ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification
The environment around us is very important, our survival as a human race depends on the environment. It supports us, giving us food, shelter, drinking water and habitable conditions. The effects of global warming and how it is affecting the way we live and work is well documented. Environmental Certification ISO 14001:2015 is the way for Organizations to reduce their environmental footprint.
There are many ways to help the environment, one of them being the ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification standards for businesses and organizations of any kind. The ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification is a family of ISO standards that are related to environmental management that exists to help businesses and/or organizations minimize how they negatively affect the environment while conducting their business activities, comply with applicable laws, regulations and other environmentally oriented requirements and to improve over time on their approach to minimize how they negatively affect the environment. The certification has grown in popularity due to the reason that it can be applied to any organization or services. It can be applied to manufacturing, construction, pharmaceuticals, food, and service industries.
The standards for ISO were finalized in 1996 and they are updated every five years to remain relevant in the ever changing business landscape, the ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification standard is compatible with other management system standards namely ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management Standard, ISO 45001:2018 Safety standard, ISO 27001, Information security Standards, ISO 13485, Certification to Medical Devices.
These standards are also recognized internationally. Governments and local authorities place a lot of importance on ISO 14001:2015 Environmental certifications, which leads many companies to undergo the certification because it gives them a greater chance of winning tenders from the government or local authorities. The certification also helps companies gain a competitive advantage and the trust of both internal and external stakeholders. The last update made to ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification was in 2015.
Other ISO standards that look at different types of management such as Quality Management ISO 9001 and Safety ISO 45001 all use High Level structures, meaning that ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification can easily be integrated into any existing ISO management system. ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certifications is suitable for any business or organization such as private, non-profit or governmental. All it requires is that any business or organization considers all environmental issues connected to its operation such as air pollution, waste management, soil contamination and resource use and efficiency and as all other ISO management systems require, improve gradually on how they approach environmental concerns that they might cause.
The primary aim of the ISO 14001:2015 Environmental certification is to help companies become more environmentally friendly and provide a structured and defined way of dealing with the issues of environmental welfare. The main elements that need to be addressed in ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Certification are Managing processes and procedures and identifying environmental aspects which are within the control of the organization and the impact derived from these aspects. So basically, a company is supposed to define what it does to alleviate its environmental impact and do what they have stipulated. ISO 14001:2015 Environmental certification also requires the active and proactive role to be taken by management and employees alike. Read more…
