How can you identify environmental impacts in the EMS process?

2 How to identify environmental aspects and impacts?

When identifying environmental aspects and impacts, the methods and tools used will depend on the scope, scale, and complexity of your organization and its EMS. Generally, you should define the boundaries and scope of your EMS, review any legal or other requirements related to environmental aspects and impacts, collect data and information on these aspects, use a checklist or matrix to list and categorize them, then evaluate and rank them using a scoring system or weighting factors. Doing so will help you determine which environmental aspects are most important for your EMS.

3 How to involve stakeholders in identifying environmental impacts?

Identifying environmental impacts is an ongoing process that requires consultation and communication with both internal and external stakeholders, such as employees, customers, suppliers, regulators, or communities. To involve stakeholders in the identification process, you can establish a cross-functional team or committee to oversee and coordinate the process, assigning roles and responsibilities to different staff members or departments. Surveys, interviews, workshops, or focus groups can be used to gather feedback and suggestions from stakeholders. Additionally, providing training and awareness programs can help educate them on the benefits and requirements of your EMS. Lastly, it’s important to share your findings with stakeholders and solicit their input and approval on objectives, targets, action plans, and performance indicators.

4 How to update and review your environmental impacts?

Identifying environmental impacts is a process that requires regular updates and reviews to reflect any changes in your organization's activities, products, services, or external environment. Triggers for updating and reviewing your environmental impacts include new or revised legal or other requirements, such as regulations, standards, or customer demands; new or modified processes, equipment, technologies, or materials; significant incidents, accidents, or complaints; periodic audits, inspections, or assessments; and continuous improvement cycles. For example, the Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) model can be used to monitor and measure your environmental performance and implement corrective and preventive actions.

5 How to use tools and software to identify environmental impacts?

Identifying environmental impacts can be a complex and time-consuming task, especially for large or diverse organizations. Fortunately, there are various tools and software available to help simplify and streamline the process. For instance, environmental aspect and impact registers, templates, or databases provide a standardized and structured way to record and organize environmental aspects and impacts, while calculators, models, or simulators help quantify and estimate carbon footprints, water footprints, or life cycle assessments. Additionally, environmental aspect and impact management systems, platforms, or applications integrate and automate EMS processes like data collection, analysis, evaluation, reporting, and communication. Plus they provide dashboards, charts, or graphs to visualize and track environmental performance.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?