Environment & Natural Resources

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Earlier this month, New York State Assemblywoman Kelles and State Senator Biaggi introduced the Fashion Sustainability and Social Accountability Act in the New York State Assembly and Senate. If the legislation becomes law, it would amend New York’s general business law to require fashion companies to publicly disclose extensive information about their environmental, social, and governance (“ESG”) policies, impacts, and targets for improvement.

Specifically, the Act would require all fashion retail sellers and manufacturers doing business in New York that have annual worldwide gross receipts surpassing $100 million to disclose:

  • ESG due diligence policies and processes;
  • ESG outcomes, including actual or possible negative environmental and social impacts; and
  • Binding targets for prevention and improvement of ESG outcomes and policies.

Continue Reading Will New York’s Fashion Sustainability and Social Accountability Act Set a Trend?

At the end of 2021, the California Statewide Commission on Recycling Markets and Curbside Recycling (the “Commission”) sent a letter to The California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery, also known as CalRecycle, and California Attorney General Rob Bonta, asking them to investigate illegal labeling of plastic bags as recyclable by retailers. The Commission is alleging that businesses in the state are falsely implying that their bags are capable of being recycled through curbside collection with the “chasing arrows” logo and words such as “recyclable” and “recycle.” The Commission believes this labeling is impeding the curbside recycling process.
Continue Reading California Recyclability Labeling Scrutiny Poised to Increase Retailers’ Liability Risk

A recent survey of top decision-makers by Crowell & Moring finds that nearly 80% of responding companies have identified and adopted environmental performance goals beyond what regulations require. Fewer than half of those surveyed measure their company’s performance against those goals—and in some cases are experiencing challenges implementing them.

The survey of 225 respondents, including in-house counsel and compliance, ESG, and sustainability professionals, is detailed in a new report, “ESG Survey: Environmental Performance and the Stakes for Your Business.”

The report finds that 44% of respondents say their organizations are measuring their carbon footprint, and 13% are measuring their environmental impact on ethnically and racially diverse communities on an ongoing basis. Both are likely to be key areas of focus of the current U.S. administration’s regulatory and enforcement activities.
Continue Reading Crowell & Moring Survey Finds Companies Are Setting Environmental Goals, But Questions of Measurement Persist

Brussels – Whereas more than half of the EU consumer population is found to be receptive to green claims, only one-fifth appears to actually trust the sustainability claims made by brands. More and more, the market is realizing that “sustainability” is more than a buzzword and green claims should be substantiated by clear and transparent data. The reputation and trustworthiness of the brand can be at stake.
Continue Reading ESG in fashion (2) : the EU framework on greenwashing in the fashion industry

On November 2, 2021, Crowell & Moring attorneys Judith Bussé, Ryan MacFarlane, Nicole Janigian Simonia, and David Stepp will be presenting a webinar to address the top 5 ESG challenges and opportunities for international companies and organizations.

Climate change is a global challenge that demands a global response. Global standards are vital in a number of areas to tackle the cross-border problems that many organizations face from forced labor issues, global initiatives, and disclosure requirements to greenwashing. Among the pressing issues are how plastic packaging and waste is regulated on a global level, how the recent EU initiatives apply to companies established outside of the EU territory, x, and x. Level-setting will need to go beyond what environmental, social and governance (ESG) basics address and so called “green” or sustainable investments that claim to pursue environmental goals will begin to see more scrutiny. Governments around the globe are working on numerous voluntary standards and a wave of new ESG regulation calls for more extensive and detailed corporate disclosures including that ESG risks are appropriately managed by third parties, such as supply chains and other business relationships.
Continue Reading Webinar: Top 5 ESG Challenges and Opportunities for International Companies and Organizations

Retailers need to prepare for a major shift in chemical regulation policy recently announced by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that could affect a broad range of products currently being sold in the US. Under this sweeping new policy, EPA plans to address chemical risks by directly regulating articles that are manufactured with those chemicals. Crowell environmental attorneys, Warren Lehrenbaum and Jennifer Giblin, addressed this and other important developments at EPA in a wide-ranging question and answer session with the Retail Industry Leaders Association on Tuesday, October 5, 2021.
Continue Reading EPA’s Shift In Chemical and Hazardous Materials Regulation and What Retailers Can Expect

Brussels – More and more fashion companies are announcing programs with ambitious (some more than others) goals in relation to environmental, social and governance criteria. Recently ASOS launched its ‘Fashion with Integrity’ (FWI) 2030 programme, committing to achieve Net Zero across the full value chain by 2030. Also consumer demand is not lagging behind, urging fashion companies to change the way they run their businesses and minimizing environmental impact while keeping track of human rights and labour practices across the production and supply chain.
Continue Reading ESG in fashion: a general overview of the EU framework on environment, social and governance criteria in the fashion industry

Nail polish dripping from open bottles

On October 1, 2021, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control (“DTSC”) published a proposed regulation that would list Nail Products Containing Toluene as a Priority Pollutant under its Safer Consumer Products (“SCP”) program.

Comments will be accepted by the DTSC respecting the proposed regulation until November 18, 2021.

The proposed regulation is aimed specifically at nail salon workers as well as pregnant women and their fetuses, infants, children and adolescents.

The rationale behind DTSC taking this action at this time, in part, is that these populations, within the specific context of nail salons currently under consideration, are deemed “sensitive subpopulations” pursuant to 22 Cal. Code Regs. § 69501.1(a)(64), as well as comprising a significant percentage of persons of color and/or persons of lower socioeconomic status, as set forth in Cal. Gov’t Code 65040.12(e) (“Environmental Justice”).

The proposed regulation covers nail coatings and nail polish thinners, including an array of specific types of coatings, including solvent or UV base coating, top coating, lacquer, gel nail polish, hard gel, shellac, nail art paint, and nail polish thinner, and thus is quite comprehensive in scope.
Continue Reading DTSC Proposes Adding Toluene-Containing Nail Products To SCP Priority Pollutants

A person peeling off a label off a bottle

In 2020, Greenpeace published a major report that purports to show that less than 15% of all plastic, including single-use plastic that is labeled as “recyclable,” is actually recycled in the United States. These dramatic findings kicked off a new wave of putative class action cases against manufacturers who regularly use plastic packaging, much of which is labeled as recyclable. For example, mere days after issuance of the Greenpeace Report, Earth Island Institute sued a group of ten major companies, including Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Clorox and Nestle over the use of plastic packaging that allegedly contributes substantially to plastics pollution in California waterways.

On Monday, the United States District Court for the Northern District of California dismissed one of the more prominent recent cases, which had been filed by Greenpeace itself against Walmart. Greenpeace, Inc. v. Walmart, Inc., No. 21-cv-00754-MMC (Sept. 20, 2021). Greenpeace’s case, brought under the widely-used, California consumer protection law, Cal. Bus. & Professions Code §17200 (“UCL”), sought to hold Walmart liable for making what Greenpeace alleged were false and misleading “recyclable” claims for certain products. Greenpeace alleged that the claims were false, not because the products are not recyclable, because most consumers do not have access to recycling programs that could accept the products for recycling.
Continue Reading Greenpeace Plastics Recyclability Suit Dismissed for Lack of Standing

On September 8, 2021, Crowell & Moring attorneys Karel Bourgeois and Judith Bussé will be presenting a webinar in collaboration with IBJ/IJE.

This webinar will discuss some of the most important European and national initiatives and their likely impact in practice: from the EU Action Plan on Sustainable Finance (March 2018) to the more…