The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the launch of an Outdoor Use Safer Choice label on September 18, 2024. This new label aims to identify outdoor cleaning products, such as pet care items, fire defense products, and cleaners for cars, boats, or grills, that meet stringent EPA criteria for environmental protection.
"Washing our cars, barbeque grills, and even our dogs outdoors often means that the cleaning products we use go directly into the environment," said Jennie Romer, Deputy Assistant Administrator for Pollution Prevention at the EPA Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention. "Safer Choice’s new label will help people find products that go the extra mile to protect the environment, giving consumers peace of mind when cleaning outdoors. By recognizing outdoor use formulations with safer ingredients that break down in the environment, this new label highlights another way that companies continue to develop chemicals that are safer for the planet to prevent pollution from the start."
EPA scientists scrutinize every ingredient in Safer Choice-certified products to ensure they contain only the safest possible components. The Safer Choice label helps consumers identify products whose chemical ingredients meet EPA's safety criteria without compromising performance.
For outdoor-use products, EPA's Safer Choice program mandates that each ingredient must break down quickly and have lower aquatic toxicity. Products like all-purpose cleaners can also meet these additional standards despite typically being used indoors.
Currently, over 50 Safer Choice-certified products satisfy these additional criteria for outdoor use. The Outdoor Use Safer Choice label is expected to appear on products as early as next year. Consumers can also find Safer Choice-certified outdoor use products by selecting the “Products with outdoor uses” option on the Safer Choice product search page.
The Safer Choice program promotes using chemicals that align with EPA’s rigorous standards for human health and environmental safety while providing companies a way to distinguish their products in the market through the Safer Choice label. More information is available on the Safer Choice program website.
