Since the International Organization for Standardization initially issued the environmental management system (EMS) series of standards (ISO 14001) in 1996, numerous companies have developed EMSs and attained third-party registration to ISO 14001. As these facilities have continued to implement their ISO 14001 EMS, they began to experience some of the benefits of attaining this certification. The main benefit that I am going to discuss is cost savings, because as they say, money talks.

There is no denying that attaining ISO 14001 certification requires financial resources. However, once a facility is certified, there is an opportunity to recoup some of the money spent in attaining the certification. One of the underlying principles of ISO 14001 is to create a program that, if implemented, will show continual improvement. This continual improvement is achieved and measured as part of the EMS by evaluating a facility’s environmental aspects and setting goals (objectives and targets) on a regular basis.

A common objective and target I have seen in a number of ISO 14001 EMSs is to reduce the amount of waste generated by a certain percentage. By setting this as a goal, facility personnel look at facility operations and identify ways to achieve the goal. Then through the ISO 14001 EMS, method(s) of waste reduction are implemented. On the conservative side, these waste reductions have resulted in a reduction in waste disposal costs of between 10 and 20 percent for a facility. Reducing waste generation can also result in associated cost savings at a facility including:

• Reductions in water use
• Reductions in fuel and electricity use
• Reductions in raw material use
• Increased productivity

If you’re not like the rest of us and motivated by the thought of saving thousands of dollars in operating costs, raw material costs and waste disposal costs as a result of obtaining ISO 14001 certification then you might be interested in some of the other benefits. These include:

• Good public relations - the facility’s image with the public, regulatory agencies, lenders and investors will be enhanced
• Improvement in environmental performance - the facility will experience fewer notices of violation and transition from reacting to environmental crises to becoming proactive with regard to integrating environmental issues into all business activities
• Creating a system that is self-perpetuating - once the EMS is implemented due to its structure and documentation an orderly process for understanding and meeting regulatory requirements has been created that can continue despite personnel or other changes at a facility

Now you can make an informed decision about whether or not to pursue ISO 14001 certification as you should have an understanding of what it takes to become ISO 14001 certified (Part I article in December newsletter), what it takes to maintain ISO 14001 certification (Part II article in January newsletter) and the benefits of ISO 14001 certification.