Sustainability History Project

Along the lines of the recent post Quantifying “sustainability” using certification systems, the Oregonian today featured an article originally from the New York Times News Service about the Federal Trade Commission’s revised “Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims,” or “Green Guides“[1]:

Manufacturers of products that claim to be environmentally friendly will face tighter rules on how they are advertised to consumers under changes proposed Wednesday by the Federal Trade Commission.

The commission’s revised “Green Guides,” last updated in 1998, warn marketers against using labels that make broad claims that cannot be substantiated, like “eco-friendly.” Marketers must qualify their claims on the product packaging and limit them to a specific benefit, such as how much of the product is recycled.

For more about the Green Guides, see “Reporter Resources: The FTC’s Green Guides .”
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[1] Oregonian article: Tanzina Vega, “Environmental Claims on Products Will Have To Be Cleaner,” Oct. 7, 2010, pp. B1, B4. Original NYT article: Tanzina Vega, “Agency Seeks to Tighten Rules for ‘Green’ Labeling,” Oct. 6, 2010.

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