Roth has been certified in accordance with the ISO 14001 environmental management standard for ten years. While many competitors are only just beginning to follow suit, Roth’s environmental management system is already firmly established. This certification is often an important consideration for potential customers when choosing a supplier.

The ISO 14001 standard for environmental management systems builds on ISO 9001 and, like its quality management counterpart, also focuses on continual improvement based on the PDCA cycle: Plan – Do – Check – Act. Since introducing ISO 14001 in 2014, we have been able to make systematic improvements and reduce our environmental impact year on year.

Defining environmental objectives

To continuously improve our environmental performance, we set ourselves environmental objectives for each financial year. These are defined using the SMART methodology, which means they must be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound. In particular, we define objectives for reducing our energy consumption and minimising CO2 emissions.

Monitoring progress

We continuously measure our effect on the environment. The results are analysed each quarter and the data is incorporated into our environmental life cycle assessment. This helps us to assess the relevance of the impacts and identify ways to control them. If we notice during a quarterly review that we are not on track to meet our environmental objectives, we adjust the measures accordingly.

Exploring system boundaries

As a supplier of precision parts, our customers determine the materials and, to a certain extent, the manufacturing method. These decisions are highly relevant to our environmental impact. We assume an advisory role and talk to our customers about how we can reduce our impact on the environment together. However, many of our customers already have a strong awareness of sustainability and view their business activities from an economic, ecological and social perspective. One of the reasons these customers choose to work with us is because we are ISO 14001-certified. Furthermore, we also strive to have a positive environmental impact at the other end of the value chain. For example, we ensure that our suppliers adopt environmentally friendly practices and, ideally, are certified according to ISO 14001.

Since environmental management is of strategic importance to us, the issue is also represented at the management level. At Roth, our quality manager also serves as the deputy to the environmental officer. This ensures that environmental considerations are always factored into decisions at the highest level.