Vellco Gains ISO 14001 Accreditation

Over the past couple of years Vellco Tyre Control has embarked on an expansion programme that has led to a number of significant developments in the company’s evolution. Now, as news of a partnership agreement with Sapphire Energy Recovery breaks, Vellco has announced that it has ISO 14001: 2004 accreditation.

ISO 14001 is viewed by managing director, Chris Fell as perhaps one of the company’s most important accomplishments to date. “Although Vellco is not the first casing collection company to gain this endorsement, for a company in this sector of the market to be awarded ISO 14001 certification is an outstanding achievement and I am absolutely delighted,” he commented.

“Vellco is now one of a very rare band of casing specialists to hold this accolade which has been made possible by a good deal of extremely dedicated hard work. It is without doubt a superb environmental standard that all Vellco staff can feel justly proud of.”

When asked what achieving ISO 14001 status means to Vellco, business development director John Campbell pointed out that having this accreditation will enable the company to promote the impressive ISO 14001 logo in most areas of its business including, of course all official company paperwork. He continues: “It is also a reassurance to Vellco’s customers and other companies within the tyre industry that Vellco is operating a collection process that is completely environmentally auditable, professional and legally robust. Basically Vellco ticks more boxes that the industry might expect. It is also a coveted status to assist with future tender contracts of all types, especially with local government agencies (whom expect this type of accreditation as a pre-requisite and therefore elevates Vellco to a position of cutting edge professionalism.”

In order to collect and transport waste tyres, the bare minimum requirement is a waste carrier’s licence which involves a minimal amount of registration and checking. However Vellco chose to operate at a higher level having already achieved ISO 9001 accreditation some time ago.

Vellco commenced the application process for ISO 14001 accreditation back in 2004 with office manager, Erlinda del Mar taking project leader responsibility for what has been a very time consuming project. Erlinda explains that having considered the full scope of activities that the company could apply for, it was decided that Vellco would apply for certification in the collection, grading and recycling of tyres and accessories (which encompasses most forms of automotive waste). She adds: “Then the hard work began and our first objective was to produce a trading manual for which Vellco were assisted by a leading UK consultancy company.”

The next step was to create an official application for the certification which commenced in January 2005 and was finally formalised by the end of March 2005. It was an extremely demanding task with Erlinda being assisted by Vellco’s Environmental Officer, Stephen Ford, Transport Manager Dave Hollis and Call Centre Manager, Aimee Richardson.