How does an organization become Accredited?

Recommendations endorsed by ACWI* concerning Federal laboratory accreditation:

• The National Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program (NELAP) is the Board's recommended program, because NELAP adequately meets (or is taking measures that meet) the broad needs of the majority of federal agencies performing water testing. Specifically, it is focused on uniform accreditation requirements across states, state reciprocity (and therefore, potentially reduces accreditation costs for labs operating in several states), and allows Federal as well as state accrediting authorities. For NELAP to serve as a satisfactory accrediting program for federal laboratories, NELAP needs to continue its efforts to:
• Obtain more state participation and reciprocity
• Address standards for ambient monitoring, field sample collection, and field measurements
• Promote the development of Performance Based Methods System (PBMS) implementation
• The MDCB (and its parent organization, the NWQMC) will periodically re-evaluate NELAP's suitability to serve as a national accreditation program in order to: (1) review the status of their progress in the aforementioned efforts, and (2) encourage state, federal, and private participation in NELAP.

*ACWI is the parent organization of the NWQMC and the Methods Board and is an inter-organizational group chartered under the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) that represents all levels of the government and the private sector. Back to Accreditation...