The Environmental Management System (EMS) of

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

was developed under the standards of the

ISO 14001 The ISO 14000 family is a set of international standards for Natural environment, environment management systems. It was developed in March 1996 by International Organization for Standardization. The goal of these standards is to help organizations ...

. In creating the EMS it was necessary to provide maximum flexibility to each centers of NASA while living up to the standards of the ISO 14001, along with the " Executive Order 13148". The system was designed to benefit by "increased involvement of management and shop level personnel; reduced mission delays; improved procedures; reduction in single point failures; identification of pollution prevention opportunities; improved compliance; and better relationships with regulators and the public".

History

The EMS was tested at the

Glenn Research Center NASA John H. Glenn Research Center at Lewis Field is a NASA center within the cities of Brook Park, Ohio, Brook Park and Cleveland between Cleveland Hopkins International Airport and the Rocky River Reservation of Cleveland Metroparks, with a s ...

in Cleveland, Ohio,

Johnson Space Center The Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) is NASA's center for human spaceflight in Houston, Texas (originally named the Manned Spacecraft Center), where human spaceflight training, research, and flight controller, flight control are conducted. ...

in Houston, Texas, and

Stennis Space Center The John C. Stennis Space Center (SSC) is a NASA rocket testing facility in Hancock County, Mississippi, United States, on the banks of the Pearl River (Mississippi–Louisiana), Pearl River at the Mississippi–Louisiana border. , it is NASA ...

in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. The test study was carried out to evaluate the challenges of the system, including costs, resource requirements, and benefits. NASA's EMS development team has received the Circle Award from the White House for "creating an agency wide environmental management system".

Current role

EMS is part of NASA's overall management system that integrates environmental concerns and issues into operational processes. The EMS offers a systematic approach to evaluating and managing all potential environmental ramifications of NASA operations and assists in prioritizing issues and monitoring performance improvements. NASA's EMS model consists of a continual cycle of environmental policy, planning, implementation, checking and corrective actions, and management review. Following this model provides an efficient way of doing business. The EMS allows the prediction of potential environmental problems early in the planning process, provides for the design of activities to minimize or avoid these problems, and allows for a continuous check or audit of environmental performance, making improvements where appropriate.

References

{{reflist NASA groups, organizations, and centers