PRA Environmental Technical Services
We offer
The European Ecolabelling Scheme
The European Union Ecolabel is a flower symbol which can be used on goods and services which have a lower environmental impact than similar products performing the same function. The EU Ecolabelling Scheme was established in 1992 under Council Regulation No.880/92 to establish a recognisable environmental label across all EU countries.
To date, about 10 product groups with various sub-categories have been included in the scheme including indoor paints and varnishes and more recently exterior coatings. The overall scheme is the responsibility of the EU Environment Directorate-General who provides information about the Scheme in general and paints and varnishes in particular. Each Member State is required to designate a Competent Body which, in the case of the UK, is the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). A section of the DEFRA website is devoted to the European Ecolabelling Scheme. DEFRA is in turn responsible for approving organisations to carry out test work in support of the scheme and PRA is one of the organisations approved for testing paints and varnishes.
We can carry out the test work needed in order to obtain the Ecolabel and we can also review your documentation and verify it on behalf of DEFRA. If necessary we can actually produce all the documentation for you.
To date we have a 100% success rate in obtaining the Ecolabel on behalf of our clients and surprisingly not all these clients were UK based. Our policy is that if our involvement is acceptable to the appropriate Competent Body we are pleased to work for clients in any country.
Paint Performance Testing
If you wish us to test reduced environment impact architectural coatings please visit our Paint Performance Testing page. Here you will find suites of tests for the different classes of coatings used on buildings.
The scheme allows you a number of options. We can compare reduced environment impact coatings obtained from different manufactures or we can compare reduced environment impact coatings with their conventional equivalents. You can also choose if you would like us to give our opinion on the performance of the coatings tested.
On-site Pollution Monitoring
We offer Stack Emission and Occupational Exposure Monitoring services. The links will take you to pages where you can obtain full details. We can also carry out analysis of contaminated land and water and advise on appropriate remedial measures.
Product Safety Testing
We are called upon to test paint raw materials as well as coatings before and after application. The determinations that we carry out include:-
- Combustibility
- Flash Point
- Residual monomer content
- Toxic element content
- VOC content
