Forum Standing Committee Working Groups

Greenlist system

SC Johnson and Son, Inc. has pioneered its patented (and licensable at no cost) Greenlist system for ranking chemicals and reducing the environmental footprint of its products.

“The manufacturing and packaging of our many products requires literally thousands of raw materials. Our goal is a significant annual increase in the use of those that are environmentally preferred. While our facilities around the world already meet or exceed government requirements, we plan to measure ourselves against a much higher internal standard. Through Greenlist™, our own patent-applied-for process, we are using internationally recognized information sources such as the ECOTOX database to classify all the ingredients that go into our products according to their impact on the environment and human health. Each is evaluated as part of the Greenlist™ process and given a rating of 3 for "Best", 2 for "Better", 1 for "Acceptable" and 0 for "Restricted Use Material" (RUM). These are utilized to compute cumulative scores that managers are challenged to increase each year. We are currently conducting initial screenings for the six material categories that constitute 80% of what we buy and sell: surfactants (detergents), solvents, propellants, insecticides, resins and packaging.”

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