90 days.
That is how long sustainability professionals have before the EU makes something official that most of them are not ready for.
In September, the Green Claims Directive takes effect.
Generic "carbon neutral" claims - the kind built on cheap offsets purchased at $5 a tonne - become illegal across the European Union. Not discouraged. Not flagged. Illegal. With fines reaching up to 4% of annual turnover for companies that get it wrong.
The number that puts this in context:
Right now, the average voluntary carbon credit trades at $5.6 per tonne.
High-integrity tech-based removals — the kind that will actually hold up under this directive - trade at €150 to €500 per tonne.
That is a 100× price gap. And September is the moment the EU officially decides which side of that gap counts.
What most companies are doing:
Waiting to see how enforcement works before changing anything.
What that costs:
The companies that change their claims in August under deadline pressure will do it reactively - stripping language, adding caveats, hoping nobody notices.
The companies that started the internal conversation twelve months ago are walking into September with clean claims, credible evidence, and zero legal exposure.
But here is what I keep coming back to.
In most of the exposed companies, someone already knew this was coming.
A sustainability analyst. A legal advisor. A consultant who flagged it in a report that got filed away.
They knew. They said something.
And then nothing happened - because being right is not the same as being heard.
The professionals navigating this well did not have better information. They had the standing, the clarity, and the authority to move their organization before the deadline made it urgent.
That gap - between knowing the signal and being the person people listen to — is the one I work on with people directly.
If September feels closer than your organization's readiness — reply directly.
Or if you want to look at your positioning, your authority gaps, and where that gap actually lives in your specific context:
André Rodríguez
Founder | SustainMotion360
I read every response. The best conversations I have start here.