5 steps to set up an emergency plan according to ISO 14001

Introduction

Do you have a personal emergency plan? Probably not, but if you live in an area of very high risk of e.g., earthquake, it is a good idea to have a procedure regarding what to do in such situation. For example, your personal plan could be to go in the smallest room, which is most resistant to collapsing, or to fill a bathtub with fresh water because you can expect an interruption in water supply; you may also need to set up escape bag in case of evacuation.

If you own and invest in a small or medium company, or run an organization, and have no emergency plan – you need to STOP & THINK about it. It is too unsafe to lose everything overnight.

To set up a crisis plan in a small organization you don’t need a Ph.D. in ecological science – just follow these steps and don't stress if your plan isn't great. You will improve it over time

Purpose of an emergency plan

The aim of an emergency plan is to guide personnel in an accident or emergency situation to prevent or minimize injury, damage and material loss. An additional goal is to prevent environmental impact from the accident or emergency.

ISO 14001 certification states in clause 4.4.7 Emergency preparation and response that the “organization shall establish, implement and maintain a procedure(s) to spot potential emergency things and potential accidents. The organization shall answer to actual emergency things and accidents.”

It is “good practice” for the emergency plan to determine major risks of accidents, outline preventive measures and key personnel, list contact details, confer with SDS (safety data sheet of dangerous substances), and specify emergency instrumentation and response. It should be written and structured to be read quickly and simply.

Explanation of basic terms

Before going into the details, let’s explain some basic terms.

ISO 14001 Certification doesn't outline terms like incident, accident and emergency. These terms are outlined and used principally in OH&S (Safety at work).

The Oxford English Dictionary defines “accident” as “an unfortunate incident that happens unexpectedly and unintentionally, typically resulting in damage or injury.” Consider that the first part of the definition is generic and also the same in all cases, however the impact depends upon the particular scenario  (e.g., injury is said to safety at work, environmental harm is said to environmental management, or a crash involving road vehicles is related to a road accident).

The definitions below aren’t official; they are simplified in order to explain basic variations in terms associated with environmental incident, accident, and emergency things.

Incident 

An unplanned, potentially harmful or damaging situation or event, not resulting in environmental damage or other loss.

Accident 

An unplanned, most likely harmful or damaging situation or event, leading to environmental damage or other loss.

Emergency 

An unplanned situation or event leading in involvement of the public emergency services, police, or the environmental regulative authorities.

Steps in setting up an emergency plan

The following steps will explain how to set up your emergency plan as per ISO 14001 and based on “good practice.” ISO Environmental Certification is generic standard; therefore you should customize it to your specific scenario and needs.

Step 1: Identification

You have to identify the specific potential accident associated with your circumstances and type of activity. If you run an office, a fire may be your only potential risk.

Some types of accident and emergency:

• fire
• chemical explosion
• spillage or release of materials that are corrosive, toxic, flammable, or carcinogenic

Step 2: Prevention.

You have to brainstorm together with your personnel for preventive measures associated with to every type of accident. ISO 14001:2015 Certification states that emergency plan(s) shall include actions to prevent and mitigate associated environmental impacts.

Preventive measures depend upon your specific situation and may include e.g.:

Step 3: Emergency plan. 

Depending on complexness and needs, the organization must establish one or more emergency plans.

An emergency plan aims to:

• outline the categories and environmental impacts (step 1)
• define preventive measures (step 2)
• provide contact information to key personnel (on-site & off-site)
• identify the location of appropriate technical data and emergency equipment (site layout)
• highlight any special instructions or actions
• identify and provide names of people trained in first aid

Make sure that all your staff knows about the plan, where to find it, and what it contains.  It is important that they know how to prevent accidents and what to do in case an accident occurs. You should, as stated in ISO 14001, review and revise your emergency plan where necessary, particularly after the occurrence of accidents or emergency situations

The Emergency Plan is not intended to be a comprehensive instruction with all background information. It is a clear and simple operational procedure for dealing with accidents.

Step 4: Training and drills (testing for training effectiveness). 

You have to train your employees about preventive measures and your emergency plan, and you should include in the training plan all necessary background information. Unfortunately, this is not enough, because in a real emergency situation, people’s behavior is unpredictable. To be sure that personnel will react according to the emergency plan, you have to, as stated in ISO 14001:2015 Certification, perform periodic drills based on predefined scenarios. How often? That depends on the risk. For example, atomic submarines have daily or weekly drills. Frequency of testing should be related to the environmental risk of your site, staff turnover, the introduction of new processes or materials, and conclusions from any previous exercises or incidents. For the average SME, yearly drills will usually be satisfactory.

Step 5: Evaluation and improvement.

Drill reports have to take into consideration gaps between the emergency plan and the drill result. The output of the drill report should focus on closing gaps and any other recommendations related to improvement of the emergency plan. For example, you may notice during the drill that free access for fire trucks is blocked by pallets for raw materials. You have to highlight this in the report, followed with, as stated in ISO 14001, corrective actions for eliminating cause(s) of incidents in order to prevent recurrence. What does that mean? You have to find out why free access was blocked, e.g., due to the lack  of warning labels, or employee training, or something else, followed by actions to prevent it from happening again in the future. With this approach, you will continue to improve your performance over time, which is one of the fundamental requirements of ISO Environmental Certification.

Even with the best preparation and prevention, accidents still happen. When they do, you will be prepared and ready for a fast reaction to minimize injury, environmental damage, equipment loss, and eliminate unnecessary calls to the public emergency services.

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