TABLE OF CONTENTS This clause of the Standard has three parts:
Measuring impacts to monitor performance and to track progress towards the objectives and targets.
Calibration and maintenance of measuring equipment.
Evaluating compliance with the relevant environmental legislation and regulations.
Chapter 6 dealt with defining the starting position, defining and measuring the environmental aspects. Quantities of rubbish generated, units of electricity consumed and weight of scrap generated were given as three examples. For each objective or target, you need a means of being able to say whether you are winning or not.
Although the principle of measurement is included here, the practice is best carried out at the objective setting stage, and has therefore been included in Procedure 13 'Environmental objectives and targets'.
As in ISO 9001, monitoring and measuring equipment must be calibrated and maintained and records kept so that there is evidence that the equipment is sufficiently accurate for its purpose.
You may have measuring equipment built into your processes to keep them under control, or you may take measurements in order to plot your progress towards objectives. Do remember that your measuring equipment only needs to be sufficiently accurate for the purpose. If all you want is to show a trend, the degree of accuracy required will be less than if you have to keep operating parameters within a tight range, or you have safety systems which trigger alarms or shut-down routines if a process is going out...
