AUDITING

(Environmental
audit)
CHAPTER V
 Topics
• Definition, purpose types
• Concept, programme, scope
– Environmental audit process – an overview
– Steps in the EMS audit process
– Effective elements of audits program

• Planning and audit team

• Report and review
• Following up an Environmental Audit
Audit

• Comparison of actual conditions to expected conditions, and a

determination as to whether one is in conformance or not in

conformance
Environmental Audit (EA)
• EA began as a means of checking compliance
with environmental legislation.
• As a tool for management to gauge the efficiency
of its management system.
• Its function in EMS is at once EMS is in place, the
organization has to verify that the system is
followed, is working and has no deficiencies.
• It can detect deficiencies.
• Able to assist continual improvement.
Definition of environmental audit.
Is defined as a systematic, documented
verification process of objectively obtaining and
evaluating audit evidence to determine whether
specified environmental activities, events,
conditions, management systems, or
information about these matters conform with
audit criteria, and communicating the result of
this process.
Types of EA
• Several types of environmental audits.
Some are as follows:
(1) Compliance audits are used to ensure that the
company is meeting all regulations regarding
specific environmental practices, or the
implications of non-compliance.

(2) Systems audits focus on how systems are used

internally to manage environmental risks.
(3) Audits of transactions of property transfers and due
diligence for purchasing property are used to reduce or to
understand the potential risks involved in these
transactions regarding environmental risk. Lending
institutions often require environmental audit of a
property before mortgage approval, does not want to run
the risk of the company defaulting on the loan. Thus the
lending institution would become the owner, and if
contamination exists, the lending institution might have to
pay for clean up.
(4) "Treatment, storage, and disposal facility"
audits are used to follow different types of
hazardous material throughout their life cycle,
from origin to disposal. This helps ensure that
they are properly disposed and stored.

(5) Audits which focus on preventative measures

that can be taken to reduce the amount of risk a
company has if these measures are functioning.
(6) Audits to determine accrual of the amount of liabilities
and costs associated with environmental damages and to
determine that proper disclosure of these costs have been
made to the public.

(7) Audits to appraise the production process itself to ensure

that products meet specific requirements. Once the
environmental risks have been identified, the auditor must
check for compliance with accounting standards. Several
rules governing environmental disclosures have been
developed in recent years.
 What is an Environmental Audit

• Environmental auditing is a systematic, documented, periodic and

objective process in assessing an organization's activities and services in
relation to:

– Assessing compliance with relevant statutory and internal requirements

– Facilitating management control of environmental practices
– Promoting good environmental management
– Maintaining credibility with the public
– Raising staff awareness and enforcing commitment to departmental
environmental policy
– Exploring improvement opportunities
– Establishing the performance baseline for developing an Environmental
Management System (EMS)
The ISO EA guideline
• EA is guided by the set of international standards within the ISO
family. The series of standards are as follows:
– ISO 14010
– ISO 14011
– ISO 14012
Concept, scope and effective
elements of audit program
Environmental audit process – an overview
Steps in the EMS audit process
Concept
Scope
Effective elements of audits program
Refer hand
out page 12
7-131
Refer handout pag
e 131-136
Concept
• Audit is based on the generic concept of auditing.
• Simply put, an audit, any audit, is the comparison of actual
conditions to expected conditions, and a determination as to
whether one is in conformance or not in conformance.
• An audit is fundamentally a comparison of audit evidence to
audit criteria to determine findings.
• The audit criteria are the expectations or “rules” of how
conditions should be
Scope
• In establishing scope of the EA basically there
are two options:
– To limit the scope to an assessment only of the
degree of compliance with policies, requirement-
type documents, and procedures.
– To assess the adequacy of the policies,
requirement-type documents, and procedures to
begin with and, given their adequacies, to then
assess the degree to which compliance with these
documents is achieved.
• The scope of EA could be for the whole organization at one
time, phased to consider parts of the site, departments, or
operation separately.
• The audit scope defines what part of the organization will
be audited.
• The scope should be specific, pre-determined.
• Audit scope describe the extent and boundaries of the audit
in term of factors such as physical location and
organizational activities as well as manner of reporting.
• An audit should have scope for the objective
which is agreed upon by parties involved, that is
the auditor and auditee, before any audit is
carried out.
• The scope determined by client and lead auditor.
• Any changes of audit scope require agreement
from lead auditor and client.
 Effective elements of audits program

• Nature : pre-planned & methodical

• Be free from bias/prejudice
• Encompass some form of inquiry & critical consideration of the resultant
findings
• Concerned with all activities that affect environmental issues & with results
reflecting environmental performance
• should ensure that such activities carried out in effective & consistent manner,
in accordance with planned arrangements
Audit team and Planning

Audit team ; lead auditor, auditor, audit team, client, auditee.

Audit plan (AP)
Audit team
• There are many players involved during
audit process, which include:
– lead auditor
– auditor
– audit team
– client
– auditee.
 Lead auditor
• Has most responsibilities in any audit
• Ensuring efficient and effective conduct and completion of
the audit within the audit scope and plan approved by
client.
• Responsible for collecting relevant information, forming an
audit team and directing team activities, preparing and
coordinating working document, procedures, audit plan,
resolving problem that arise, determining whether IS 14010
have been met, notifying critical nonconformance
recognizing when audit objectives become unattainable and
reporting the reasons, making recommendations for
improvement to the EMS and reporting within the time
agreed upon.
Auditor
• Support lead auditor
• Planning and carrying out the task effectively and efficiently
• Collecting and analyzing sufficient audit evidence, prepared working
document
• Assisting lead auditor prepared report
(refer handout for auditor)
Audit team
• The member of audit team should be independent of the activities
that they audit to ensure the objectivity of the audits, its finding and
conclusion
• They should be free from bias and any potential conflict or interest
throughout the audit process.
• The audit team should be competent enough to carry out audit.
• The team as a whole should posses an
appropriate combination of knowledge, skills
and experience among them to carried out audit.
• The process of selecting audit team member
should ensure that the audit team possesses the
overall experienced and expertise needed to
conduct the audit. (refer handout / clause 4.2)
Client
• Client and auditee can be one and the same.
• Audit team work for client
• Client is the initiator of the audit process
Auditee
• Cooperate with the audit team
• Provide facilities needed by audit team (information and record
requested)
• Ensure audit team is aware of health, safety and other requirement
• Auditee is the organization to be audited.
Audit Plan (AP)
• The AP should be designed to be flexible in order to permit
changes in emphasis based on information gathered during
the audit , and to permit effective use of resources.
• The audit plan is the document that establishes the scope,
objectives and criteria, and schedule of the audit.
• It also goes into specific details on what areas will be
audited, when, and by whom.

• The plan should, if applicable , include:

– Audit objective and scope……(refer handout/ clause 5.2)
Any premises that wishes to conduct an environmental audit
must have a clear idea of the objectives of the exercise and the
steps required to achieve it. Before commencing an
environmental audit, the following requirements must be
fulfilled:
The audit objective describes why an audit is being conducted
Report and review

Planning and audit team

What is audit report

Content of audit report
Finding summary
Circulation of audit draft report
Final report
What is Audit Report
• Part of post audit activities.
• The audit findings and summary should be delivered to the
client in a written report.
• Final Audit Report addressing :
– Environmental Legislation compliance status

– Departmental environmental policies, procedures and guide

lines conformity status

– Status of current environmental performance

– Recommendations for performance improvement

Contend of Audit Report
• The Audit Report should include:
– An Executive Summary

– Introduction and background to the audit

– Audit scope and objectives

– Description of audit approach and methodology

– Summary of audit findings and recommendations

– Conclusions
( refer handout page 125)
 Finding summary

• In particular, the findings summary should comprise the

followings:
– Status of compliance with environmental legislative requirements

– Status of conformity with internal environmental policies, procedures

and guidelines

– Status of good environmental practices implementation

– Level of staff awareness of operational issues relating to environmental

performance

– Overall status of environmental performance

– Recommendations for environmental performance improvement

Circulate draft audit report for comments
• Include the following parties on the circulation list:
– The Audit Management Committee

– Senior audit site management

– Site Facilitator(s)

– Site personnel with responsibilities for implementing the

major recommendations

– Other parties included on the agreed circulation list

Final report
• Incorporate or resolve all comments received before producing the
Final Report

• Issue the report to the Audit Management Committee and site senior
management for endorsement
Following up an
Environmental Audit

Develop action plan

Implement action plan
Checking and monitoring
Review action plan
Output
1.Develop action plan
• Upon endorsement of the Audit Report, an Action Plan with
the appropriate targets and objectives for environmental
improvement may be developed in consultation with audit
site senior management.
• An action plan should cover:
– Action objectives;

– Specific actions required;

– Responsible party(ies);

– Budget allotted; and

– Implementation program
2. Implement action plan
• Responsible party(ies)to undertake actions according to the allotted
budget, and the agreed timescale for completion.
3. Checking and monitoring
• To monitor progress of Action Plan
implementation, a status report should be
carried out and should include information on:
– Progress of action(s) undertaken

– Problem(s) encountered when action(s) taken

– Proposed solution(s) and revised timescale for

completion
4. Review action plan
• Review the Action Plan upon completion of Action Plan
implementation.
• Key points to review include:
– Review results of action plan implementation

– Establish levels of performance improvement achieved

– Address possible need for changes to Green management

policy, objective(s) and procedure(s)

– Next audit scope and schedule

OUTPUT
– Action Plan

– Status report for implementation

– Scope and schedule of next audit

• You have completed one full cycle of an environmental audit. In
the last cycle you have identified the key environmental issues and
their effects, established the current performance status, identified
environmental performance improvement opportunities and
established specific improvement objectives and targets as part of
an Action Plan.
• We hope that in the process you have also gained invaluable
experience and confidence in conducting subsequent
environmental audits.
THE END