CRI Green Label Plus: What Our Flocked Carpet Tile Certificate Covers, and What It Doesn’t

For carpet in the United States, one question comes up in almost every school, office and public-sector specification: is it Green Label Plus? Until this month our answer was a set of emissions test reports. It is now a certificate, with a number anyone can look up. This page explains what the certificate actually says, line by line, where it applies and where it stops, so that a specifier or a buyer can use it correctly.

What Green Label Plus is

Green Label Plus is the Carpet and Rug Institute’s indoor air quality testing programme for carpet. A product is tested by an independent laboratory for the chemicals it releases into the air of a room, and certified if its emissions fall within the programme’s limits. Those limits include the ones in California’s CDPH Standard Method, version 1.2, the test method usually called Section 01350. The certificate is issued per product category, carries a number, and expires; it has to be renewed.

It is about one thing: what the floor puts into the air people breathe. That is why schools and offices ask for it. Children and staff spend all day in the same rooms, and the floor is the largest surface in them.

Our certificate, line by line

The two scenarios are the standard rooms that CDPH v1.2 models: a private office and a school classroom. The certificate reports the total VOC range for each; in both, ours is 0.5 mg/m³ or less.

Where it stops

Tile, not roll. The certificate names modular tile. Six of our designs (California, Forest, Florence, Milan, Bologna and Torento) are made both as roll and as tile. Ordered as tile they are covered; the roll version is not. If your specification calls for Green Label Plus, order tile, and the product page for each design says which applies.

Not the adhesive. A floor is installed with an adhesive, and the adhesive releases its own emissions. CRI certifies adhesives separately, and LEED looks at adhesives as their own product category. Ask the installer for the adhesive’s own emissions documentation; our certificate does not cover it.

Not fire, slip or sound. Green Label Plus is about air only. For fire we hold Bfl-s1 to EN 13501-1 (SGS), with ASTM E648 data for North American projects on request; slip resistance is 0.45 to EN 13893 (SGS); impact sound reduction is ΔLw 21 dB (SGS). The full list is on our certifications page.

Not a promise of LEED points. The certificate says USGBC recognises Green Label Plus for the LEED v4.1 and v5 Low-Emitting Materials credit. Whether a project earns that credit depends on every product category in it. What the certificate gives the project team is the evidence for the flooring line.

How to write it into a specification

Name the requirement and ask for the number, so it can be checked: “Carpet tile: CRI Green Label Plus certified. Submit the GLP certificate number and expiry date.” Put adhesives on their own line. The rest of a flocked flooring clause (fire, slip, impact sound, cleaning, installation) is in how to specify flocked flooring.

Outside the United States, specifications use other schemes. In China we also hold an SGS report to GB 18587 with formaldehyde not detected. For a project that cites a different national scheme, send us the clause and we tell you plainly what we can document.

Where it matters most

Schools. The certificate reports the classroom scenario directly. For the rest of a school floor (corridors, libraries, slip and cleaning) see the school flooring guide.

Offices. The private office scenario is the other half of the certificate, and low-emitting materials are a standard line in workplace and LEED fit-outs. See the office flooring guide.

Childcare and healthcare. Rooms where people spend the whole day, often at floor level. The childcare and healthcare guides cover the rest of those briefs.

Ordering certified tile

Our minimum is 500 m² per colour, because each colour is its own production run; custom colours and custom prints need the full 500 m². Samples are free and the buyer pays the courier: send your courier account number, or we quote the freight before shipping. Stock designs typically take a few weeks to produce and custom prints around 4 to 8 weeks. We ship FOB, CIF or DDP; for US projects, the steps from quote to delivery are in importing commercial flooring from China.

Ask for certified tile samples

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