What is Environmental Management System ISO 14001?

Why do you need an ISO 14001 certificate?

• With the alarm of global warming and its consequences, human society is paying more and more attention to ecology and ecological protection. Environmental management system ISO14001 follows certain management standards that help maintain the environment around us. Companies that have passed the environmental management system ISO14001 verification and obtained the environmental management system ISO14001 certificate are in a favorable position in the competition with their competitors and are recognized globally.

• Environmental regulations are getting stricter and enforcement is getting stricter. Customers and shareholders are increasingly demanding that businesses reduce their environmental impact and show what the organization, business is doing, and how it can be improved. Environmental management systems can help organizations, businesses control and successfully manage the most important environmental aspects such as emissions, waste disposal, utilization of natural resources and energy efficiency.

• The ISO14001 certification of the environmental management system proves that the environmental management system of the organization and enterprise has been measured according to the best practice standards and meets the requirements.

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ISO 14001 is an international standard for the design and implementation of environmental management systems (EMS). The provisions of ISO 14001 provide a framework and guidance for establishing an environmental management system so that organizations do not miss out on the important elements needed to successfully establish an environmental management system. EMS, consisting of policies, processes, plans, practices, and records, define the rules governing how a company interacts with its environment. This system needs to be individually tailored to the organization to meet the exact legal requirements and environmental interactions that match specific business processes.

 

The 2020 draft of the European Commission's "European Climate Law" first proposed that Europe will achieve "carbon neutrality" by 2050, that is, the goal of reducing net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050. Subsequently, at the Glasgow Climate Summit COP26 in November 2021, representatives of more than 100 countries listed this as an official national development goal. It is urgent to highlight the national and official levels to drive carbon reduction in the industry.

On this basis, the introduction and implementation of ISO 14001 by organizations/enterprises will not only help to establish a good public image, but also to review and evaluate the environmental impacts, risks and costs caused by the operation process.

 

Content structure of ISO 14001

ISO 14001 is divided into 10 parts. The first 3 chapters are introductory, and the last 7 chapters describe the requirements of an environmental management system, summarised as follows:

Chapter 4: Organizational Context - Understanding the needs of the organization in order to implement an environmental management system, including identifying internal/external issues, identifying interested parties and their expectations, identifying the scope of the environmental management system, and the process requirements required by the system.

Chapter 5: Leadership – The leadership requirements include the need for top management to play a role in the implementation of the environmental management system by ensuring environmental commitment, defining and communicating environmental policy, and assigning roles and Responsibility to demonstrate commitment to an environmental management system.

Chapter 6: Planning - Top management must plan the functions of the EMS, assess the risks and opportunities of the EMS in the organization, identify the environmental goals that need improvement, and develop plans to achieve those goals. In addition, the organization must have a way of assessing how the organization's processes interact and affect the environment, as well as taking stock of the laws and other commitments the organization is required to adhere to.

Chapter 7:Support—details the management of all resources of the environmental management system, including the competency, awareness, communication within the organization, and documented information requirements of relevant staff.

Chapter 8:Operations - Requirements address all aspects of the environmental controls required by the organization's procedures, as well as the need to identify potential emergencies and develop response plans to prepare for emergencies should they occur.

Chapter 9: Performance Evaluation - The requirements needed to ensure that the organization can monitor whether the environmental management system is functioning properly, including monitoring and measuring business processes, assessing environmental compliance, internal audits, and ongoing management reviews of the environmental management system.

Chapter 10: Improvement - Over time, the organization shall take action to make the environmental management system better, including assessing and taking corrective action for process nonconformities.

The aforementioned requirements are all based on the PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) cycle, using these elements to implement changes in organizational processes in order to drive and maintain process improvements.