OR&A Home Page

International Standards and ORA™

BS EN ISO 14001 - Environmental Management Systems
This standard is intended to provide organizations with a framework to protect the environment and respond to changing environmental conditions in balance with socio-economic needs. It specifies requirements that enable an organization to achieve the intended outcomes it sets for its environmental management system.

This systematic approach to environmental management can provide senior management with information to build success over the long term and create options for contributing to sustainable development by:

— mitigating the potential adverse effect of environmental conditions on the organization;

— assisting the organization in the fulfilment of compliance obligations;

— enhancing environmental performance;

— controlling or influencing the way the organization’s products and services are designed, manufactured, distributed, consumed and disposed by using a life cycle perspective that can prevent environmental impacts from being unintentionally shifted elsewhere within the life cycle;

— achieving financial and operational benefits that can result from implementing environmentally sound alternatives that strengthen the organization’s market position;

— communicating environmental information to relevant interested parties.

This International Standard, like other International Standards, is not intended to increase or change an organization’s legal requirements.

The success of an environmental management system depends on commitment from all levels and functions of the organization, led by senior management and organizations can leverage opportunities to prevent or mitigate adverse environmental impacts and enhance beneficial environmental impacts, particularly those with strategic and competitive implications.

The same senior management can effectively address risks and opportunities by integrating environmental management into their organization’s business processes, strategic direction and decision making, aligning them with other business priorities and incorporating environmental governance into the overall management system.

Demonstration of successful implementation of this International Standard can be used to assure interested parties that an effective environmental management system is in place.

Plan-Do-Check-Act model
The basis for the approach underlying an environmental management system is founded on the concept of Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) which provides an iterative process used by organizations to achieve continual improvement

ISO14000 Plan - Do - Check - Act (PDCA) Model

The Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) model can be applied to an environmental management system and to each
of its individual elements. It can be briefly described as follows.

— Plan: establish environmental objectives and processes necessary to deliver results in accordance
with the organization’s environmental policy.

— Do: implement the processes as planned.

— Check: monitor and measure processes against the environmental policy, including its commitments,
environmental objectives and operating criteria, and report the results.

— Act: take actions to continually improve.

The above illustration shows how the framework introduced in this International Standard could be integrated into a
PDCA model, which can help new and existing users to understand the importance of a systems approach.

Contents of this ISO 14001 Standard
This International Standard conforms to ISO requirements for management system standards which include a high level structure, identical core text, and common terms with core definitions, designed to benefit users implementing multiple ISO management system standards.

This International Standard does not include requirements specific to other management systems, such as those for quality, occupational health and safety, energy or financial management. However, this International Standard enables an organization to use a common approach and risk-based thinking to integrate its environmental management system with the requirements of other management systems.

This standard also contains the requirements used to assess conformity and an organization that wishes to demonstrate conformity with this standard can do so by:

— making a self-determination and self-declaration, or

— seeking confirmation of its conformance by parties having an interest in the organization, such as
customers, or

— seeking confirmation of its self-declaration by a party external to the organization, or

— seeking certification/registration of its environmental management system by an external
organization.

Scope
This International Standard specifies the requirements for an environmental management system that an organization can use to enhance its environmental performance and is intended for use by an organization seeking to manage its environmental responsibilities in a systematic manner that contributes to the environmental pillar of sustainability.

This standard is intended to help an organization achieve the intended outcomes of its environmental management system, which provide value for the environment, the organization itself and interested parties.

Compliance with the organization’s environmental policy, the intended outcomes of an environmental management system include:

— enhancement of environmental performance;

— fulfilment of compliance obligations;

— achievement of environmental objectives.

This standard can be applied by any organization, regardless of size, type and nature, and applies to the environmental aspects of its activities, products and services that the organization determines it can either control or influence considering a life cycle perspective.

It does not state specific environmental performance criteria. However, it is intended for use in whole or in part to systematically improve environmental management.

Claims of conformity to this standard, however, cannot accepted unless all its requirements are incorporated into an organization’s environmental management system and fulfilled without exclusion.

ORA™ and ISO 14001
Whilst ORA™ Ltd. fully endorses and actively encourages the implementation of ISO 14001 in every project with which it is involved, the company itself is entirely cloud based (apart from the head office), such that maintaining ISO 14001 would be wasteful in itself.

However, in keeping with the principles of environmental management, and ISO 14001, the Environmental Policy of this office is compliant with the standard, wherever possible. It is also effectively carbon negative as explained below:

— the office is self sufficient with green energy, being supplied by a large PV and battery storage system with the capability to support the recent UK ESO / DFS initiatives;

— local transport is by company EV, recharged with green energy from the office electrical system;

— international transport requires carbon offsetting for all journeys;

— printed matter is avoided wherever possible, retaining all records in secure electronic formats;

— all office generated waste matter is segregated and recycled where possible;

— all office systems, processes and procedures are regularly reviewed and audited to improve where possible;

— lessons learned from projects are used to improve the environmental performance of ORA™ systems and processes, where possible;

— all business processes and systems are regularly reviewed and audited to identify potential improvements;