Regulatory standards favour fossil-fuel materials over bio-based alternatives
Research exposes how regulatory frameworks systematically disadvantage sustainable materials, hampering Net Zero goals and advocates adoption of EN 18027:2025 as unbiased assessment standard.
Environmental assessment standards contain built-in biases that systematically favour fossil-based materials over bio-based alternatives, according to new research published by BB-REG-NET's Environmental Working Group.
The in-depth study reveals that Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) standards – the gold standard for measuring environmental impact – penalise materials designed for composting, biodegradation, and carbon sequestration precisely because they follow circular economy pathways that make bio-based materials environmentally superior.
For British companies developing sustainable materials, this creates a challenging situation where innovative products designed to reduce environmental impact can appear worse than fossil-based alternatives purely due to assessment methodology, not actual environmental performance.
"When we sent the same data set to four different LCA specialists, we got four different results. This underscores a critical lack of standardisation – one that risks undermining both innovation and environmental integrity by allowing sustainability claims to vary widely depending on methodology, rather than facts," said Richard Lock, Managing Director of Holiferm.
The research assessed 14 international standards and found that existing frameworks systematically penalise materials designed for composting, biodegradation, and carbon sequestration. This regulatory bias has profound implications for the UK's bioeconomy, which has attracted £517 million in private investment over five years alongside £450 million in government funding.
Three critical barriers blocking fair assessment
The study identifies three critical ways current standards disadvantage sustainable materials. First, biogenic carbon bias emerges as standards fail to properly distinguish between biogenic and fossil carbon in their assessments. Bio-based materials release CO₂ that was recently absorbed from the atmosphere during plant growth, creating a closed carbon loop, but many standards treat these biogenic emissions identically to fossil fuel combustion.
Second, end-of-life discrimination creates the largest barrier to fair comparison. Materials specifically designed for composting and biodegradation are forced into assessment frameworks built for incineration and landfill. When standards assess a compostable material as if it were incinerated, they completely miss the intended environmental benefits of returning nutrients to soil and closing material loops.
Third, methodological inconsistency allows critical assessment parameters to vary by over 100 per cent depending on which methodological choices are made. Time horizons for carbon accounting, system boundaries, and allocation methods are left to practitioner discretion, rendering comparative assessments meaningless.
The findings expose a critical weakness in the UK's environmental policy framework at a time when countries such as the United States and France are implementing more supportive policies for bio-based materials, creating stable markets and driving investment.
EN 18027:2025 emerges as solution
The study identifies EN 18027:2025 "Bio-based products - Life Cycle Assessment" as the solution, providing the first standard specifically designed to eliminate bias in comparing fossil and bio-based materials. Published in April 2025, the standard addresses many structural shortcomings present in existing ISO guidelines.
Dr Jen Vanderhoven, COO of the Bio-based and Biodegradable Industries Association (BBIA) and project lead for BB-REG-NET, commented: "Immediate standards reform is critical to unlock the UK's bioeconomy potential and maintain international competitiveness. The current situation where identical products can appear drastically different environmentally depending on which assessment method is used is undermining investor confidence and preventing sustainable innovations from reaching their full market potential."
When comparing bio-based and fossil-based bottles using current ISO standards, the sustainable option's environmental score could vary by 103 per cent purely due to methodological choices. However, using EN 18027:2025, the same products yielded consistent, meaningful results.
Rachel Rothman, Professor of Sustainable Chemical Engineering at the University of Sheffield and one of the report's authors, said: "We recommend that policy makers and regulators require evaluation in line with the new EN 18027:2025 – the only standard that doesn't show bias when comparing fossil-based and bio-based materials."
With 56 of the UK's 606 government departments involved in bioeconomy regulation, often working with conflicting priorities, the lack of standardised assessment methods is creating regulatory chaos that favours incumbent fossil-based industries over innovative sustainable alternatives.
The UK bioeconomy contributes £220 billion annually to the economy and supports over 5 million jobs. Manufacturing of just 12 biochemicals has the potential to contribute 5.2 million tonnes CO₂ equivalent greenhouse gas savings and £1.6 billion annually to the UK economy.
Without urgent action to standardise assessment methods, the UK risks losing its competitive advantage in the global race for sustainable materials, undermining both its Net Zero commitments and economic opportunities in one of the fastest-growing sectors of the global economy.
