25th anniversary of EMAS
Austrian EMAS action plan creates new incentives for enterprises with an environmental management scheme
In 2020, EMAS is celebrating its 25th anniversary – with good future prospects: EMAS-registered organisations are to be given a greater advantage in public tender processes. This is the aim of the EMAS action plan, developed by experts from the Umweltbundesamt, the Environment Agency Austria, and stakeholders from business and administration, in the framework of the project ENHANCE. The action plan includes five measures which offer fresh impetus to the expansion of corporate environmental management and are intended to establish EMAS more firmly in enterprises:
- Ecological procurement: in the future, the ecofriendliness of enterprises will play an important role not only in public tenders for cleaning services but also in bids for waste disposal contracts and construction projects, where EMAS organisations will have an advantage over their competitors.
- Simplification measures for EMAS enterprises for Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) will be investigated. For example, the environmental statement (the annual report through which EMAS enterprises present their environmental performance) could be taken into account in the EIA process. This would reduce the administrative costs and burden for EMAS enterprises when applying for projects and making changes to plant equipment.
- Greater use will be made of the synergies between EMAS and the requirements that apply to enterprises under the Energy Efficiency Act. A corresponding amendment to the law is currently in preparation.
- Environmental inspections: a better exchange of information between environmental inspectors and EMAS verifiers will enable them to work more closely together in the future. Thus, duplication can be avoided and environmental inspections facilitated.
- Training for public authorities: public authorities are important multipliers for the expansion of EMAS in Austria. Therefore, from December 2020, the programme of the Academy of Public Administration will be expanded to include training courses for environmental management systems.
25 years of EMAS
2020 marks the 25th anniversary of EMAS, which will be celebrated on 29th September in Berlin, with a focus on future prospects for corporate sustainability management in the context of economic stimulus packages and the European Green Deal.
New impetus for EMAS through ENHANCE
Under the project ENHANCE (EMAS as a Nest to Help And Nurture the Circular Economy), experts from all over Europe were working together for a period of three years to develop strategies for strengthening corporate environmental management. Best practices from Austria, Spain, Italy, the Czech Republic and Estonia were shared, and action plans and administrative simplification measures for EMAS organisations were developed.
EMAS stands for “Eco-Management and Audit Scheme”. It is a voluntary instrument developed by the European Union which enables enterprises and organisations of all sizes and sectors to continually improve their environmental performance. Participating organisations communicate their performance in an environmental statement that is verified and validated by independent verifiers.
Enterprises wishing to put their environmental management system on a new footing can get competent advice from the Environment Agency Austria (Umweltbundesamt), whose experts provide support to companies that want to be assessed and audited as EMAS enterprises. The Environment Agency Austria also keeps the EMAS register and, together with three other organisations, operates the EMAS Helpdesk.
