Learn the benefits of the ISO 50001 standard for your company and how an effective energy and utilities management system can be a strategic tool to help achieve ISO 50001 standardization and to reduce costs.
Standards developed by ISO are widely known in the corporate market. The recognition is expected, since ISO – the International Organization for Standardization – is the largest developer of international voluntary standards, creating global patterns common in all nations in different areas. ISO has developed around 19,000 standards, which affect most of the different markets, including manufacturing, technology and even food security.
What is ISO 50001?
In 2011, ISO developed a specific standard for energy management: ISO 50001, based on the continuous improvement management system also applied in other well-known standards, like ISO 9,001 and ISO 14,001.
ISO 50001 defines a set of requirements so that organizations can develop:
- their own policy for more efficient energy use,;
- define targets and goals to reach results;
- use data and information to support decisions related to energy use;
- measure the results, constantly review their policy;
- and constantly practice continuous improvement in energy management.
By the end of 2016, there were around 20,000 ISO 50001 certifications worldwide. In Brazil, only 22 companies had received certification by then, including Fiat, Teksid and Vallourec.
However, as in every ISO standard, investing in ISO 50001 is each company’s choice. Energy and utilities teams frequently question exactly this matter: Is it worth it to make the investment and get certification in ISO 50001 standard? Or is it enough to just interpret and adapt the standard’s definitions to the company’s operations without worrying about standardization?
Benefits of ISO 50001 certification
Yes, it is definitely worth it to invest and get certified, since certification generates benefits that go way beyond energy efficiency, sustainability, and cost reduction.
At first, standardization aggregates recognition to the organization. It provides recognition from the market, which sees ISO standards as a reference for best practices, and recognition from the company’s internal public, facilitating the change management processes in teams.
Then, particularly in turbulent moments in the company’s business, certification contributes to maintaining the energy efficiency program and energy management policies in the long term. No company wishes to lose a standardization it’s achieved, especially one that involves serious commitment with society and the environment. Once the company is certified, the whole efficiency initiative gains more corporate ballast, maintaining this matter in the company’s strategic agenda and preserving investments, year after year.
In this context, Viridis’s energy management solution, developed exclusively for operations that consume large amounts of energy, is a strategic tool to help achieve ISO 50001 standardization and to drastically reduce operational, auditing and maintenance costs. With more than 300 features in the system, Viridis can instrument and operationalize all the standard’s practices and definitions, enabling a great part of the actions to be automatically executed and contributing to enhance the productivity of teams. Click here and learn more about our solutions.
Viridis’s Commercial Director. He has worked for 35 years at Vallourec in energy, maintenance, and industrial assembling. He managed the energy and utilities project at the Vallourec & Sumitomo (VSB) plant. He holds a BEng in Electrical Engineering and graduate degrees in Industrial Automation and Business Management. He is a member of CB-116, which developed the ABNT NBR ISO 50,001 – Energy Management standard. He was responsible for making Vallourec the first steel company in Brazil to achieve this certification. He is a member of the Board of Renewable Energy and Oil & Gas at FIEMG.
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