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Biodegradable and compostable: when is the word itself the violation?
Status
Split by market. France bans “biodégradable” on product or packaging (L.541-9-1, from 1 January 2022) and bans industrial-only “compostable” on plastic. The United States does not ban the words; 16 CFR § 260.8 makes unqualified degradable claims for landfill-destined items deceptive, and § 260.7 conditions compostable claims on evidence plus facilities. EmpCo lists “biodegradable” as a generic environmental claim from 27 September 2026. Certification marks are a different family, treated in Theme 3.
biodégradablePrescribed, banned or litigated wording — not production artwork
compostablePrescribed, banned or litigated wording — not production artwork
Wording lock-ups record prescribed, banned or litigated phrases for identification and commentary. They are not production artwork and do not grant permission to print.
Two words, four regimes
Theme 3’s compostability articles answer a scientific question: what did the item pass? This article answers a claims question: may the pack say the word? The answers diverge by market more sharply than for almost any other environmental sentence, because one major jurisdiction has banned the word, one has conditioned it, one has listed it as a generic claim, and several US states have written their own compostable-labelling statutes on top of the federal guidance.
France is the ban. L.541-9-1 forbids “biodégradable”, “respectueux de l’environnement” and equivalent mentions on a product or a package from 1 January 2022. Plastic products or packaging compostable only in industrial units may not bear “compostable”. Those compostable in home or industrial composting must bear “Ne pas jeter dans la nature” (the France AGEC article; France country report). The architecture is the opposite of a substantiation regime. A complete EN 13432 file does not authorise “biodégradable”. It does not authorise industrial-only “compostable”. The French word is the violation. “Ne pas jeter dans la nature” is a warning the dual-compostable pack must add, not a boast it may substitute.
United States: evidence, not a ban
The Green Guides do not prohibit “biodegradable” or “compostable”. They define when the unqualified claim is deceptive. Section 260.8: it is deceptive to misrepresent that a product or package is degradable, biodegradable, oxo-degradable, oxo-biodegradable or photodegradable. A marketer making an unqualified degradable claim should have competent and reliable scientific evidence that the entire item will completely break down and return to nature (decompose into elements found in nature) within a reasonably short period of time after customary disposal. It is deceptive to make an unqualified degradable claim for items entering the solid waste stream if they do not completely decompose within one year after customary disposal. “Unqualified degradable claims for items that are customarily disposed in landfills, incinerators, and recycling facilities are deceptive because these locations do not present conditions in which complete decomposition will occur within one year” (16 CFR § 260.8). Kitchen-tidy bags and almost every other consumer pack are customarily landfilled, incinerated or recycled. The unqualified US word is, on the Guides’ own example, unavailable for those items.
Section 260.7 is the compostable companion, already quoted in the standards article: competent and reliable scientific evidence that all materials will break down into usable compost in an appropriate composting facility, or in a home compost pile or device; qualification if such facilities are not available to a substantial majority of consumers or communities where the item is sold; qualification where the item cannot be home-composted safely or in a timely manner; qualification where consumers would be misled about the benefit when the item is landfilled (16 CFR § 260.7). Industrial composting access for packaging is, as that article records, a minority offering. The unqualified US word “compostable” is therefore unavailable across much of the distribution even for a certified item.
State statutes then layer mandates onto that guidance. California, Washington, Colorado, Minnesota and others prescribe which marks, which ASTM methods and which qualifications may appear. Those rules are the subject of the US compostable-labelling article and are not restated here. The claims point is that a BPI or Seedling mark can be required, permitted, or insufficient depending on the state, and that none of those state statutes is § 260.7.
EmpCo: “biodegradable” as generic
Directive (EU) 2024/825 lists “biodegradable” among the examples of a generic environmental claim, alongside “eco-friendly” and “climate friendly”. From 27 September 2026 a generic environmental claim is per se unfair where the trader cannot demonstrate recognised excellent environmental performance relevant to the claim, unless the specification of the claim is provided in clear and prominent terms on the same medium (the generic-claims article). Two consequences follow for EU packs. A bare “biodegradable” is inside the generic-claim prohibition. A specified “biodegradable in industrial composting to EN 13432 in 12 weeks” may leave the generic-claim definition — and still has to be true, still has to survive the rest of the UCPD, and still cannot be printed on a French SKU because L.541-9-1 bans the French word regardless of specification. National word-bans and Union generic-claim rules stack; specification does not punch a hole in L.541-9-1.
What a printer should take
| Field | Rule |
|---|---|
| France — banned words | “Biodégradable”, “respectueux de l’environnement”, equivalents; industrial-only “compostable” on plastic. From 1 January 2022. Certification is not a defence. |
| France — required warning | “Ne pas jeter dans la nature” on plastic compostable in home or industrial composting. |
| US — degradable / biodegradable | Unqualified claim deceptive for items customarily landfilled, incinerated or recycled, because they will not decompose within one year in those environments (16 CFR § 260.8). |
| US — compostable | Evidence that the whole item becomes usable compost in the named environment; qualify if facilities are not available to a substantial majority; qualify for home and for landfill fate (16 CFR § 260.7). Then apply the relevant state statute. |
| EU from 27 Sep 2026 | Bare “biodegradable” is a generic environmental claim. Specify on the same medium, or do not use the word — and still do not use it on a French SKU. |
| Marks | Seedling, OK compost, BPI record a test. They do not authorise a banned word and they do not replace a facilities qualification. |
Traps
The first trap is putting a Seedling on a French industrial-only SKU and keeping the word “compostable”. The mark and the word are different legal objects; France has banned the second. The second is printing unqualified “biodegradable” on a US kitchen bag because a laboratory showed disintegration in a test that does not resemble a landfill. § 260.8 names that case as deceptive. The third is treating EmpCo’s specification gate as a way around L.541-9-1. It is not. The fourth is confusing this article with the oxo article: oxo-degradable plastic is a material ban under SUPD Article 5 in the EU; “biodegradable” is a claims word. They can appear on the same doomed pack and they are still not the same rule.
References
Code de l’environnement Article L.541-9-1.. Available at: Open source (Accessed: 22 August 2026).
16 CFR § 260.8 Degradable claims.. Available at: Open source (Accessed: 22 August 2026).
16 CFR § 260.7 Compostable claims.. Available at: Open source (Accessed: 22 August 2026).
Directive (EU) 2024/825 OJ L, 2024/825, 6.3.2024.. Available at: Open source (Accessed: 22 August 2026).
Note on sources and verification
L.541-9-1 is characterised from the France country report and the France AGEC article in this tranche, citing the stable Legifrance URL. Section 260.8(a)–(c), including the one-year landfill/incinerator/recycling-facility example, is from the Cornell LII / eCFR text as retrieved. Section 260.7 is characterised from this library’s compostability-standards article, which quotes the eCFR provision; it is not re-derived at length. EmpCo’s listing of “biodegradable” as a generic-claim example is from Directive (EU) 2024/825 as used in the generic-claims and bio-based articles. State compostable-labelling statutes are pointed to, not restated. No millimetre specification is stated because none of these instruments publishes one for the banned or qualified word.
Last verified: 22 August 2026.