The Spanish Eco-design Standard. Implementation in SMEs

The Technological Center CARTIF has carried out a successful pilot project for the implementation of the Spanish Standard UNE 150301:2003 “Environmental Management of the process of design and development. Eco-design”. The implementation was developed during the year 2004 in six SMEs of Castilla y León (Northwest Spain). The Spanish Standard UNE 150301:2003 [1] establishes the requirements of an Environmental Management System of the process of design and development of the products and/or services of an organization. The implementation of this Spanish Standard in the participating organizations had both economic and environmental positive effects. The main benefits the companies achieved with this project were: i) obtaining an environmental certification, ii) having environmental information about their product/service iii) improving the company image and iv) reducing costs. In this paper, the experience of two of the participating SMEs, which belong to different industrial sectors, is presented.