Digital Product Passport

Collect and share product information and claims

Making information available and sharing it with consumers and other companies is of the utmost importance nowadays. Therefore, the requirement for a Digital Product Passport is present across all directives and regulations of the EU Green Deal and Circular Economy Action Plan. This is applicable to all products (with a few exceptions) and each regulated product group shall meet specific requirements.

In general, a product passport shall meet the following conditions:

• Connection through a data carrier to a unique product identifier 
• The data carrier shall be physically present on the product, its packaging or on documentation accompanying the product 
• The data carrier and the unique product identifier shall comply with standard ISO/IEC 15459:2015 
• All information included in the product passport shall be based on open standards, developed with an inter-operable format and shall be machine-readable, structured, and searchable, in accordance with the essential requirements of the relevant legislation
• The information included shall refer to the product model, batch, or item 
• The access to information included in the product passport shall be regulated in accordance with the essential requirements and access rights of the relevant legislation and delegated act

Whereas this seems like a regulatory burden to be met, there are enormous benefits to manufacturers after the implementation of a Digital Product Passport, which can enhance the usability, performance, and product development cycle.

Examples could include:

• Implement full post-market traceability for purposes such as better recall management, post- market performance assessment and defect or incident reporting.
• Manage repair, upgrade and circularity mechanisms. 
• Establish end-user or consumer communications, especially in relation to transparent social, ethical and other product claims. 
• Publish mandatory and relevant product documentation, such as certifications, declarations, instructions for use, warranty information.

DNV provides a range of sustainability services, such as validation of Environmental Performance, Carbon Foot printing and Supply-chain traceability services. As part of our wider Digital services, DNV also offers a unique Digital Product Passport service to its customers, which enables them to meet the requirements for digital availability of compliance information, as well as additional communication and post-market traceability services.

Reach out to our team of experts to know if your products will be subject to this regulation and see how we can support in your overall EU Green Deal strategy and compliance needs.