ISO 14000: The Status of the Environmental Management Systems and Envrionmental Auditing Standards, 1996 Environmental Conference Proceedings

The operational heart of the emerging IS0 14000 international environmental standards is the Environmental Management System (EMS) and Environmental Auditing (EA) components. The EMS will serve as the standard document for companies seeking IS0 14000 registration, supported by critical tools such as the EA. These standards are currently in Draft International Standard (DIS) stage for balloting and are expected to be adopted by IS0 after midyear 1996, while the U.S. national standard that mimics the DIS documents may be available a few months earlier. This panel will present an up-to-date overview of the IS0 14000 EMS and EA, and will discuss the goals and potential benefits of an international EMS standard, as well as potential disadvantages to U.S. Companies. The requirements set forth in the draft EMS standard (14001) will be explained and implications for the pulp and paper industry discussed. The moderator and all panelists are active members of the U.S. Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to ISO/TC 207 and featured panelists Joel Charm has served as Chair of the SubTAG for Environmental Management Systems from its inception.