ISO 14001 – The standard for more sus­tain­abil­i­ty

En­vi­ron­men­tal awareness is nowadays present in the majority of economic sectors. En­vi­ron­men­tal friend­li­ness and sus­tain­abil­i­ty are no longer only of interest to zealous idealists. Nowadays, no company can afford to make en­vi­ron­men­tal policy low-priority, even if it’s only in response to customer demand. Customers and investors are re­quest­ing more and more often that clear steps toward improving en­vi­ron­men­tal balance be taken. To prove that en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion plays an important role in your own company, you can apply for ISO 14001 cer­ti­fi­ca­tion. Yet what re­quire­ments do you have to fulfill in order to obtain it?

Many bigger companies nowadays install an en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system. In doing so they are at­tempt­ing to organize and improve ac­tiv­i­ties related to en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion within their op­er­a­tions. The­o­ret­i­cal­ly, every company can use their own ideas and concepts for a good en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system. However, what is actually being done in­ter­nal­ly for en­vi­ron­men­tal­ly-friendly pro­duc­tion is then not trans­par­ent for external groups (customers, investors, creditors). And the ef­fec­tive­ness of these self-created en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment systems can only be un­der­stood with dif­fi­cul­ty by external parties.

For this reason, the In­ter­na­tion­al Or­ga­ni­za­tion for Stan­dard­iza­tion’s (ISO) 14001 standard generally provides guide­lines with which re­spon­si­bil­i­ties relating to en­vi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty can be sensibly organized. Anyone who has aligned their en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment with this standard, can also apply for a cer­tifi­cate. Should a company pass the ISO 14001 cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, it can advertise worldwide with this dis­tinc­tion. This way it can also present itself to customers and business partners as a company that demon­stra­bly supports en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion.

So that companies are con­tin­u­ous­ly getting closer to their stated en­vi­ron­men­tal ob­jec­tives and con­sis­tent­ly op­ti­miz­ing their system, ISO 14001 relies on the con­tin­u­ous im­prove­ment process (CIP) and the PDCA cycle. Both resources con­sti­tute simple tools for making steady im­prove­ments in quality to the en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system.

The first version of the standard was released as early as 1996. In 2000 and 2015 two revisions replaced older versions. Through the most recent revision, the standard was adapted to the High-Level Structure with which other ISO guide­lines are aligned. Here is a matter of ter­mi­no­log­i­cal and struc­tur­al adap­ta­tions so that all standards are working with the same vo­cab­u­lary. Now more than 350,000 companies worldwide are certified and work in ac­cor­dance with the guide­lines in ISO 14001.

The ISO 14001 standard consists of ten sections, whereby the first three only contain details on the document itself. The actual guide­lines are listed starting in Section 4.

In order to be able to introduce a well-func­tion­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system, one must first deal with the framework con­di­tions within their own company. For this reason, Section 4 requests that man­age­ment consider all internal and external aspects that would be affected by an EMS. Documents must be issued in which all of the company’s en­vi­ron­men­tal­ly-related aspects are listed. In par­tic­u­lar, this comprises the work, man­u­fac­tured products and the offered services them­selves: To what extent do pro­duc­tion and services have an effect on en­vi­ron­men­tal balance?

Legal reg­u­la­tions can be part of the external context, but also the social situation, which includes customer opinion. Should a company neglect en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion, it can sometimes have dev­as­tat­ing con­se­quences.

Section 5 deals directly with the company’s man­age­ment. The ISO 14001 standard stip­u­lates that specific roles are to be assigned that focus on es­tab­lish­ing an EMS. Fur­ther­more, man­age­ment should set a good example. Even with the behavior of upper man­age­ment, it must be clear what value en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion has within the company.

De­ter­min­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal policies is also part of man­age­ment’s re­spon­si­bil­i­ties. These outline the ap­prox­i­mate direction of en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion within the company. They are con­sid­ered the guiding prin­ci­ples for the entire company and emphasize the com­mit­ment to sus­tain­abil­i­ty. Fur­ther­more, they demand the con­tin­u­ous im­prove­ment of the EMS and the ob­ser­vance of all en­vi­ron­men­tal legal re­quire­ments.

So that an en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system can function, risk and op­por­tu­ni­ties within the company must be iden­ti­fied. Then you can plan specific pre­ven­tive measures: what you can do to minimize risks and increase op­por­tu­ni­ties. This also requires you to define specific en­vi­ron­men­tal ob­jec­tives. The defined ob­jec­tives must be realistic and oriented toward con­di­tions within the company. It is also important that the ob­jec­tives are specific. Instead of working with vague visions, as is the case with en­vi­ron­men­tal policy, clearly mea­sur­able spec­i­fi­ca­tions are needed for the en­vi­ron­men­tal ob­jec­tives.

The area of support refers to the required resources. An EMS can only be efficient if man­age­ment makes available a suf­fi­cient budget, sound in­fra­struc­ture and above all trained personnel. ISO 14001 thus requires adequate training for employees. This is because the defined ob­jec­tives can only be achieved with the necessary expertise and the right attitude toward the subject of en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion.

The success of EMS depends on the com­mit­ment of both man­age­ment and employees. At the same time, com­mu­ni­ca­tion plays an important role. But not only is in­for­ma­tion sharing dealt with in this section. Com­mu­ni­ca­tion must also be geared toward external parties.

The section on op­er­a­tional aspects addresses specific impacts of the work. Beyond the product life cycle, con­se­quences for the en­vi­ron­ment should be analyzed. The objective should be to integrate a system for pro­tect­ing the en­vi­ron­ment in every step.

The section likewise calls for preparing strate­gies for en­vi­ron­men­tal emergency scenarios. Employees in dangerous sit­u­a­tions should have recourse to suitable au­toma­tisms. Here too, the company’s cir­cum­stances play a role: different in­dus­tries must deal with very different risks. In order to prevent emer­gen­cies, the company should also submit an emergency response plan.

A company must con­stant­ly monitor its EMS. This includes regularly measuring and eval­u­a­tion in­di­ca­tors. The ISO 14001 standard stip­u­lates an internal audit for this. In this way man­age­ment and staff can recognize problems in time and introduce coun­ter­mea­sures. So that the mon­i­tor­ing functions are effective, ISO 14001 states that you should define clear auditing standards and the reg­u­lar­i­ty in which the checks are to be conducted. The collected data must then be doc­u­ment­ed and com­mu­ni­cat­ed in­ter­nal­ly (and, in part, ex­ter­nal­ly)).

ISO 14001 stip­u­lates that the en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system used by a company must be con­tin­u­ous­ly optimized. This is the only way to ensure that the EMS obtains long-lasting good results. So that im­prove­ments are im­ple­ment­ed in the right areas, any non-con­for­mi­ties should be noted. An important question to answer is: In which aspects does the actual EMS not meet the required demands? The answers to this question offer starting points for im­prove­ment measures.

ISO 14001 provides companies with guide­lines toward which a company can orientate itself when designing its en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system. Instead of venturing to attempt the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the EMS system on its own, the company can rely on the in­ter­na­tion­al­ly es­tab­lished standard. However, the guide­lines also provide the op­por­tu­ni­ty for cer­ti­fi­ca­tion. With a cer­tifi­cate that proves adherence to the norm, one can show their com­mit­ment to en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion at the in­ter­na­tion­al level.

An ISO 14001 cer­ti­fi­ca­tion can be obtained from an in­de­pen­dent ver­i­fi­ca­tion authority. These exist in the form of private companies, but also as as­so­ci­a­tions. Before you com­mis­sion a certifier, you must align your en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system with ISO 14001, or even first install an EMS in your company. This is then checked in an (optional) internal audit for con­for­mi­ty with the standard. In doing so, you can simulate the actual audit via an in­de­pen­dent third party, note possible errors and then eliminate these in advance. Many companies call in a third party for this step. They can not only look at the system ob­jec­tive­ly from the outside, but also provide valuable tips for im­prove­ment based on their ex­pe­ri­ence.

The actual audit begins with a doc­u­men­ta­tion review: ISO 14001 requires in many areas a thorough doc­u­men­ta­tion. En­vi­ron­men­tal policies and en­vi­ron­men­tal ob­jec­tives, mea­sure­ment methods, role al­lo­ca­tion or the business concept are recorded in writing and presented to the certifier. The in­spect­ing authority then checks if the company has fulfilled its doc­u­men­ta­tion oblig­a­tion and if the pro­ce­dures described in the documents are compliant with the spec­i­fi­ca­tions.

Should the certifier notice smaller flaws during the audit, the company can correct these during a second step. However, should they notice serious errors, the cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process will im­me­di­ate­ly be ter­mi­nat­ed. If you pass the document review, the in­spec­tion’s second step occurs on-site. Here the auditor speaks with employees and examines the ef­fec­tive­ness of the EMS. In addition, review of the doc­u­men­ta­tion takes place again, but this time it is more detailed. If one passes this step as well, they receive the desired seal.

However, the cer­tifi­cate is only valid for three years. Within this time period an annual sur­veil­lance audit takes place, though it is far less com­pre­hen­sive than the first audit. After three years have passed, however, the cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process starts over again. Both audit steps must then be gone through again.

An ISO 14001 cer­ti­fi­ca­tion brings many ad­van­tages; however, it is also time and cost intensive. This doesn’t only begin with certifier costs. First of all, you must implement an ap­pro­pri­ate en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment system within your company. The planning work that is necessary for this most likely cannot be achieved by re­spon­si­ble employees alongside their original re­spon­si­bil­i­ties. This is why during planning you should calculate using less in-house manpower. The partly-required doc­u­men­ta­tion that must be prepared also ties up resources. How high the internal costs are is strongly dependent on existing struc­tures within the company.

Finally, there are also costs for the audit itself. Here, cer­ti­fi­ca­tion au­thor­i­ties are guided by the spec­i­fi­ca­tions of the In­ter­na­tion­al Ac­cred­i­ta­tion Forum (IAF). The costs are therefore not dependent on the company size and industry in which the business operates. Both factors affect the cer­ti­fi­ca­tion authority’s expenses. To save costs, different man­age­ment systems can sometimes be certified at the same time: ISO 9001 (quality man­age­ment), ISO 31000 (risk man­age­ment) and ISO 50001 (energy man­age­ment), for example, are very ideal for im­ple­ment­ing together.

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