National foreword

This British Standard is the UK implementation of EN ISO 14071:2024. It is identical to ISO 14071:2024. It supersedes PD CEN ISO/TS 14071:2016, which is withdrawn.

The UK participation in its preparation was entrusted to Technical Committee SES/1/5, Environmental Management - Life cycle tools and techniques.

A list of organizations represented on this committee can be obtained on request to its committee manager.

Contractual and legal considerations

This publication has been prepared in good faith, however no representation, warranty, assurance or undertaking (express or implied) is or will be made, and no responsibility or liability is or will be accepted by BSI in relation to the adequacy, accuracy, completeness or reasonableness of this publication. All and any such responsibility and liability is expressly disclaimed to the full extent permitted by the law.

This publication is provided as is, and is to be used at the recipient’s own risk.

The recipient is advised to consider seeking professional guidance with respect to its use of this publication.

This publication is not intended to constitute a contract. Users are responsible for its correct application.

Compliance with a British Standard cannot confer immunity from legal obligations.

This British Standard was published under the authority of the Standards Policy and Strategy Committee on 31 October 2024.

This European Standard was approved by CEN on 17 October 2024.

CEN members are bound to comply with the CEN/CENELEC Internal Regulations which stipulate the conditions for giving this European Standard the status of a national standard without any alteration. Up-to-date lists and bibliographical references concerning such national standards may be obtained on application to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre or to any CEN member.

This European Standard exists in three official versions (English, French, German). A version in any other language made by translation under the responsibility of a CEN member into its own language and notified to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre has the same status as the official versions.

CEN members are the national standards bodies of Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye and United Kingdom.

European foreword

This document (EN ISO 14071:2024) has been prepared by Technical Committee ISO/TC 207 "Environmental management" in collaboration with CCMC.

This European Standard shall be given the status of a national standard, either by publication of an identical text or by endorsement, at the latest by April 2025, and conflicting national standards shall be withdrawn at the latest by April 2025.

Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent rights. CEN shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.

This document supersedes CEN ISO/TS 14071:2016.

Any feedback and questions on this document should be directed to the users’ national standards body/national committee. A complete listing of these bodies can be found on the CEN website.

According to the CEN-CENELEC Internal Regulations, the national standards organizations of the following countries are bound to implement this European Standard: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye and the United Kingdom.

Endorsement notice

The text of ISO 14071:2024 has been approved by CEN as EN ISO 14071:2024 without any modification.

Foreword

ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation of national standards bodies (ISO member bodies). The work of preparing International Standards is normally carried out through ISO technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a technical committee has been established has the right to be represented on that committee. International organizations, governmental and non-governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in the work. ISO collaborates closely with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all matters of electrotechnical standardization.

The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular, the different approval criteria needed for the different types of ISO document should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance with the editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives).

ISO draws attention to the possibility that the implementation of this document may involve the use of (a) patent(s). ISO takes no position concerning the evidence, validity or applicability of any claimed patent rights in respect thereof. As of the date of publication of this document, ISO had not received notice of (a) patent(s) which may be required to implement this document. However, implementers are cautioned that this may not represent the latest information, which may be obtained from the patent database available at www.iso.org/patents. ISO shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.

Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not constitute an endorsement.

For an explanation of the voluntary nature of standards, the meaning of ISO specific terms and expressions related to conformity assessment, as well as information about ISO’s adherence to the World Trade Organization (WTO) principles in the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), see www.iso.org/iso/foreword.html.

This document was prepared by Technical Committee ISO/TC 207, Environmental management, Subcommittee SC 5, Life cycle assessment, in collaboration with the European Committee for Standardization (CEN) Technical Committee CEN/SS S26, Environmental management, in accordance with the Agreement on technical cooperation between ISO and CEN (Vienna Agreement).

This first edition cancels and replaces ISO/TS 14071:2014, which has been technically revised.

The main changes are as follows:

additional specifications on the review process;
corrections of inconsistencies.

Any feedback or questions on this document should be directed to the user’s national standards body. A complete listing of these bodies can be found at www.iso.org/members.html.

Introduction

For life cycle assessment (LCA), critical review is the conformity assessment approach in accordance with ISO 14040 and ISO 14044. These standards contain the overarching requirements for critical review in concise form.

Based on these requirements, a common critical review practice emerged that satisfied interested parties. For the mandatory case of LCA studies intended to be used in comparative assertions intended to be disclosed to the public, the performance of a critical review is established as a key feature for the acceptance of the study by interested parties. However, even in the broad range of applications of LCA, for which a critical review is not mandatory, the commissioners of the LCA study often decide to perform a voluntary critical review to improve the robustness of their studies and to increase credibility.

It is one of the key features of critical review that it does not relate to an accreditation scheme, but ensures quality by making the individual reviewer personally responsible for the work and by giving priority to the content rather than the form.

Because of the increasing use of LCA itself, as well as the broader application in tools such as carbon footprinting or upcoming labelling initiatives, this document specifies the established critical review practice in a more comprehensive way, by providing additional requirements and guidance for conducting a critical review and ensuring the relevant competencies.

1 Scope

This document specifies requirements and gives guidance for conducting a critical review of any type of life cycle assessment (LCA) study and the competencies required for the review. It provides additional requirements and guidance to ISO 14040 and ISO 14044.

This document provides:

details of a critical review process, including clarification with regard to ISO 14044;
guidance to deliver the required critical review process, linked to the goal of the LCA and its intended use;
content and deliverables of the critical review process;
guidance to improve the consistency, transparency, efficiency and credibility of the critical review process;
the required competencies for the reviewer(s) (internal, external and panel member);
the required competencies to be represented by the panel as a whole.

This document can be applicable to other standards that require independent review of LCA-based procedures and information (e.g. ISO 14045, ISO 14046, ISO 14025, ISO 14067), and can be adapted to the specific fields of application. Other reference standards can be included in the critical review process.

This document does not apply to

critical reviews performed prior to its publication, and
the applications of LCA (as illustrated in ISO 14040:2006, Figure 1).

2 Normative references

3 Terms and definitions

4 Critical review process and tasks

4.1 Defining the scope of the critical review

4.2 Selecting, making agreements and replacing external reviewer(s)

4.3 Critical review process

4.4 Validity of critical review statement and report

4.5 Critical review report and critical review statement preparation

4.6 Revision of an existing critical review

4.7 Critical review tasks

5 Reviewer(s) competencies

Bibliography

BS EN ISO 14071:2024

Environmental management. Life cycle assessment. Critical review processes and reviewer competencies

Current

Published:

31 Oct 2024