Regulation (EC) No 1221/2009 of the European Parliament and of the CouncilShow full title

Article 20 U.K. Requirements for environmental verifiers

1. In order to obtain accreditation or a licence in accordance with this Regulation, a candidate environmental verifier shall introduce a request with the Accreditation or Licensing Body from which it seeks accreditation or a licence.

That request shall specify the scope of the requested accreditation or licence by reference to the classification of economic activities as set out in Regulation (EC) No 1893/2006(1).

2. The environmental verifier shall provide to the Accreditation or Licensing Body appropriate evidence of its competence, including knowledge, relevant experience and technical capacities relevant to the scope of the requested accreditation or licence in the following fields:

(a) this Regulation;

(b) the general functioning of environmental management systems;

(c) relevant sectoral reference documents issued by the Commission, under Article 46, for the application of this Regulation;

(d) the legislative, regulatory and administrative requirements relevant to the activity subject to verification and validation;

(e) environmental aspects and impacts including the environmental dimension of sustainable development;

(f) the technical aspects, relevant to environmental issues, of the activity subject to verification and validation;

(g) the general functioning of the activity subject to verification and validation in order to assess the appropriateness of the management system, in relation to the interaction of the organisation and its products, services and operations with the environment including at least the following:

(i)

technologies employed by the organisation;

(ii)

terminology and tools deployed in the activities;

(iii)

operational activities and characteristics of their interaction with the environment;

(iv)

methodologies for the evaluation of significant environmental aspects;

(v)

pollution control and mitigation technologies;

(h) environmental auditing requirements and methodology including the ability to undertake effective verification audits of an environmental management system, identification of appropriate audit findings and conclusions and preparation and presentation of audits reports, in oral and written forms, to provide a clear record of the verification audit;

(i) information audit, the environmental statement and the updated environmental statement in relation to data management, data storage and manipulation, presentation of data in written and graphical format for the appreciation of potential data errors, use of assumptions and estimates;

(j) the environmental dimension of products and services including the environmental aspects and environmental performance during the usage and post-use, and the integrity of data provided for environmental decision making.

3. The environmental verifier shall be required to demonstrate a continuing professional development in the fields of competence set out in paragraph 2 and to maintain such development for assessment by the Accreditation or Licensing Body.

4. The environmental verifier shall be an external third party, independent, in particular of the organisation's auditor or consultant, impartial and objective in performing its activities.

5. The environmental verifier shall ensure that it is free from any commercial, financial or other pressures which might influence its judgment or endanger trust in its independence of judgment and integrity in relation to the verification activities. The environmental verifier shall ensure compliance with any rules applicable in this respect.

6. The environmental verifier shall have documented methods and procedures, including quality control mechanisms and confidentiality provisions, to comply with the verification and validation requirements of this Regulation.

7. Where an organisation acts as environmental verifier, it shall keep an organisation chart detailing structures and responsibilities within the organisation and a statement of legal status, ownership and funding sources.

That organisation chart shall be made available on request.

8. Compliance with these requirements shall be ensured through the assessment carried out prior to the accreditation or licensing and through the supervision by the Accreditation or Licensing Body.

(1)

Regulation (EC) No 1893/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 December 2006 establishing the statistical classification of economic activities NACE Revision 2 (OJ L 393, 30.12.2006, p. 1).