The Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI) announced that it is the first organization within the soft floor covering sector to earn accreditation as a certification body for indoor air quality by the American National Standard Institute (ANSI), the premier source for international standardization and conformity assessment.

CRI’s Green Label and Green Label Plus programs, which test for and certify low emissions from carpet, carpet cushion and adhesive, comply with the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Guide 65, General requirements for bodies operating product certification programs.

“CRI is proud to have the first and only ANSI-certified green carpet program in the United States,” said CRI President Werner Braun. “We set the standard with the Green Label program, and now we are raising the bar with this prestigious ANSI certification that recognizes best practices for indoor air quality testing and certification.

“Today, indoor air quality is an important environmental consideration, especially since we spend approximately 90 percent of our time indoors,” Braun added. “Architects, builders and specifiers can have full confidence that Green Label and Green Label Plus carpet is a desirable, attractive green building product. They can rest assured they are purchasing the very lowest emitting products on the market.”

CRI began the ANSI certification process in June 2006, which involved audits of the green carpet programs by Georgia Tech Enterprise Innovation Institute, an ANSI team and CRI’s third party indoor laboratory, Air Quality Science of Atlanta. According to ANSI, a certification body is an impartial third party that tests and evaluates a product to determine its compliance with relevant standards.

In 1992, CRI launched the Green Label program to test carpet, cushions and adhesives for low-emitting volatile organic compounds (VOCs). The program was enhanced and named Green Label Plus in 2002 when California’s Indoor Air Quality Program and the Sustainable Building Task Force approved Green Label Plus certification in lieu of Section 01350, the low-emitting materials criteria for the Collaborative for High Performance School testing protocols (CHPS). Green Label Plus meets and even exceeds Section 01350 in several respects, including testing annually for specific chemicals, testing for six additional chemicals, maintaining a chain of custody process and performing an annual audit of the testing laboratory.