Hi Reader, as you might know, I work as a sustainability advisor.
I’m hired by institutes, companies, and universities to help make their research labs more sustainable.
Why? Because it also saves time, enables new solutions, and signals top-down commitment.
However, another crucial point is that I have a sense of which innovations are valid and which deceptive.
Therefore, I want to help you understand a topic that no one else really talks about:
Today's Lesson: Claiming Greenness
Understanding shortcomings in sustainability marketing
Number Of The Day
In March 2023, the EU Commission adopted a proposal for a Directive on Green Claims. The goal was “to ensure consumers receive reliable, comparable, and verifiable environmental information" The Commission had found that 53% of green claims provided vague, misleading, or unfounded information, and 40% of claims had no supporting evidence. As of June 2025, the initiative is on hold, allegedly due to concerns about the burden on micro-enterprises.
2023
Unraveling Sustainability Claims
From the very beginning, I was one of the few who openly talked about misconduct.
Ever since the start of my career in sustainability, I have worked with different companies.
This is how I fund our activities, and of course, this is also how I gain access to information that nobody outside would normally see - information that I am then able to share with you.
Especially in collaborations like this one with Eppendorf, I was able to share energy consumption data with you that wasn't shared before.
Many people deviate from their original path of boldly addressing shortcomings because at some point, money becomes too important.
Since this has not happened to me, and as I am one of the few people in the field with the necessary technical expertise, I want to talk about something I often address in my advisory practice:
Misguiding marketing - below, is one example to keep it digestible, but I also have written an extended version you:
Pitfall #1 False Sense of Transparency and Information
A major trend at the moment is materials made from biogenic sources - for example, plant waste streams.
With those, the claim of a negative carbon footprints arose.
You see it in marketing, in talks (hosted even by TEDx) and other sources. However, there is a flaw.
How is that possible?
I would argue it isn’t.
It’s just a mathematical trick. The issue is that many openly share footprint data with huge savings of kgCO2/kg product.
We get the impression they have valid data.
Yet, combined with clever marketing, claims become misleading as we see only the final number, not how it was calculated.
Here’s how it works: biogenic carbon refers to carbon that plants absorb from the atmosphere and store in their biomass.
However, this thinking only applies when materials are used for a long time (like in construction for 50-150 years).
But there is the workaround: companies are allowed to conduct only cradle-to-gate life cycle analyses, i.e., from material sourcing to the point the product leaves the factory.
Click to enlarge. Of note, even full life cycle assessments bear a trap: We can refer to the "neutrality assumption" (meaning the carbon fixed by plants equals the carbon released, setting emissions from those to 0). So, no emissions? Makes for a great comparison with our conventional plastics! Not quite, we have emissions from manufacturing, transport, and end-of-life treatment. Every product has a footprint. Moreover, these analyses usually include only CO₂ and ignore other environmental impacts such as acidification or toxicity. In short, they tell only part of the story.
That allows them to claim biogenic carbon storage without accounting for what happens after use - even if the item is incinerated just two days later.
Pitfall #2: “Certifications”
Even worse though is that companies can certify these numbers.
For instance, ISCC certification is available for such claims.
Yes, companies applying for the ISCC PLUS certification have to go through a 143-page form. While one can debate whether “long” means “thorough,” there is little doubt that these guidelines were developed with good intentions. The issue lies rather in their robustness and usefulness in the end. While in other cases such certifications might be valuable, in this instance, it hurts the consumer significantly.
When we hear “certification,” we assume reliability. In my view, what ISCC is doing here is either naïve or negligent.
By certifying cradle-to-gate analyses, they enable companies to make misleading marketing claims.
And to make matters worse, the ISO standard has other problems:
Many ISO standards merely tell companies what to do, not how to do it. They outline for example that "Cradle to ..." boundaries have to be defined but not which ones.
On top of that, not all ISO standards are certifiable. Some are just frameworks, especially those related to life cycle assessments.
That means: in practice, companies can design their assessments to get the most favorable results, calculate within that limited setup, and still get certified.
Especially in this case, certification only verifies their bookkeeping, not the applicability of their sustainability claims.
Fittingly, ISCC has already faced scrutiny:
Used cooking oils (UCO) are often used for biofuels and waste streams of those for lab bioplastics. A fantastic article by T&E has outlined the weaknesses and suspected points of fraud in the ISCC certification. ISCC PLUS in this case follows the Mass-Balance-Approach, meaning that renewable and fossil feedstocks are mixed in the same production streams, and sustainability credits are simply allocated on paper. How difficult is it to falsify or issue these documents multiple times? Moreover, the system lacks transparency: detailed audit data on feedstock origin, allocation, and emissions aren’t public, making independent verification difficult. Finally, while exporting firms are audited by associated bodies, the primary sources rarely are (less than 10% in the biggest exporting countries). So, who knows where these oils come from. In 2023, the German Federal Office of Agriculture and Food questioned the legitimacy of certified suppliers delivering biofuels made from used cooking oils to the EU, suggesting possible fraud.
In essence, a “negative” footprint implies that the more you buy, the better for the planet which is simply not true.
PS: Apart maybe from a few selected waste streams that end up in the construction sector
Pitfall #3: Best-Case Assumptions
Companies with great innovations sometimes make sustainability claims that are theoretically correct but practically unrealistic.
As you can see below, the biogenic carbon of this product reduces emissions by more than 3.4 kg CO₂ per kg of product.
This is because CO₂ has a relatively higher molecular weight than the carbon in biogenic sources (i.e., more carbon in oils than in CO₂).
While plant oils have a carbon content above 75% by weight, even at 80%, I can’t get beyond 2.93 kg (0.8 × 44/12 for the carbon-to-oxygen ratio).
Click to enlarge. Again, this is not illegal - it’s just about optimizing numbers. I think this particular company has several amazing innovations, but in terms of their carbon accounting for products, I don’t think they follow best practices.
That means, companies can cherry-pick cases and enhance their numbers.
The same counts plastics like PLA where one can assume composting but the actual number or functionality of these facilities is totally unknown.
Applying The Knowledge
Of course, there are other pitfalls like companies using smart wording: for example: "Closed-loop recycling"
It doesn't exist on an economically relevant basis - but if you refer to one single loop, you are technically on the safe side.
See how plastic recycling commonly works on the left and some data from repeating this process six times on the right. The graphs come from a study by Akhras et al. (2024) which provides a good overview of the topic — and additional references can be found there. However, contrary to common belief, it’s not only chain shortening that occurs; increased branching can also take place, as shown by Patel et al.
If you also want to read about take-back programs and plastic composting, you can do so in the full length version.
Thus, working with a sustainability advisor can be crucial at times.
Why? Because following misleading marketing claims might lead you to choose a product that sounds greener but isn’t.
Also, when reporting your data to a funding body or agencies, using flawed data could mean your rejection or sent-back for correction, creating a huge amount of extra work that you have to handle.
Therefore, pay attention:
“Verified by ...” ≠ objective truth. Certifications are helpful, but they don’t guarantee objectivity.
What don't you know about the advertised process?
What is the best-case scenario vs. what really happens? Follow impressive numbers but ask what baseline was used.
Upcoming Lesson:
DNA & RNA Stability Questions
How We Feel Today
References
Akhras, M.H., et al., 2024. Cascadic degradation of selected polyolefin grades in a simulated closed-loop recycling process. Clean Techn. Environ. Policy, 26, 3507–3526. doi:10.1007/s10098-024-02818-x.
Patel, A.D., et al., 2024. Defining quality by quantifying degradation in the mechanical recycling of polyethylene. Nat. Commun., 15, 8733. doi:10.1038/s41467-024-52856-8.
If you have a wish or a question, feel free to reply to this Email. Otherwise, wish you a beautiful week! See you again on the 20th : )
Edited by Patrick Penndorf Connection@ReAdvance.com Lutherstraße 159, 07743, Jena, Thuringia, Germany Data Protection & Impressum If you think we do a bad job: Unsubscribe
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