Home

Join Us

Action Alert Service

WSI Projects

EcoStewards Journal

Forest Campaigns

Biodiversity Program

Latin American Alliance

ISO 14,000

Mexico City Congresso

Board & Staff

Links

The ISO 14000 series of environmental standards includes the following standards:

• The Environmental Management Standards guide managers in how to develop an evolving environmental policy, how to select the action steps for the managers to follow as they implement and maintain environmental monitoring of their production processes, and require that up to date manuals of their action steps be kept.



• The Environmental Auditing Standards goes through the steps necessary to develop a program to audit an organization's environmental management program.



• The Environmental Labeling Standards goes through how to develop a labeling program, and what constitute the different types of labels and their characteristics.



• The Environmental Performance Evaluation Standards goes through how to select appropriate environmental indicators and how to evaluate environmental performance.



• The Life Cycle Analysis Standards describes how to develop two distinct types of analyses. How to make the value judgement as to which is the better or less harmful of the set of impacts of one product or production process versus another is beyond the scope of the standards.



• i) Inventory analysis is a cradle to grave analysis of the environmental impact of specific production processes or sub-processes. It is called inventory analysis because it lists and measures important inputs and outputs, such as energy usage and each toxic chemical released. This makes it possible to compare the environmental impact of different production processes ofthe same product.



• ii) Impact analysis includes the environmental impact beyond the production processes so that the full environmental impact of different products serving the same need can truly be compared. This may include eco-system impacts such as diminishing salmon population or loss of migrating fowl habitat, and health and safety impacts such as increased incidence of asthma or loss of quality drinking water.



• The Environmental Aspects in Product Standards is a manual for product developers to use. It presents some general considerations to take into account when developing product standards so they can balance function with environmental impact.