Issue Material passports that survive AI-designed matter

Summary

Material passports record what a product or building is made of, but they are not yet a universal requirement and are mainly used in sustainability and circular economy work. Only the European Union makes them mandatory, rolling out digital product passports across product groups between 2026 and 2030 under its ecodesign regulation. Today they are most common in construction, where they depend on manual data entry and are not updated in real time. Cross-border traceability is rare, and even with ISO, CEN and IFC frameworks the lack of a shared classification remains a major barrier, so a US trial is testing acceptance of multiple identifiers. As AI begins to generate formulas for new composites and bioengineered materials, the classification gap is expected to grow, raising questions about what counts as a material and how AI-designed content should be disclosed in food, pharmaceuticals and advanced manufacturing.