ISSA Director of Legislative Affairs Bill Balek and The Ashkin Group President Stephen Ashkin met recently with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Pesticide Program Dialogue Committee (PPDC) Work Group on Comparative Claims in Washington, D.C., to recommended a pilot program that would allow manufacturers to make “green” claims on disinfectants and sanitizers used in institutional settings.

The EPA currently prohibits manufacturers or distributors from labeling or marketing disinfectants or sanitizers as green. This policy is based on the EPA’s determination that Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, or FIFRA, registration is sufficient assurance of a product’s safety and effectiveness and that any additional claims may be misleading.

However, ISSA and The Ashkin Group both maintain that the professional cleaning industry has broadly accepted the use of green cleaning products and that facility service providers want to be able to identify and use environmentally preferable disinfectants and sanitizers.

“Ultimately, we provided the EPA with three different options to consider,” said Ashkin. “They agreed to meet with us again in February 2009 and, if they decide to move forward, we will meet again in April and should have an idea of what the [implementation] timetable will be.”

Under the first option, manufacturers could have their disinfectants/sanitizers certified by leading certification organizations as they do now for other cleaning products and market them as green certified.

Under the second option, green-certification labeling and identification would be allowed only through the EPA’s Design for the Environment program.

Under the third option, manufacturers would be allowed to make “factual claims” about their products, such as that they are biodegradable or made from bio-based ingredients, as long as the claim could be substantiated.

Observed ISSA’s Balek: “We remain confident that the EPA will carve a reasonable path forward, allowing the use of objective and verifiable claims of environmental preferability regarding disinfectants and sanitizers to the benefit of the institutional market.”