What is ISO 14001?

ISO 14000 is that series of ISO documents/standards that is concerned with environmental management. The full series includes many related documents that discuss many specific environmental related issues such as labeling and lifecycle management. ISO 14001 deals specifically with the requirements to establish and maintain an environmental management system.

• ISO 14004 is a guidance document. It provides tips and hints regarding improvement of environmental quality management systems beyond the very basic requirements of ISO 14001. It is guidance and not intended to be audited against but contains useful advice about implementation and good practice.
• ISO 14001 is the requirements document. It is written as a specification that can be audited and verified and is intended to be the basis of registration schemes. It is a generic, general standard for environmental management and is applicable to any organization that interacts with the environment. The environmental management system that it specifies requires organizations to establish a management system to identify their interaction with the environment, control that interaction and improve environmental performance. It does not and cannot specify any actual level of performance but it does require continued environmental improvement. Further, it acknowledges that organizational environmental improvement can only be successful if it supports organizational objectives too – thus it is encouraging tangible value from an ISO 14001 program.
• While the purpose of the standard is to drive environmental performance, it also requires control over (and improvement) of organizational support processes such as document control, competency, corrective action, etc. These support processes and the overall approach will be familiar to those already involved with ISO 9001 as they are basically the same requirements – these are the basic requirements to establish any management system to support organizational success.

ISO 14001 is an excellent statement of commitment to environmental improvement and is occasionally required by customers and regulators. It is internationally accepted and recognized and yet flexible enough for any organization. While like any of the ISO standards it is possible to abuse it, it is also possible to commit to it and tangibly benefit from it, including promotion of a positive environmental commitment that sometimes influences customers.

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