Environmentally Sound Products and Product Systems
From the production and use phase until disposal, products and product systems have manifold environmental impacts. In this area, the past decades have brought numerous measures in environmental policy as well as corporate approaches that aim at the reduction of adverse environmental impacts. Ökopol can draw upon solid experience of market research, expert advice and background studies in the field of Integrated Product Policy and the respective policy instruments. The institute enjoys confidence from all stakeholder groups in the role of promoting and facilitating the stakeholder dialogue in this field.
Since the early nineties Ökopol has been performing Ecolabel related studies and facilitated workshops on overarching aspects like interlinkage of ecolabels with other political instruments. On the other hand, Ökopol has for many years been giving technical input to or leading the development of product group specific criteria. The focus lies on the European Ecolabel and the German Blue Angel but respective work for corporate labelling activities is also included.
Ökopol is also deeply involved in the processes of implementation of the Ecodesign Directive (2009/125/EC) and the Energy Labelling Directive (2010/30/EU) on energy-related products (ErP) within various projects and for several stakeholder groups and authorities including the European Commission (DG Environment), the German Federal Environment Agency and ministries. Both technical and political issues are in the focus of the reflections. Ökopol provides a publicly accessible website providing information on the implementation of the Ecodesign and Energy labelling Directives in English (www.eup-network.de) and German language(www.eup-network.de/de/aktuell/).
The field of Green Procurement is dealt with not only in the above mentioned stakeholder dialogues but also in specific projects for different stakeholders from industry and public authorities (e.g. developing respective guidance for German ministries).
The activities are conducted by the interdisciplinary team of Ökopol experts and are supported by well established contacts to different stakeholder groups (National governments, public authorities, industry associations, companies and NGOs).
Current references: Environmentally Sound Products and Product Systems
Title | Client, Project leader, Project partner | Duration |
---|---|---|
Development of the "Blue Angel" Ecolabel - Framework Contract 2020 (FKZ 3720 37 303 1) |
German Federal Environment Agency, Dessau (DE) Project leader: Ökopol GmbH, Hamburg (DE) Project partner: DBFZ gGmbH, Leipzig (DE); Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft e.V. (IBP), Stuttgart (DE); Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft e.V. (UMSICHT), Oberhausen (DE); Hydrotox GmbH, Freiburg (DE) |
2020 – 2023 |
Support of the Round Table on Marine Litter to operationalize the measures proposed under Environmental Objective 5 of the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), "Reduction of Marine Litter" (FKZ: 3719 25 204 0) Short description |
German Federal Environment Agency, Dessau (DE) Project leader: Ökopol GmbH, Hamburg (DE) Project partner: Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft e.V. (UMSICHT), Oberhausen (DE); ÖkoMedia GmbH, Stuttgart (DE); Prof. Dr. Thomas Schomerus, Lüneburg (DE); s.Pro - sustainable projects GmbH, Berlin (DE) |
2020 – 2023 |
Further development of the product portfolio of the "Blauer Engel" eco-label with a focus on services (FKZ: 3719 37 310 0) |
German Federal Environment Agency, Dessau (DE) Project leader: Ökopol GmbH, Hamburg (DE) Project partner: Corsus - Corporate Sustainability, Hamburg (DE); FH Münster (iSuN Institut für Nachhltige Ernährung) (DE); Green Film Shooting/Birgit Heidsiek, Hamburg (DE); KlimAktiv gemeinnützige Gesellschaft zur Förderung des Klimaschutzes mbH, Tübingen (DE) |
2019 – 2023 |