Our certifications

TUV Austria is the leading independent certification body for compostable products. It provides TUV OK HOME and TUV OK INDUSTRIAL certifications.

OK HOME is particularly important because composting can be done without any special equipment, unlike industrial composting (which is the problem with polylactic acid (PLA) bioplastic - only industrial). Industrial composting requires commercial facilities because the products that are only industrially compostable require higher temperatures for biodegradation.

Many cities currently do not have adequate facilities and waste sorting infrastructure to assure that industrial composting products are actually composted in commercial facilities.

The BPI Certification Mark indicates third-party verification of compostability for manufacturers and brand owners to use on products and packaging and for consumers, end-users, and composters to use when determining whether or not a product or package is compostable. BPI is the leading third-party verification of ASTM standards for compostable products in North America.

The BPI Certification process is rigorous and ensures that items can be cycled back into the soil safely at a commercial composting facility. This is done through testing to ASTM standards and applying additional restrictions on carcinogens and fluorinated chemicals.

The Compost Manufacturing Alliance (CMA) is a private group of over twenty industrial compost manufacturing facilities across the U.S. dedicated to interacting productively with manufacturers who are, in turn, dedicated to producing and developing compostable products. The CMA approaches the certification of compostable products to standards that are directly correlated to real-life industrial composting operations and evaluate the "compostability" of products or materials in a way that protects compost manufacturing and, in turn, the environment. The certification criterion is even more rigorous than existing certification bodies in the way that in addition to conventional evaluation requirements (ASTM D6400 Biodegradation and Disintegration, Total Fluorine Analysis, Heavy Metals Analysis, Phytotoxicity Analysis, % Ash, and FTIR) a CMA field test is also required to determine if a product or material is compostable outside of the laboratory-optimized conditions.