Environment

Environmental Concerns
All organisations will have seen the increasing interest in environmental concerns by consumers and many Governments and much environmental legislation already exists with the likelihood being that this will increase.

This environmental legislation includes controls to combat pollution and is increasingly concerned over energy efficiency, the disposal of waste, the use of scarce natural resources and the protection of the environment. Also, in many instances, with the rising costs of energy and fuel, good environmental initiatives will save money.

So many organisations are becoming increasingly aware of the benefits of instituting good environmental practices and environmental management into their operations and being able to show that they are concerned with helping to improve the environment.

Environmental Legislation
There is a lot of Environmental Legislation which companies need to address. Regulations which now affect companies include various Environmental Protection Regulations, Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations, packaging regulations, control of hazardous waste and the control of VOC emissions.

Legislation continues to increase and change, and a good system needs to be in place to ensure that an organisation fully complies with all of the requirements and the first stage is to understand what legislation applies to your company.

Environmental Management and BS 8555
BS 8555 was developed for small and medium sized companies to help them address legal compliance issues that affect their business. It allows a company to follow a series of approved stages and obtain certification at whichever of the stages is appropriate for them, up to full ISO 14001 approval if required.

Many companies stop at Stages 2 or 3, which deals with ensuring legal compliance, but without implementing a full environmental system.

Environmental Management System Standard, ISO 14000
For organisations that wish to have a full environmental system there is the internationally accepted ISO 14001, which considers the legal compliance issues as the first step and then moves towards introducing objectives and targets for improvements and a fully documented management system.

Organisations who already have an ISO 9001 quality system in place can find that with only minor changes many of the quality management procedures and processes they already have in place fully satisfy the requirements of ISO 14001.