Standards & Compliance Briefing: WindMade Debut, GHS, Prop.65, EPD

WindMade has launched the first global consumer label for products made with wind energy. The WindMade Product Label can be applied to all products using a minimum 75 percent renewable energy, with wind power representing the largest share. The organization already offers a company-level label.

The US Occupational Safety and Health Administration signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Healthy Environments and Consumer Safety Branch of the Department of Health of Canada, to collaborate on implementing the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling. Under the agreement, OSHA and HECS will establish a working group to reduce systematic barriers to GHS implementation. OSHA aligned its Hazard Communication Standard with the GHS in March 2012, and all US employers with hazardous chemicals in the workplace must conduct training on the new label elements and safety data sheets format by December 2013.

A California senate committee approved Assembly Bill 227, which give business owners receiving a notice of Proposition 65 violation a two-week grace period, during which they could avoid a lawsuit by posting the required warning signs and paying a $500 fine. Another committee will look at the bill next week, but time is tight, with only two weeks until recess, the Sacramento Business Journal reports. Governor Jerry Brown proposed his own plans to reform Prop. 65 last month.

Meanwhile, California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has extended the public comment period on possible amendments to its criteria and procedure for listing chemicals under Prop. 65. The comment period will now run an extra 30 days until July 31.

NSF Sustainability has verified an environmental product declaration for a broad variety of rEvolve modular nylon carpet tiles manufactured by Mannington Commercial. The tiles are also Platinum certified to the NSF/ANSI 140 Sustainability Assessment for Carpet standards. EPDs are a preferred reporting tool in the new LEED V4 standard draft expected out later this year, NSF says.

BOMcheck, a web database to help manage supply chain compliance with substance regulations, has now published RoHS and REACH materials declarations for more than 1 million parts. Consultancy Environ runs the website on behalf of an industry collaboration led by Philips, Siemens, GE, Osram, Sony Mobile, Schneider Electric, Toshiba, Agfa, Texas Instruments and TE Connectivity, and more than 480 companies use the site to gather materials declarations from over 3,100 suppliers.