A group of 22 Italian restaurants in downtown San Francisco (US) established an EMS following the requirements of ISO 14001. You are performing an internal audit before the fourth certification cycle. The audit plan included an audit of the General Manager (GM) as the last interview before the closing meeting.
During the interview with the GM, you audit clause 10.3 (Continual improvement). The dialogue is as follows.
You: Could you please tell me how did you improve the EMS to enhance environmental performance (Clause
10.3)?
GM: One way to improve the EMS is to improve one or several of its processes. We decided to improve the water-consuming processes in all our branches. We use water in many of our processes (e.g. to wash our kitchens, our cutlery, plates, and glasses, to keep our floors clean). The idea was to review these processes in detail to reduce the amount of water used per customer. Each of the 22 branches sent us their results, we analysed the data and found out that the average water consumption per customer was reduced by 13%; therefore, we improved our environmental performance. We are happy about that.
You: What about the results in each branch?
GM: Have a look at this table:

Analysing this table, what would be your decision related to raising nonconformities to clause 10.3? Select two.

• A. I would raise a nonconformity for the whole group
• B. I would not raise any nonconformity
• C. I would raise an opportunity for improvement for branches in B, C, and D
• D. I would raise a nonconformity for branches in B
• E. I would raise a nonconformity for branches in D
• F. I would raise a nonconformity for branches in C and D

An audit team leader arrives at a steel fabrication organisation that manufactures fire escape stairs to carry out a Stage 2 certification audit. At a meeting with the EMS Manager, she is told that they have won their biggest contract from a construction organisation to manufacture and install fire escape stairs. They appointed a subcontractor to perform the installation work. The EMS Manager wants the ISO 14001 audit extended to cover the installation site.
Select which one of the options is the correct response by the auditor.

• A. Do you realise that this involves an extension to the scope of the audit and will require an application process?
• B. Can you arrange to bring the installation team here so that we can include this in the audit?
• C. Would you write to my audit programme manager with this request?
• D. We have used all our allocated time in preparation for this audit so how can we extend the audit scope?

In the case of ISO 14001 EMS audits that follow the recommendations of ISO 19011, which two of the following statements are true?

• A. An audit on an external provider may also be referred to as a third-party audit.
• B. Second-party audits are conducted by certification body auditors with experience in evaluating legal compliance.
• C. The audit plan should consider the effect of the audit activities on the auditee ' s processes.
• D. The frequency of internal audits is determined based on the environmental importance of the processes concerned.
• E. EMS auditors do not need to evaluate the organisation ' s capability to respond to and recover from disruptive incidents.
• F. Internal auditors can audit their own work.

During a second-party audit at a paper mill, you find that the EMS Manager conducted the environmental risk process. In the environmental aspects register, aspects were listed by emissions to air, releases to water, releases to land and other aspects such as energy consumption and waste disposal. They were categorised as either significant or not significant.
The EMS Manager had an action plan only for significant aspects.
Match each of the following statements of your concerns to a clause of ISO 14001.

CleanHavenServices is a national dry cleaning and laundry organisation with 50 shops. You are conducting an EMS surveillance audit of the Head Office and are sampling environmental performance measurements. You find that all failures to meet compliance criteria originate from five shops in the same region. Most of these failures relate to the release of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which exceed regulatory limits. The Environmental Manager tells you that these are the oldest shops in the organisation. He states that the cleaning equipment needs replacing, but the organisation cannot afford it now. He was instructed six months ago by Head Office to stop monitoring the air quality in the five shops.
On raising the matter with senior management, you are told that there are environmental objectives to replace the equipment in these shops over the next five years, which will eventually solve the problem.
After further auditing, you raised four nonconformities against ISO 14001.
Based on the scenario, select the four options which best describe the evidence for raising such nonconformities.

• A. The release of Volatile Organic Compounds exceeding regulatory limits did not align with the organisation ' s environmental policy to protect the environment.
• B. The senior management was unaware that future regulations will likely ban the use of Volatile Organic Compounds in dry cleaning processes.
• C. The management failed in planning to replace obsolete equipment which damages the environment.
• D. The organisation does not measure Volatile Organic Compound emission levels to determine whether environmental regulatory limits were being met.
• E. The organisation failed to adequately control the laundry operations in five shops and produced greenhouse gases exceeding regulatory limits.
• F. No action was taken when the earlier sampling of air quality showed regulatory limits being exceeded.
• G. The organisation failed to improve its environmental performance when monitoring of air quality in five shops was terminated.
• H. Shop managers were told to ventilate the laundry area and ignore the pungent odour of the Volatile Organic Compounds.