OTTAWA (RPRN) 8/6/2009–TerraChoice, North America’s leading environmental marketing company, and a leading voice against greenwashing, will join the global team supporting Big Room’s application to create a new .eco (Dot Eco) Internet extension.

“Big Room’s Dot Eco is about trust and transparency – two critical components of enabling green markets,” said Scott McDougall, President and CEO of TerraChoice. “Dot Eco will be a useful tool in the fight against greenwash by helping to disclose details about a company’s environmental performance and impact. We’re pleased to lend our support.”

In 2009, TerraChoice Environmental Marketing released its Seven Sins of Greenwashing report on environmental claims in consumer markets, revealing that 98 per cent of products surveyed were found to be greenwashing.

The Big Room Inc. application for the Dot Eco extension has been developed along with an international team of advisors and investors with deep roots in sustainability, environmental, and business communities.

TerraChoice will join other leading organizations including WWF International, Green Cross International, David Suzuki Foundation, Verité, and ISEAL Alliance on the Dot Eco Stakeholder Council. The Stakeholder Council is a key body guiding Big Room’s global policy development process for how Dot Eco should work.

“We’re excited that Terrachoice has lined up behind our vision for Dot Eco – we both understand that Dot Eco must be credible and trustworthy – part of the solution to greenwashing,” said Anastasia O’Rourke, Big Room co-founder. “Terrachoice’s extensive experience with the EcoLogo environmental certification program, and its ‘Sins of Greenwashing’ series will be invaluable as Big Room continues to build its application for Dot Eco.”

Big Room’s ‘.eco system’ will place key environmental and sustainability information along side the technical information collected and stored when a web address is registered. The .eco system will display current, detailed eco-information to anyone with a browser, anytime they need it, anywhere on the planet.

Big Room will submit its application for Dot Eco when the application round for new gTLDs overseen by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers opens in the first quarter of 2010.