 (Environmental Management Systems) and EMAS (Eco-management and Auditing Scheme). ISO 14001 and EMAS are standards related to environmental management systems. Accreditation to one of these standards shows that a company has an effective environmental management system. This is useful as it will inherently help regulatory issues to be addressed and will satisfy the interests of many parties.
For instance, many companies will demand accreditation as a way of demonstrating environmental performance and will only use suppliers who have attained these levels. The standards also have an in-built requirement to demonstrate continual improvement and so this keeps business moving forwards in environmental terms.
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How can Envex help?
Whether you are already working towards formal accreditation of your environmental management system or if you are just thinking about starting to work towards it, Envex can assist you.
Support can be provided in the form of practical help and feedback as well as a gap analysis report. This will allow you to gain an overview of how far you have to go to be compliant with standards such as ISO 14001 or EMAS and, more importantly, how you can bridge the gaps.
Support can be provided in a number of ways:
An initial environmental review:
This is the first step for organisations that have not yet implemented an EMS. An initial review helps to identify the legislation relevant to your business, the significant environmental impacts and evaluate the existing management systems that you may have.
An environmental audit of your organisation:
This is suitable for organisations that have an EMS and wish to know how to improve it to a level that would allow them to apply for formal accreditation to ISO 14001 or EMAS. The analysis takes the form of a gap analysis and the final environmental report incorporates an action plan to guide your organisation to the required standard of environmental management.
An environmental audit of your supply chain:
This is in the same format as an external audit of your business, except that this audits a supplier (or potential supplier) to your business. Such environmental audits allow you to ensure that your supply chain has implemented an environmental management system in accordance with your specifications.
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