APP Blog: Getting the Most from the Climate Change Amendments to the ISO Standards

Since 2024, we’ve seen many organisations and discussed their responses to this requirement. Whilst the initial response from many was that of indifference, we found that through discussing the broad range of impacts and opportunities that climate change brings, those organisations went from a state of indifference to that of being fully involved. 

The International Organization for Standardization on their own website state that ‘ISO standards play a pivotal role in accelerating climate action through sustainable practices’ and whilst the addition of the innocuous statement ’The organisation shall determine whether climate change is a relevant issue’ to Clause 4 seems fairly lightweight, it sets a basis for future amendments of the Standards. In earlier versions of the ISO 14001 standard, the critical focus was to ensure organisations had policies in place to prevent pollution; in other words, start with the basics. 

A key issue with the release of the amended standards by the ISO organisation was the lack of guidance that went along with the release of the statement. For most ISO Standards, there are accompanying guidance standards (e.g. ISO 9000 for terms and definitions, ISO 27002 for deeper reviews of how InfoSec controls can be implemented). 

In our team, we believe that the value of Legal and Guidance updates that come from the UK, EU and other governments presents a wealth of information to organisations, and on this matter, we were proved correct. For the past 10 years at least, government organisations have been working to develop frameworks of metrics that organisations can use to measure and report their climate change activity. 

In 2024, the UK Government released their response to the ‘Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures’ (TCFD) and this set out a brilliant framework for organisations to use in their ISO Management systems. 

Focus on the Impacts, not the Causes of Climate Change

One immediate response we often hear from Senior Leaders and Auditors alike is that climate change is an environmental issue and should be left in the ISO 14001 Standard. However, we disagree, and similarly, so do climate change experts. In this blog, we’re not going into the causes of climate change but rather the impacts and how to manage them.

Consider the key impacts of climate change: 

• Extremes of temperature (hot and cold) 

• Rising sea levels

• Extreme weather such as high wind, heavy rains, no rain

• Results of extreme weather such as flooding, drought

The secondary impacts of these lead to a range of disruptions (e.g. loss of resources, transportation delays) that will impact your organisation. In 2024, the Panama Canal restricted ship movements to 36% of their regular levels due to drought. The resulting delays and additional costs to logistics costs were enormous; some organisations reported an additional $400 - $500 increase on a container as routes had to be lengthened and logistics costs increased. 

Impacts of Climate on differing ISO Standards

How then, does climate change affect an organisation with ISO Standards? A quick glance at the table below shows that climate change, whilst an environmental phenomenon, will impact your organisation, whichever Standard you are working with. 
 

A Framework for managing and reporting the impact of Climate Change

The UK Government, in its response to the TCFD, set out a framework for managing Climate Change in organisations. This framework enables organisations to identify issues that fit under both ‘Risks’ and ‘Opportunities’. 


The framework identifies two types of ‘risks’, transitional and physical, alongside a range of opportunities. Pulling all the actions together from these risks and opportunities will effectively set out your Climate Change Strategy. 

Focusing on some of the elements under the two categories, the framework identifies risks in following areas: 

⇒ Policy and Legal risks: Organisations need to adapt to updated and new regulations. Some sectors are under more pressure than others and business leaders should seek regulatory guidance to better define their responsibilities.

⇒ Technological risk: New issues may arise around the production and use of existing products and technologies.

⇒ Market risks: Business leaders should not depend on getting everything they need from traditional sources.

⇒ Reputational risk: The need to exhibit a high level of corporate social responsibility in this area can affect reputation, positively and negatively.

⇒ Physical risks: the need to manage the day to day impacts of extreme weather; some of which can happen in a very short period of time (e.g. surface water flooding) and others over time (heat exhaustion). 
It might seem strange to say that there are opportunities with climate change, but there definitely are!

Organisations are already:

• Becoming more sustainable by adapting to climate change

• Identifying new markets and products because of climate change

• Finding new resources that they can use

• Switching to low-carbon energy and technology

About ISO Compliance Register

We hope you found this article useful. At ISO Compliance Register, we believe in the value that Legal and Compliance Obligations can bring an organisation. We support companies large and small, and compliance managers with the information they need to grow a strong, sustainable business. 

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