Environment is an interdisciplinary topic, therefore, most CEN and CENELEC sectors deal with environmental issues. CEN and CENELEC respond to the challenges posed by the developments within the various sectors as well as by the evolution of the legislation in Europe.
CEN and CENELEC have an advisory group to deal with horizontal and strategic environmental issues and various Technical Committees addressing horizontal and sector specific standardization.
CEN-CENELEC Strategic Advisory Body on Environment (SABE)
CEN and CENELEC set up the CEN - CENELEC Strategic Advisory Body on Environment (SABE) to deal with the strategic issues related to the protection of the environment and to respond to the challenges posed by the developments within the various sectors as well as by the evolution of the legislation in Europe.
The main tasks of SABE are:
- Provide strategic advice for the CEN and CENELEC BTs on environmental matters and identifying future relevant topics
- Promote standardization within the European environmental policy framework
- Facilitate information exchange among key stakeholders,
- Support Technical Committees in addressing environmental related issues in their standardization work.
SABE has the following of Horizontal Teams for issues which are universally applicable in the field of environment:
In addition, SABE has Topic Groups to coordinate ongoing or initiate new work on a specific subject in the environmental field, e.g. derived from the European Green Deal. Presently, SABE has one Topic Group:
SABE explores the need for coordination on other topics linked to e.g. the European Green Deal. For example, SABE has developed an overview on an overview on how management standards support biodiversity.
SABE supports the activities of the CCMC Environmental Helpdesk
SABE has a close link to Technical Committees developing standards in the field of environment, such as:
- CEN/TC 350 “Sustainability of construction works”
- CEN/TC 444 “Environmental characterization of solid matrices”
- CEN/TC 465 “Sustainable Cities and Communities”
- CEN/TC 466 “Circularity and recyclability of fishing gear and aquaculture equipment”
- CEN/TC 467 “Climate Change”
- CLC/TC 111X “Environment”
- CEN-CLC/JTC 10 “Material efficiency aspects for products in scope of Ecodesign legislation”
- CEN-CLC/JTC 14 “Energy management and energy efficiency in the framework of energy transition”
