Requirements on Consumer Information about Product ... - ANEC

Consumer Information about PCF
gas emissions of goods and services“, a guideline below a British Standard) or resp. in
combination with ISO 14040 / 14044 (LCA) and taking into consideration the Greenhouse
Gas Protocol Product / Supply Chain Initiative of World Resources Institute (WRI) and World
Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD).
Against this background the herewith presented study analysed the suitability of the LCA /
PCF approach for environmental labelling, prioritisation of consumer information and the
relevance of PCF in different product groups.
From these analyses the following general recommendations to standardisation and
legislation can be given:
Other environmental effects should not be disregarded
The narrow approach to only focus on greenhouse gas emissions bears the risk to overlook
other relevant environmental impacts or even lead to wrong conclusions that increase
negative environmental effects in the worse case (e.g. in the case of electricity). Therefore
screening analyses of other environmental impacts must be included in a PCF.
The PCF is a fundamental indicator for some products or product groups. Still a
comprehensive sustainability assessment of products cannot be carried out on the basis of
the PCF alone. Other useful evaluation tools like life cycle assessments, eco-efficiency
analyses and sustainability analyses can be used to complete the picture.
The screening of relevant other environmental impact categories besides global warming
potential must thus be an obligatory component of a Carbon Footprint study.
ISO 14024 Type I labels like the Blue Angel should be retained as lead labels
The above considerations clearly support retention of eco-labels in accordance with ISO
14024 (Type 1), such as the Blauer Engel eco-label, as lead labels. The advantages of
ecolabels over CO2 labels are summarized again below (the arguments apply both to the
Blauer Engel and by analogy to other national eco-labels and the European eco-label):
- easily understood and reliable information for consumers: from an overall environmental
perspective an eco-labelled product is clearly better than comparable
products;
- inclusion of all relevant environmental and health aspects;
- identification of criteria on the basis of LCAs and eco-toxicological assessments;
- subsequent discussion by a panel of experts;
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