environmental management

The International Organization for Standardizations (ISO) last year published the first standard on carbon neutrality of organizations and products. In a new factsheet, the German Environment Agency (UBA) outlines its strength and shortcomings and draws some conclusions relevant to companies, verifiers, courts and policymakers.

About 500 German undertakings are obliged to include sustainability-related information in their annual reports. According to the plans of the EU Commission more undertakings shall report in the future and apply uniform reporting standards. A study on behalf of UBA recommends precise requirements for reporting on targets, actions and performance indicators and corporate greenhouse gas neutrality.

“Public administrations must pioneer and be a role model in climate protection”, said Dirk Messner, President of the German Environment Agency (UBA) at an online meeting of the Network of Heads of European Environmental Administrations (EPA Network) on November 25th. He presented UBA’s guide on greenhouse gas neutral administrations, now also available in English.

This is the message of a virtual panel discussion hosted by OECD, UBA and UNEP in the context of current debates on the vulnerability of global value chains to crises and the legal regulation of human rights and environmental due diligence. The discussion focused on the need to better dovetail environmental protection and respect for human rights.

The German Environment Agency (UBA) has conducted its fourth mobility survey of its staff's commuting behaviour and arrangement of business trips in the context of its in-house environmental and health-oriented mobility management. Nearly 68 percent of employees commute to work on foot, by bicycle or bus and train. The national average is only 32 percent.

The UBA had already introduced an environmental management system in the late 1990s, which was then validated in 2001 according to the most stringent requirements worldwide under the EU Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS). In the meantime 14 UBA sites – including all air quality monitoring stations – have been validated according to EMAS. In 2017, UBA decided to become greenhouse gas-neutral.

The “UNEP/UNESCO/BMUV International Postgraduate Training Programme on Environmental Management for Developing and Emerging Countries” offers each year a long and several short courses on environmental management for specialists and managers from developing and emerging countries.