Eurofins Product Testing - IAC Indoor Air Comfort - certified products

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IAC Certification services

Eurofins "Indoor Air Comfort" product certification is an innovative tool for showing compliance with low VOC emission requirements of all relevant European specifications on two levels:

Standard level "Indoor Air Comfort - certified product" shows compliance of product emissions with all legal specifications issued by authorities in the European Union.

Higher level "Indoor Air Comfort GOLD - certified product" shows compliance of product emissions with the voluntary specifications issued by all relevant ecolabels and similar specifications in the EU.

A certified product can apply for whatever other label on basis of the test report as regards emissions into indoor air. But Eurofins "Indoor Air Comfort" certificate may be used as such - e.g. in countries and for products where no public low emission label exists.

Please click here for a list of labels for which Eurofins test reports are accepted.

Background:

Many products are undergoing VOC chamber emission testing. Eurofins is well known to be the world market leader for performing such tests.

But a spot test does not tell us much about the properties of the product in future (e.g. after 1 week, 1 month, and 1 year). Clients and down-stream users may be in doubt.

• IAC Certification will help to establish trust, strengthening relationship between manufacturer and consumer.
• IAC Certification will also help the manufacturer to be prepared for reacting in an appropriate manner if complaints appear, either published in media, or sent in by individual customers.

IAC Certification means:

• After an initial characterisation test and first certification, an external surveillance system will identify any changes in the promised product properties, allowing the manufacturer to take corrective action.
• Only VOC related amendments of an existing quality assurance system in production will allow sufficiently constant product emissions properties.
• Continuous certification will require external on-site auditing of the quality documentation and manufacturing site, along with re-testing in regular intervals.
• An easily visible certification mark allows the user to assume the correctness of the manufacturer's statements without further investigations.

Organisation of IAC certification

1. Test of sample in test chamber (Testing schedule may differ by product group);
2. Reporting of test results (Specifications may differ by product group);
3. Contract between manufacturer and certification body, including agreements on actions for maintaining low VOC emissions from labelled products, e.g. on details of production, exclusion of certain raw materials, factory production control, quality documentation;
4. Initial audit of relevant manufacturing site(s); Audit report including the relevant documentation;
5. IAC Certification process, including evaluation of test and audit reports, granting or denying of certificate according to the criteria;
6. Periodic external audits by Eurofins incl. survey of emission relevant elements of quality documentation;
7. Periodic re-testing for ensuring reliability of claims on low emissions;
8. Continuous monitoring and improvement of specifications, testing and auditing methodology.

Such certificates may be important for showing compliance of a product with purchase specifications, or with sustainable or "green" building project and certifications.

Other certification programmes

Eurofins is approved certification body ("ÜZ-Stelle") for the German Ü mark for floorings. Eurofins may offer both - ÜZ certification for Ü mark, and IAC certification. Audits then can be performed in parallel for both purposes for saving time and costs.

The same applies to the US Indoor Advantage certification operated by Scientific Certification Systems SCS. Eurofins Indoor Air Comfort IAC product certifications is working in partnership with this programme, and again audits can be combined between the both.

Indoor Air Comfort covers only European specifications, it does not cover the USA, and it does not cover LEED specifications if these rely on US based specifications only. For that purpose, we recommend the Indoor Advantage program, operated by Scientific Certification Systems SCS in Emeryville, California.

Further Information

• Specifications / criteria and procedures (version 2.1, March 2010) for obtaining Indoor Air Comfort or Indoor Air Comfort Gold certificates:
  • Specifications / criteria and procedures in English
    (last edit: 2010-03-30)
  • Specifications / criteria and procedures in German
    (last edit: 2010-03-30)
  • Services and price list in English
    (last edit: 2010-07-14)
• Flyers describing Indoor Air Comfort certification
  • in English
  • in French
  • in German
• List of certified products - link to database coming during 2010
  
  
• Presentation describing Indoor Air Comfort certification
  
  

• Publication "Product certification – a new tool for good indoor air quality"
  in Gefahrstoffe 69 (2009) 3, 115-116, see www.gefahrstoffe.de

For further information please contact our national organisations or our specialists for making use of the experience of Eurofins, the world market leader for VOC emissions chamber testing.

Order forms and testing request forms for VOC testing are available for free download here.

Your direct contacts:

Direct contact to Eurofins Product Testing A/S, the world market leader for VOC emissions chamber testing:

• Sales: Reinhard Oppl, email ReinhardOppl@eurofins.com
• Certification: Dr. Roland Augustin, email ccs@eurofins.com
• Testing laboratory: Thomas Neuhaus, email product-emissions@eurofins.com