EmpCo vs the Green Claims Directive
EmpCo is the operative anti-greenwashing law. The separately proposed Green Claims Directive is politically dormant in May 2026. Build substantiation as if it applied.
EmpCo is the operative anti-greenwashing law. The separately proposed Green Claims Directive is politically dormant in May 2026 — treat its evidence standards as the ceiling, EmpCo as the floor.
The EU's anti-greenwashing programme was designed as two complementary instruments. EmpCo (Directive 2024/825) updates the UCPD with prohibitions and disclosure duties — the negative layer, enforced ex post by national regulators. The proposed Green Claims Directive (COM/2023/166) was intended as a positive layer requiring ex-ante substantiation and third-party verification of explicit environmental claims based on life-cycle methodology.
What Green Claims would have added: recognised scientific evidence, life-cycle perspective, trade-off disclosure, comparison to common market practice, and mandatory independent verification before any claim is used. It also restricted private rating labels and excluded scoring labels not grounded in EU law.
Where the file stands in May 2026: politically dormant, not formally withdrawn. The Council agreed a general approach in June 2024; trilogues opened in January 2025; on 20 June 2025 the Commission signalled withdrawal citing micro-enterprise burden, and Italy pulled support. As of May 2026 the European Parliament's Legislative Train still lists the file as pending; no replacement text is on the table.
Practical posture. National regulators (ACM, AGCM, DGCCRF, BaFin) and courts already treat life-cycle evidence, third-party verification and methodology disclosure as de facto benchmarks — see the rulings against TotalEnergies, KLM, Adidas and DWS. Companies that build substantiation now to Green Claims-style standards remain defensible whether the proposal is revived, replaced or shelved.
Citations: Directive (EU) 2024/825; COM/2023/166 (proposed Green Claims Directive); European Parliament Legislative Train, May 2026.