Zudu is proud to share that we have received our ISO 14001:2015 certification for environmental management systems (EMS). This is an internationally recognised standard that allows companies such as ours to create a framework for monitoring, tracking, and improving our processes to reduce our environmental impact.
This achievement marks a significant milestone in our ongoing commitment to sustainability, responsible growth, and minimising our carbon impact.
ISO 14001:2015 is a standard that sets out criteria for organisations to manage their environmental responsibilities in a clear, transparent, and SMART goal-oriented way. It covers a range of activities depending on the industry, most commonly: utility use, waste management, supply chain, hardware management, and software systems.
While the standard will include set criteria, organisations can expand on what’s included in their EMS to make it more applicable to their operations and location.
As Zudu already holds ISO 27001 and ISO 9001 certifications, achieving the ISO 14001 standard required us to expand on our existing policies and create goals centred around the management of specific environmental key performance indicators (KPIs).
Following revisions, we were subject to an external audit that assessed the changes and approved that they meet the ISO 14001 standard. While the standard provides a baseline, we are proud to go above and beyond and work with external partners to support our activities, including our sustainable hosting providers at AWS; the Digital Poverty Alliance through our involvement in the Charter for Digital Inclusion; and the National Trust for Scotland with whom we planted 10 trees to mark our 10 years in business in 2024!
This certification is more than a badge – it reflects our tech-for-good approach to projects and documents our efforts in a way we can use to meaningfully report to our clients, suppliers, and the public. All organisations have a responsibility to limit their impact on the planet, and this certification strengthens our position as a responsible company for our clients and demonstrates our efforts and progress.
While little will change from our clients’ perspective, we are now able to report on data more efficiently and recommend more sustainable approaches to project delivery across discovery, design, development, marketing, and hosting/support. This includes (but is not limited to!) the use of light-weight scripts, code, and APIs in projects to reduce server calls; better optimisation between software and hardware features during routine maintenance updates; monitoring of device lifecycles through responsible purchasing and disposal methods; and hosting powered by sustainable energy to reduce overall carbon impact. Alongside this, we can support clients with audits of their projects and wider digital ecosystem to help identify areas for improvement and optimisation to not only reduce their environmental impact but also their costs and overheads!
As part of our environmental sustainability policy, we are aiming to achieve net zero across our operations by 2027 and we want to take our clients on this journey with us. To learn more about our approach, speak with our teams at contact@zudu.co.uk.
