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As government purchasers continue asking for greener products and services, the supplier community has responded with a growing assortment of environmental claims. Suppliers make claims ranging from "Earth Friendly" to "Mother Earth Approved" to "Green Certified." Sorting the legitimate greener claims from the "greenwashed," misleading ones have proven challenging for purchasing professionals and consumers alike.

When early government purchasing advocates first began promoting the value of considering environmental considerations along with more traditional price, performance and availability concerns, there were only about a dozen environmental labels worldwide. There are currently more than 500 labels according to Jacob Malthouse from Big Room, the managers of the www.ecolabelling.org website that attempts to track the explosive growth in the environmental labeling world. The website has not been updated in six months, but it is being revamped to better handle the proliferation of labels.

Government purchasers are coping by quickly sifting through the various environmental claims to determine which are legitimate. They are also using their professional expertise and purchasing power to influence the future of the green marketplace.

Avoiding the confusion

Professional purchasers are less likely to be misled by exaggerated or misleading environmental claims because they understand the differences between standards, certifications, verifications and labels. Often mistakenly used interchangeably, there are important differences.

Standard — A standard is a specification document that establishes the environmental and human health parameters a product or service must meet to be considered a greener offering. It establishes clear thresholds and requirements such as minimum recycled-content percentages, energy- or water-efficiency requirements, toxicity tests and volatile organic compound (VOC) limits. A well-written standard makes it very clear what is required.

Certification — A certification is proof from an independent third party that a particular product or service meets a specific standard. It provides assurance that a product actually delivers the benefits it claims.

Verification — Verification means an independent third party has determined that a specific environmental claim (such as the product contains X% post-consumer recycled content or contains Y% bio-based content) is accurate. Verification is another way of providing proof that a product delivers on its claimed environmental benefits. Verification to a specific standard results in certification.

Label — A label is an identifying mark used by suppliers to draw attention to the environmental benefits of a product or a service. While some labels are based on being certified to a standard, other labels are awarded based on an individual's or organization's professional judgment, based on membership with a specific trade association or created by a supplier's marketing department. A label is not particularly meaningful unless it is supported by a rigorous verification or a standards-based certification program.

Confusion continues about the differences among the terms because North America's two oldest, most established environmental leadership standards — EcoLogo (www.ecologo.org) and Green Seal (www.greenseal.org) — are ISO Type I environmental labeling programs. Type I programs combine standard setting, certification and labeling into a single entity.

Some suppliers are exploiting that confusion by creating their own labels to identify greener products without providing much clarity about what the label means, which products are eligible for it or how a product demonstrates compliance.

Other labeling programs such as EPA's Design for the Environment (DfE) program are not standards-based programs and instead award the DfE label based on internal EPA analysis. The Cradle to Cradle (C2C) label, similarly, is based on a consulting firm's professional assessment instead of a specific standard. While these programs and other similar approaches are identifying greener products, the lack of an accompanying standard makes them challenging for government purchasing.