Can ISO 9001 stop climate change?

By itself? No, of course not. But can it support the work of others? I'm still dubious, but on that point opinions differ.*

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Last year the ISO published the London Declaration. According to the ISO website, "the London Declaration to combat climate change through standards defines ISO’s commitment to achieve the climate agenda by 2050." Among other things, the London Declaration states formally and unequivocally that the ISO will "Foster the active consideration of climate science and associated transitions in the development of all new and revised International Standards and publications." [Emphasis added.] This means that whenever ISO 9001 is next revised, the relevant committees will have to consider climate science and "associated transitions" when writing it.

What will this look like? I've emailed people who know more than I do, to get some idea of what the current thinking is. I haven't heard back from them yet. One person suggested in casual conversation** that there might be no more than a line added to clause 4.1 that the organization "shall consider the implications of climate change" when identifying the "issues ... relevant to its purpose" that make up its Context. But somebody else answered back that, "Some aspects affecting climate change should be addressed in design and development of products and services. Otherwise it's too late." So I have no idea where this will end up. 

My own opinion—and I emphasize, for reasons spelled out below, that this is a personal opinion—is that ISO 9001 should stay in its lane. In the first place ISO 9001 is a Quality management system standard. It's directly focused on the satisfaction of customers and other interested parties. But a company can satisfy its customers without taking any action on climate change, ... unless the customers themselves demand such action, in which case presumably the company is already working on it. In this sense, adding requirements to consider climate change is a distraction from the standard's true job. 

In the second place, ISO 9001 is a generic Quality management system standard, equally applicable to a global manufacturing concern or to a neighborhood five-and-dime. If a local hamburger restaurant wanted to implement ISO 9001, they should be able to do so. But small enterprises like that are unlikely to spend much time or effort considering the implications of climate change. So depending on what new requirements are finally added to the standard, I can see a couple of possibilities.

The requirements might be deep and substantive. In this case, we should expect small and medium-sized enterprises to opt out, because meeting the requirements will be too difficult. If we follow this route, the number of companies who seek new certifications—or maintain their existing ones—will drop significantly. A result like that won't be good for the ISO brand.

The requirements might be superficial. In this case—if the requirements can be satisfied by adding a few words to your Quality Policy and then taking literally no other action—companies probably won't opt out. Quality Policies are easy to edit. But in this case, we should expect the customers of ISO 9001 to get pretty cynical about the exercise. They'll get the idea that they can take credit for fighting climate change just by updating a document that hangs on the wall; they'll know how ineffective that action is; and then how seriously will they take anyone else's statements about climate change? How seriously will they take the ISO brand? This result won't be any better than the last one.

Maybe there's a sweet spot between these two bad outcomes. I sure hope so. But it seems like the easiest way to avoid this dilemma is to stay out of the arena. If ISO 9001 never had to say anything about climate change in the first place—if ISO 9001 left consideration of climate change to other standards that are directly focused on the topic—then it could continue to focus on the areas where it really does some good: on the quality of processes, products, and services; and on the satisfaction of customers and interested parties.

Just an opinion.  

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* In the interests of strict compliance with all applicable regulations, it is my duty to inform you that I recently joined TAG 176: that's the American component of ISO/TC 176, who are responsible for writing the ISO 9001 family of standards. As a result, there are formal rules about what information I am allowed to discuss about the committee's work. In particular:

1. I'm not allowed to reveal the personal data of any other committee member. But that's fine, because I have no interest in talking about individuals. My topic is always the ideas and principles.
2. I'm not allowed to reveal how any particular individual or National Standards Body voted. But that's fine too. See above.
3. I'm not allowed to share any presentations or working documents. But I never planned to.
4. I am allowed to share my personal opinions, so long as I clearly identify them as such (and to be clear everything in the body of this post is hereby identified as a personal opinion), and so long as I don't criticize the committee. But that's fine too, because you should absolutely not take anything I say here as a criticism of the committee. I am confident that the committee will do the best it possibly can, given the parameters that have been mandated by the ISO central authorities.

** This discussion took place during the 2022 ISO/TC176 Plenary Meeting, which is going on this week.