ISO 50001 Energy Management

Importance of Energy Management

Energy is used in many forms including electricity, gas, oil and steam and is a resource used by organizations worldwide. Most sources of energy deplete natural resource; there are also sources which are renewable.

Reducing your energy consumption will not only reduce your costs, it’ll also reduce your carbon footprint and help reduce your environmental impacts. It also reduces your reliance on others to provide the energy you need to operate, hence reducing the risk to your organization.

Energy management is, therefore, quickly becoming one of the most fundamental areas of focus across all business sectors worldwide.

The new international energy management standard, ISO 50001 was issued on 15 June 2011, and as with other ISO standards, it’s based on the Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle, which allows easy integration with your existing systems.

How is  ISO 50001 different from ISO 14001?

ISO 50001 has been designed exclusively for the management of energy and includes a number of requirements and techniques not covered by ISO 14001. Of course, most organizations include energy as an aspect in the majority of organizations’ ISO 14001 environmental management systems. But the emphasis shown to energy within ISO 14001 is far less, and it is often overlooked with organizations concentrating on the more obvious environmental aspects, such as chemicals and waste.

Implementing an energy management system certified to ISO 50001 includes the need to establish baseline(s) of energy usage and energy performance indicators as well as the usual objectives and targets which exist within an environmental management system. Besides this, there are specific clauses  in ISO 50001 relating to design (covering facilities and production lines, etc) and procurement, including specifying energy purchasing requirements.