​BPA uses an Environmental Management System (or EMS) to implement its environmental policy and to meet environmental responsibilities, including the sustainability requirements of Executive Order 13693. The EMS guides BPA's activities, ensuring implementation of environmental/sustainability requirements and fostering continuous improvement. It is implemented through an agency wide management system referred to as the Balanced Scorecard.

In response to E.O. 13693 and related Executive Orders, BPA has also established a Sustainability Policy (720-1) and formed a cross-agency Sustainability Team to coordinate and implement sustainable activities throughout BPA.

The EMS standards are based on and equivalent to the ISO (International Standards Organization) 14001 requirements of Plan-Do-Check-Act, described as follows:

Plan: Establish the objectives and processes necessary to deliver results in accordance with the organization’s environmental policy.

Do: Implement the processes.

Check: Monitor and measure processes against environmental policy, objectives, and targets, legal and other requirements and report the results.

Act: Take actions to continually improve the performance of the environmental management system.

In September 2015, the EMS was independently audited by a Department of Energy-approved auditor and found to be functionally equivalent to the primary IS014001 standard elements and judged fully implemented in conformance with the requirements of E.O. 13423.

As a result, on November 24, 2015, the BPA Chief Operating Officer made a declaration of a "fully implemented EMS." On November 25, 2015, the BPA Administrator concurred with the declaration.

BPA’s EMS is further described in the EMS Handbook and the BPA Manual Chapter 902: Environmental Management System.