Understanding Environmental Aspects and Impacts (ISO 14001)
A guide to identifying and evaluating environmental aspects and impacts as required by Clause 6.1.2 of ISO 14001:2015.
Introduction
The core of an Environmental Management System (EMS) is understanding how your organization interacts with the environment. ISO 14001:2015 requires you to identify these interactions (“aspects”) and their effects (“impacts”).
Definitions
- Environmental Aspect: Element of an organization’s activities, products, or services that interacts or can interact with the environment. (The Cause)
- Environmental Impact: Change to the environment, whether adverse or beneficial, wholly or partially resulting from an organization’s environmental aspects. (The Effect)
Example:
- Activity: Washing a company vehicle.
- Aspect: Use of water and cleaning chemicals; discharge of dirty water.
- Impact: Depletion of natural resources (water); water pollution.
The Process (Clause 6.1.2)
1. Identification
You must identify aspects within the defined scope of your EMS. Consider:
- Activities: Manufacturing, maintenance, office work, transport.
- Products: Design, packaging, use, end-of-life.
- Services: Delivery, on-site repair, waste management.
- Conditions: Normal operations, abnormal conditions (start-up/shutdown), and emergency situations.
Look for:
- Emissions to air.
- Releases to water.
- Releases to land.
- Use of raw materials and natural resources.
- Use of energy.
- Energy emitted (heat, radiation, vibration, noise, light).
- Generation of waste.
2. Evaluation of Significance
Not all aspects are equal. You need a criteria to determine which ones are “significant.” Criteria often include:
- Scale: How much?
- Severity: How bad?
- Probability: How often?
- Legal: Is it regulated?
- Stakeholders: Do neighbors or customers care?
3. Lifecycle Perspective
You must consider a life cycle perspective. This doesn’t mean a full Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), but thinking about stages you can control or influence:
- Raw material acquisition.
- Design.
- Production.
- Transportation.
- Use.
- End-of-life treatment.
Documentation
You must maintain documented information of:
- Environmental aspects and associated impacts.
- Criteria used to determine significance.
- Significant environmental aspects.
Conclusion
Identifying aspects and impacts is not a “set and forget” exercise. It’s a dynamic process. Whenever you change a process, buy new equipment, or launch a new product, you must re-evaluate your environmental footprint.