Building Products Environmental Certification Program

Validate environmental claims, protect your brand, and gain a competitive advantage in the marketplace

Don’t just promise buyers that your product meets environmental requirements – prove it. Intertek’s Environmental Certification Program eliminates the confusion in the eco-labeling marketplace. The Program evaluates the environmental impacts of building products and materials, providing manufacturer’s confidence in promoting their environmental claims, knowing they have been certified by a leader, with more than 100 years experience providing testing, quality and safety for products worldwide.

Environmental Certification Program Components

The program is focused on single or multiple attribute certifications, and consists of five key components: 

1. Writing the Test Plan - During the generation of the test plan for the product, careful consideration will be given to what claims can meaningfully be made for it. Inappropriate claims (this fire door hinge contains no asbestos, for instance) will not be allowed. Once correct credentials are identified, nationally or internationally recognized test standards will be utilized to validate these claims. 

2. Initial Plant Inspection - The manufacturing facility will then be audited by trained Intertek personnel to witness the production of the test items and to gather the information necessary for the preparation of a Quality Control Manual. 

3. Creation of the Quality Control Manual - The Quality Control Manual will adequately describe the methods and procedures utilized in the product’s manufacture. 

4. Performance of Verification Tests - Intertek will perform tests based on the sustainable attributes a manufacturer selects such as recycled content, solar reflectance, emissions, and energy efficiency, and will then third-party validate the claims about the products. 

5. Quarterly Plant Audits and Retest - After products are issued certification, a routine program of unannounced, quarterly plant inspections will begin to ensure the product is continuing to be manufactured to a quality commensurate with this program. 

Our goal is to stabilize the industry, not add to the “green claims” confusion. We have a close relationship with the International Code Council - Evaluation Services (ICC-ES) group that offers a similar program called Sustainable Attributes Verification and Evaluation (SAVE). Consequently, the first nine attributes of our new program are identical to those of the SAVE program.

Attributes:

• Determination of Recycled Content of Materials
• Determination of Biobased Material Content
• Determination of Solar Reflectance, Thermal Emittance and Solar Reflective Index of Roof Covering Materials
• Determination of Regionally Extracted, Harvested or Manufactured Materials or Products
• Determination of Volatile Organic Compound (VOC) Content and Emissions of Adhesives and Sealants
• Determination of Volatile Organic Compound (VOC) Content and Emissions of Paints and Coatings
• Determination of Volatile Organic Compound (VOC) Content and Emissions of Floor Covering Products
• Determination of Formaldehyde Emissions of Composite Wood and Engineered Wood Products
• Determination of Certified Wood and Certified Wood Content in Products
• Determination of Durability of Paints and Coatings
• Energy efficiency: efficiency of solid-fuel heating appliances, thermal resistance value, etc.
• Water efficiency: water use by plumbing fixtures 
• No toxic substances 
• Mold resistance
• Heavy metals content in non-metal materials
• Asbestos free
• No inorganic halides or other chemicals controlled by the Montreal Protocol
• No radioactivity