Firms face three key issues on ‘greenwashing’
Lawyers at McCann FitzGerald have identified the main challenges that businesses may face in applying new rules aimed at combating ‘greenwashing’.
The regulations implementing the EU’s Green Transition Directive come into effect on 27 September.
The European Union (Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition) Regulations 2026 are aimed at providing consumers with greater protection against unfair or misleading commercial practices.
Misleading practices
They broaden the list of misleading practices in the Consumer Protection Act 2007 to include providing false or misleading information about a product’s environmental or social characteristics, and making unverifiable claims about future environmental performance.
They also automatically ban several practices linked to environmental claims – including the display of a sustainability label not based on a certification scheme or not established by a public body.
In a note on the firm’s website, the McCann FitzGerald lawyers note that greenwashing and environmental claims are “firmly” on the radar of the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission’s (CCPC).
CCPC guidance
They say that the CCPC has already been active in promoting the new rules and has published a guidance document.
The lawyers say that firms are likely to face three main issues in the early stages of applying the new rules.
- Old stock,
- Certification gaps, and
- Generic and offsetting claims.
On old stock, the firm says that CCPC guidance indicates that national authorities may take a phased, compliance-oriented approach where traders demonstrate genuine transitional difficulties and reasonable good-faith efforts to comply for products already in the distribution chain.
“It does not, however, exempt traders from the new rules, and it notes that online claims are likely to face earlier scrutiny than physical packaging,” the lawyers add.
Third-party labels
McCann FitzGerald also notes that many businesses use third-party sustainability labels in good faith without verifying whether the certification scheme meets the regulations’ new detailed requirements, pointing out that businesses will need to remove any unverified labels.
On generic and offsetting claims, the firm’s analysis warns businesses who rely on broad environmental messaging (‘eco-friendly’ or ‘sustainable’) or carbon offsetting for environmental-neutrality claims that these practices will be prohibited.
“The shift from general principle to specific prohibition means that marketing copy and product descriptions that may previously have gone unchallenged will need to be reviewed and, in many cases, withdrawn or reworked,” the McCann FitzGerald lawyers conclude.