MARIETTA, Ga., Oct. 12, 2017 /PRNewswire/ — With the global rise of obesity, disease, inactivity, asthma and depression, the critical importance of wellness is coming into focus. At a time when people spend upwards of 90 percent of their time indoors, architects, designers, construction and business communities alike are taking a second look at the indoor environments where we live, work and play to evaluate how these environments impact human health and wellness.
UL Wellness (PRNewsfoto/UL Environment)
In support of this wellness movement, UL Environment, a division of UL (Underwriters Laboratories Inc.), a global safety science leader, announced today it has developed the first certification program that verifies products’ compliance with the WELL Building Standard, a program advancing health and wellbeing in buildings globally. UL’s Wellness Certification mark will to signal architects, designers and specifiers that certified products such as furniture, interior paints and coatings, adhesives and sealants, insulation and lighting comply with requirements of the WELL Building Standard and can help their projects achieve certification.
“UL is leveraging our experience in evaluating product health and performance to certify products for wellness,” said Alberto Uggetti, vice president and general manager. “The UL Wellness Certification will enable architects, designers, specifiers and building owners to easily identify products that meet the concepts of the WELL Building Standard, making it simple to select products that support wellness in buildings.”
The Wellness Certification program uses data-driven assessments to evaluate products for characteristics such as product emissions, ergonomics and chemical and material transparency. UL’s Wellness Certification requires each product to meet the applicable preconditions listed in the WELL Building Standard, and can evaluate additional optimizations as requested. Architect and design professionals can access complete product certification details on UL’s SPOT database, which features more than 50,000 products that have been certified or validated to industry standards. Certified products will bear the UL Certification Mark and have publicly available certificates that can be used for WELL Building project documentation.
In addition to the Wellness program, UL Environment is a provider of certification programs such as GREENGUARD Certification, which is recognized by the WELL Building program as compliant to Indoor Air Quality Feature 4 of the WELL Building Standard. UL’s Wellness Certification Mark can help manufacturers looking to go to the next level and comply with additional criteria within the standard.
For more information about UL’s Wellness Certification program, visit ul.com/environment.
About UL Environment
UL Environment works to advance global sustainability, environmental health, and safety by supporting the growth and development of environmentally preferable products, services, and organizations. We help companies achieve their sustainability goals—and help purchasers, specifiers, retailers, governments, and consumers find products they can trust. UL Environment offers environmental claim validations, multi-attribute product certifications, environmental product declarations, indoor air quality certification, product emissions testing, organizational sustainability certification, and consulting. For more information, visit ul.com/environment, and connect with us via Twitter, LinkedIn, or Facebook.
About UL
UL fosters safe living and working conditions for people everywhere through the application of science to solve safety, security and sustainability challenges. The UL Mark engenders trust enabling the safe adoption of innovative new products and technologies. Everyone at UL shares a passion to make the world a safer place. We test, inspect, audit, certify, validate, verify, advise and train and we support these efforts with software solutions for safety and sustainability. To learn more about us, visit UL.com.
