June 4, 2008—The Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI) has 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 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, says CRI.
For more information, see the CRI Web site.
