Cradle to Cradle Product Certification: A Process Overview

To address the growing demand for quality products that are safer for users and the environment, more and more manufacturers are ensuring that they’re creating Cradle to Cradle Certified™ products.

This certification is having an impact upon several product categories, including the built environment, beauty and personal care, apparel, furniture, and home and office supplies.

The five levels of certification (basic, bronze, silver, gold and platinum) have a set of requirements ranging from basic product information to collection and assessment of detailed material composition and product manufacturing data. These requirements cover five categories: material health, material reutilization, renewable energy, water stewardship, and social fairness.

Category 1: Material Health
To perform the material health assessment, it is important to know the generic materials of the product, determine which materials will be assessed, and guide the identification of the chemicals present in those materials. It’s also vital to identify the final destination of the product, since it may end up as material for manufacturing a second iteration of the same product or another, or become biologically degraded. The fate or final destination affects the percentage of materials to be assessed.

Once a target level of certification is identified, the assessor precedes with the collection of materials data at the element or substance level. This information will form the basis for the material health assessment: the procedure to assess the risk of the chemicals in a product against end points that are associated with negative human health impacts and environmental damage. A rating is generated and the material health category is scored from basic to platinum.

Category 2: Material Reutilization
Next, the assessor must define the amount of material reutilized within the product, as well as how the materials can be reutilized at the end of its life. This category challenges manufacturers and designers to think about the full life cycle of the product and to create a well-defined end of life strategy. This plan should determine if a product will become material for a new product or be biodegradable under existing treatment conditions. If the latter, tests must demonstrate the claim. A material reutilization score is calculated, based on the end of life strategy and its execution and covering both the materials that go into the product and how they can be reutilized at the end of life.

Category 3: Renewable Energy
This category aims to encourage manufacturers to use renewable energy and manage the carbon emissions relating to the manufacturing process. The score level for this category depends on the percentage of renewable energy used and the percentage of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions offset. To address this category, applicants will have to report annual electricity use and GHG emissions associated with the manufacturing of the applicant product. In addition, manufacturers will document any approved renewable energy credits they’ve purchased. Or, if they are using renewable energy generated on site and have conducted a GHG inventory, they should report the amount of GHGs that need to be offset.

Category 4: Water Stewardship
Water stewardship addresses issues such as water availability and quality relating to the manufacturing of the product. In the assessment, there is a facility level assessment of the use and discharge to water, plus a characterization of local and business-specific water issues. This category seeks to identify any chemical effluents that can contaminate water and then address the issue with an optimization plan and actions. If water is not used in the final production stages, water use in the supply chain can be examined.

Category 5: Social Fairness
Social Fairness uses both self-assessment and web-based tools to identify compliance or non-compliance with fundamental labor and human rights within the manufacturing and supply chain of the applicant product. In this category, aspiring for a higher score means more data needs to be collected within the supply chain, but it provides a greater opportunity to help suppliers improve in areas where it’s possible to achieve a positive impact upon employees. In this category, manufacturers will first conduct a streamlined self-audit to assess the level of protection of fundamental human rights. Second, they will develop a management procedure aiming to address any identified issues of the self-audit. Third, they’ll conduct a full social responsibility self-audit (based on UN Global Compact Tool or B Corp). Additional requirements are needed beyond Gold level.

What’s next?
Towards the end of the overall assessment, the assessor will visit the final manufacturing facility (or the facility which has the most significant production processes) to verify the production, materials and information submitted during the assessment. Once the assessment is completed by the General Assessor, the final assessment scored will be equal to the lowest score among all the assessed categories. The General Assessor will prepare and submit the assessment package to the Cradle to Cradle Products Institute with the recommended certification level.

The Institute will review the package and make a decision on the final level. If the certification is granted above bronze, the product can display the Cradle to Cradle certification logo and the level attained in the product. The certified product will also be listed on the Cradle to Cradle Products Institute online registry. The cost and time of the assessment depends on the level of certification desired, the number of materials for the material health assessment, and the number of requirements to be fulfilled. After certifying the product, if needed, a plan to optimize the product will be developed to help the certification holder retain certification, or obtain a higher level in the re-certification.

There are 209 participating companies in the Cradle to Cradle Certification program, with more than 5000 product variations in 10 product categories. As of September 2016, the program reached 440 certifications including 105 new Cradle to Cradle certifications and 29 new certification holders.

Ana Maria Leal
Ecodesign Consultant
Consumer and Retail Solutions
SGS North America
t: (862)217-3706

Cradle to Cradle Certified™ is a certification mark licensed exclusively for the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute.

About SGS
SGS is the world’s leading inspection, verification, testing and certification company. SGS is recognized as the global benchmark for quality and integrity. With more than 85,000 employees, SGS operates a network of over 1,800 offices and laboratories around the world.

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This release was published on openPR.