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ISO 14001: 2015

Environmental Management Systems

Implement the global standard for the environmental management systems under a reputable and accredited certification body.
Have a hassle-free certification experience under Blue Wolf!

What is ISO 14001?

ISO 14001 is the internationally acknowledged environmental management standard that helps organizations plan, implement and measure how to minimize their impact on the environment.

ISO certification confirms and communicates a company’s ethical, sustainable and nature-friendly philosophy in their day-to-day operations.

The standard offers a set of practical guidelines for any organization to be more environmentally friendly by defining the purpose, objectives, and requirements for implementing an environmental management system effectively.

Certification to ISO 14001 helps organizations strengthen their brand image and acquire the trust of the customers and the community.

Established in the year 1996, ISO 14001 aims to help organizations of all sizes and types to understand the importance of environmental management and sustainability and develop plans to modify their operational activities to reduce harmful impact. The current version used globally is ISO 14001: 2015 with the same aim and objectives.

What are the benefits of getting ISO 14001 Certification?

1. Show that you are taking responsibility for the environment

ISO 14001 establishes a framework for organizations to reduce harmful impacts on the environment. Customers generally want to work with companies that care for the environment and are mindful of sustainability. With the help of ISO certification, organizations can exhibit that they are concerned about environmental and community welfare. The standard helps a company define its environmental philosophy, responsibilities, plans and actions and pushes them to conform to a standardized practice of reducing resource use and environmental impact.

2. Legal Compliance

Every company needs to understand the environmental legislation as well as the regulations stipulated for their particular industry. The certification encourages companies to understand all they need to comply with for the safe and ethical conduct of business.

3. Low-Cost Operations

The standard helps us to understand the value of resources. Organizations implementing ISO 14001 take responsibility for their actions relating to utilizing resources and learning to use them more productively. By reducing the level of unnecessary waste, companies manage to run a lower-cost operation.

4. Competitive Advantage

ISO 14001 certification brings international recognition, making a company an example in their market. Organizations gain a competitive edge and attract more customers.

5. Better Customer Relationships

Today, customers prefer to get products/services from an environmentally friendly and aware company. If a company fails to take care of the environment in their operations and management, ignore community and sustainability, they are likely to lose their customer base. ISO 14001 helps to maintain positive customer relationships, which subsequently supports customer retention.

What Are The Main Requirements For ISO 14001?

1. Resource Management : One of the major requirements / outcomes of ISO 14001 is resource management. The standard requires companies to understand the importance of resources and infrastructure and design strategies to utilize them with minimum waste for maximum productivity.

2. Environmental impact : Companies need to understand how their operations make an adverse impact on nature. Accordingly, they should devise measures to improve their actions and make environmentally friendly business decisions. A sustainable approach towards the environment is the main component of a successful environmental business strategy and ISO 14001 compliance.

3. Review, analysis, and constant improvement : According to the final clauses of ISO 14001, there should be constant monitoring of the implemented system to determine if the expected performance is being achieved. Continual development of the management system should be part of the organization culture so that business continuity can be achieved.

4. Accountability of the management : Accountability of management refers to the focus and engagement required of management to meet environmental management expectations. Responsible management lead, provide resources, monitor and collect performance data.

Certification Process

Commit - A trusted certification body is chosen, engaged, and an audit date is set.

Pre-assessment - If the clients wish, an assessment before stage 1 and 2 audits is performed.

Stage 1 Audit - The management system and documentation are reviewed to ensure everything is in place for the stage 2 audit, including determining whether internal audit and the management review have been performed. An audit report is prepared and issued by the auditor for review. If everything looks good, the auditor confirms the stage 2 audit.

Stage 2 Audit - After addressing any concerns or opportunities for improvement from the stage 1 audit, the stage 2 audit is conducted by the auditor. The auditor checks that the management system is implemented and is compliant with ISO 14001. If there are any non-conformities, these are shared by the auditor. Once non-conformities are addressed and the auditor can confirm that the standard is being met, the auditor recommends the company for certification.

Issuing the certification - With the successful completion of the two stages of audits, the certification body issues the certification.

Surveillance Audits - Every certification lasts for 3 years. The certification body organizes annual audit programs to ensure ongoing compliance.

How Blue Wolf Can Help You to Achieve ISO 14001?

Blue Wolf is a business associate of various accredited certification bodies. We audit you to determine if you meet the requirements of ISO 14001:2015. Once confirmed and certified, and to ensure 100% ongoing compliance, Blue Wolf continues to work with you through annual surveillance and recertification audits when your certificate expires.

Our auditors will help your certification experience be the best possible. We aim to help your organization achieve global acknowledgment if it effectively fulfills all the criteria.

Our audit programs are designed to ensure that your management system successfully conforms to the clauses of ISO 14001 as well as the policy objectives of your company. We are available to meet with you and offer exceptional customer care support. Talk to our experts or directly hire us to complete your certification journey.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What is ISO 14001?
ISO 14001 is the most recognized standard for environmental management systems. The current version of the standard is ISO 14001:2015. It is an international standard that ensures a company conducts eco-friendly operations and takes responsibility for environmental sustainability and community welfare. The current version of ISO 14001 gives more focus on the effective conduct of supply chain management and addresses risk factors more comprehensively. Also, the current version is more in line with other current management system standards such as ISO 9001:2015.
2. What is the purpose of ISO 14001?
The main purpose of ISO 14001 is to help organizations minimize their environmental footprint and energy consumption. The aim is to provide a framework that offers guidelines to assess and record the performance of the system after its implementation. The two main objectives of ISO 14001 are:
● Minimize pollution or environmental impacts caused from day-to-day business operations.
● Comply with all relevant legal standards to avoid penalties and government intervention.
3. Why is an environmental management program needed?
Every business organization is responsible for the community it serves and the environment it takes resources from. The environmental management program generates awareness and supports it with a holistic framework that identifies operational factors that adversely impact the environment. Further, the framework will ensure the organization works on the gaps to meet the required actions from ISO 14001.
4. How many days does it take to get ISO certified?
It depends on the type and size of your company. Generally, it takes up to six months and in some cases one year to get ready for ISO certification.
Audit days are determined from other standards and industry mandatory documents. Factors that increase or decrease the number of audit days include the number of personnel, the level of risk, the type of industry your organization belongs to, and consideration of various factors (simplifications or complications) that help to understand the complexity or your organization. All of this to ensure there is adequate audit time for your auditor to determine compliance to ISO 14001.
5. What is the cost of getting the certification?
The cost depends primarily on the number of audit days as previously addressed above.
Each certification body determines their own day rate. The rates can vary depending on the standard, the availability of auditors and the amount auditors charge the certification body. Additional factors that affect cost are the certification body’s accreditation fees, admin costs, and other costs as outlined in their proposal. It is important to be aware of additional fees as they can add up. In some cases, a certification body’s day rate may be low, but additional fees can be high, so do your due diligence. Some certification bodies you may notice will charge premium pricing based on how they perceive themselves in the marketplace, however all certification bodies have the same credibility anywhere in the world because of their accreditation. Before choosing an accreditation body, it may be necessary to check with your customers if they care about the name of the certification body. It is very unlikely your customer cares about the name however as long as it is an accredited certification body.
Other costs can be the cost of travel including food, accommodation, etc. for the duration of the audit.

Client Testimonials

See what our clients have to say about Blue Wolf

It’s a very great experience. She (Tanya) helped me a lot and she explained a lot. If there is something that we might need to improve on, she will explain in a very detailed way. It’s a very smooth and very clear process. Definitely recommended.

Timothy Zeng

CEO, HQS Automotive.

Our experience has been that this process in working with the auditors has shown us more ways to improve internally than what we expected

Stacy Gestring

Founder, Art Advertising

One of the best business decisions I think we’ve made in the entire time we’ve been here in the company.

Gary Gestring

Founder, Art Advertising

When we first started the process of looking at the standard, we were afraid we would have to force our company into a new way of doing almost everything in doing our business. And we were very pleased to find out that the standard was meant to fit how we already were doing things. And Blue Wolf and Seth really helped us in the audit to not feel so intimidated by it, but to understand it, yes that the way we are doing it does fit the standard, and instead of just criticizing where we were coming short, he gave us advice and suggestions on how the standard is actually meant to be used, to improve how we are doing things, not to force us into a certain way of somebody else doing it.
Our experience has been that this process in working with the auditors has shown us more ways to improve internally than what we expected, and we would recommend going through this for anybody that’s considering it.

Stacy Gestring

Founder, Art Advertising

After a lot of research and careful review of our options we chose to work with Blue Wolf, and we know now that we made the right decision. It’s been a great process, and I would recommend to anyone that is considering ISO 9001 to at least have a conversation with them. I don’t think you would regret it at all.
At the very beginning of this process, I think we can safely say we were very nervous about it and apprehensive about doing it. After our auditor Seth Shea arrived, we realized again what a great decision we made. He’s made this process way much easier than we thought it might be, not as scary. And the insight he’s given us, and the observations and suggestions has been one of the most… really one of the best business decisions I think we’ve made in the entire time we’ve been here in the company.

Gary Gestring

Founder, Art Advertising

Firstly, on behalf of Adam and myself, we would like to thank you both very much for providing us with the support and service during our ISO accreditation and certification process.

Your professional and knowledgeable approach and support has been very much appreciated.

Adam

Mechpro

The experience was overwhelmingly really good.  I thought we were ready but there were some lightbulb moments. It was a logical process. The auditor was patient. We wanted the certification for areas of opportunity and we had many recommendations. I appreciated the audit.  I haven’t heard anything negative out of the process to date. It’s been good.

Tracey Costin

Affordable Staff

I’ve never been involved in auditing before. Completely new. Was not sure what to expect. The process was seamless.   There were some good recommendations.  I was made to feel comfortable. The process worked quite well. I’m feeling more than ready for the next audit. There was so much going on at the time of the audit that I just wanted to go back to the audit, it was more relaxing.

 

Eva Judge

Affordable Staff

“One of the greatest things that initially sold me on BLUE WOLF was your approach towards partnering, understanding, and treating us with respect towards where we are at in compliance with the standard.“
“I was nervous about it until we spoke on the phone in the premeeting. Once you started talking about your approach and your process I was sold. But to see it in real life and to see it actually come true was even more (…)”
After his first day of the audit: “I’ve been through so many audits you can’t even count. Your approach is by far superior than any other audit I’ve ever been through. The contrast was night and day. I’ve got some younger people who don’t have quite the same experience as I do, and their ability to feel like they could be participatory, have value and be respected throughout the process was outstanding. I have not made a better choice in picking a company to work with us in an audit process prior to you. You’re going to be here every year if I can help it. And if ownership changes and they want to do something different, I’ll fight to keep this process going because it has so much value.”

Joseph Shushok

Imerys

I’ve never been a part of one of these. I have learned absolutely so much. It was a privilege to be a part of this. I don’t ever want to experience an audit a different way.

Jama Morrison

Imerys, Quality Manager

If everybody could have an audit experience like this, more and more people would actually consider an ISO certification. Because so many people hear so many things about it, stressful myths, and everyone has a bad auditor experience from somewhere else. If more people could experience an audit this way, they wouldn’t have any reason to fear ISO.

Milo Fruk

CHS Broadbent, National EMS Director

I’ve seen some really bad crap auditors. Even I learned a whole lot from what we just went through with Seth that I didn’t even understand about the standard before.

Nick Maes

Automated Wellhead. Operations manager

“Blue Wolf has been great with providing us with clarity and direction so that our team can focus on the important aspects of our quality and safety management systems. What seemed like a very intimidating process to achieve ISO accreditation was made simple by Blue Wolf and their team. Their knowledge and our processes have added value and elevated our quality and safety program to another level. Thank you, Seth Shea, and the Blue Wolf team for a wonderful ongoing experience.”

Cynthia Sayer

Safety Administrator, Clark Bros, Inc.

“Streamlined. Easy to communicate, easy to talk to. Relaxed, didn’t feel pressured. Recommended for future ISO projects.”

Andrew Stewart

Inks Production Engineer, NovaCentrix

“We completed our audit today with 1 minor non-conformance and 2 observations. I would highly recommend Blue Wolf certifications to anyone else your company is working with. Our auditor Seth was so personable, made the audit process as relaxed and comfortable as possible, made our staff feel comfortable talking to him, and he was very thorough in his findings. He makes you feel like you are working together, which is HUGE and really rare in a company/auditor relationship.”

Kerry Ashby

Senior Director, PEO/HR + Payroll Operations, Choice Employer Solutions, Inc.