Member Article

NECC not sitting on the fence with neutral issues

The North East Chamber of Commerce has confirmed its intent to become a more environmentally friendly organisation by achieving a highly recognised environmental standard.

NECC was awarded the ISO14001 Environmental Management Standard as the organisation pushes towards ‘carbon neutral’ status. Since 2007 plans have been in place to implement an environmental management system (EMS) that would enable the systematic reduction of the group’s carbon footprint.

NECC Quality Manager Kelly Pattison led the process after it was decided that NECC’s environmental impact needed to be precisely pinpointed. Energy use, transport, paper use and waste were all seen as significant areas for improvement and plans will now be followed up to reduce the usage.

The accreditation was achieved via external audits, in which the Chamber’s EMS was assessed to ensure it met all the requirements of ISO14001, with the accreditation being gained through SGS UK Ltd, an NECC member business.

Kelly said: “Achieving accreditation to ISO14001 is a key step in our journey towards becoming a ‘carbon neutral’ Chamber of Commerce. Now that we have invested time in setting up a sound environmental management system, we hope to reap the benefits in reducing our carbon footprint and impact on the environment.”

As part of the improvements, NECC has established an environmental working group, made up of staff representatives from across the business to look at action which can be taken to reduce its environmental impact.

For more information visit www.necc.co.uk/smartsessions.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .