Aplicabilidade das normas regulamentadoras nas auditorias ambientais compulsórias do estado do Paraná

Abstract

Mandatory Environmental Audits are licensing and environmental management instruments that serve as tools for the identification and promotion of environmental control and the impacts from potentially polluting organizations. In the State of Paraná, Brazil, such audits are prescribed by Law 13.448/2002 and Decree 2.076/2003, which aim to promote greater control and pollution prevention, through evaluations and studies in order to verify the compliance with environmental legislation and the conditions of human health, among other objectives. Assessing the aforementioned laws as they relate to the requirement for verification of environmental criteria - that are clearly aimed at protecting the natural environment -, it is not clear the obligation to consider the Regulatory Standards of the Brazilian Department of Labor, despite auditing laws verification requirements that aim to protect the worker. This study sought to answer whether the Regulatory Standards of the Department of Labor have been used by audit teams to check legal criteria of minimum levels of protection of the worker integrity. It also proposed to identify which standards would have greater applicability in the verification of environmental impacts and risks to the worker of the industrial activities evaluated, and the potential nonconformities arising from the nonobservance of these rules by the auditors. It tried to answer, moreover, if no legal requirement for the presence of professional specialist in Health and Safety in the audit team could compromise the quality of the audits. By evaluating the frequency verification of the Regulatory Standards in fifteen reports of Mandatory Environmental Audits, it concluded that some standards have been used by audit teams as complementary verification criteria. Knowing the Regulatory Standards more relevant in these processes, it identified potential nonconformities not only for the health and safety of the worker, but also for the environment, that could be ignored by organizations if audit teams do not contemplate it as additional criteria for this kind of auditing. This study concludes, also, that Paraná State regulation of these audits should be reconsidered so that the criteria for the registration of auditors would include training and experience in the Health and Safety area, beyond the environmental one already required to register candidates. Finally, the research proposes a checklist that could be used as additional support in the process of Mandatory Environmental Audits in Paraná State.