Cautious welcome for ISO 14001 revised draft standard 09 December 2014

News that the revision to the ISO 14001 international environmental management standard has been approved for final draft has been given a cautious welcome by Cedrec.

However, the online legislation specialist is also voicing concerns over its implementation and is urging industrial companies to start preparing now for its impact.

Strong support from ISO member bodies for the draft standard has seen the revision move towards the final approval stage. However, Cedrec says this is in contrast to the views of environmental professionals charged with implementing the revised standard.

Research conducted by Cedrec last August (2014) revealed "significant uncertainty" about the impact of the new standard on management operations.

It showed that nearly two-thirds (62%) of environmental professionals don't know how the changes will affect their management systems.

"While the new version of ISO 14001 represents a significant change in the requirements of the standard, it's clear that many environmental managers remain unsure what this will mean," comments Richard Clarke, senior consultant at Cedrec.

"So, the sooner ISO can adopt the standard as a final version, the sooner work can begin in assessing the changes that will need to be made to conform to the range of revised requirements."

Clarke is also concerned that changes to legal compliance may contribute to fundamental modifications to regulation in the future.

"While a revised 14001 supporting an enhanced legal compliance process is welcome, businesses need to know precisely what this will mean," he warns.

He points to the SNIFFER project report (April 2011) on "Improving environmental compliance outcomes" which illustrated that there is a significant variation in outcomes between third party audit and regulatory inspections.

Although the final version of the ISO standard is expected in Q3/2015 and businesses will have up to three years to move to the new requirements, Clarke believes that companies need to consider impacts as soon as possible.

Brian Tinham

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Cedrec Information Systems Ltd

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