Oberlin, Ohio—The Natural Stone Institute has received a grant from the Natural Stone Foundation to help offset ongoing costs for the ISO Technical Committee 327’s work to establish a global set of standards for natural stone. The first standard is set to be published in 2025.
“As the philanthropic arm of the Natural Stone Institute, the Natural Stone Foundation provides funding supporting globally unified standards for the natural stone industry,” said Kevin Camarata, president of the Natural Stone Foundation. “The ISO initiative is a multi-year effort that will ultimately benefit all participants by creating a globally uniform set of standards, nomenclature and terms of business. It will alleviate misunderstandings about requirements and responsibilities and will provide a single global standard that will be used as a governing guide for all things natural stone.”
ISO Technical Committee 327 on natural stones is working to create a uniform set of standards for natural stone for members of ISO in over 150 countries. The committee currently has 13 global participating members—including Belgium, Brazil, Colombia, Finland, France, Germany, India, Italy, Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom and the United States—with an additional 10 national standards bodies observing.
The Natural Stone Institute is working alongside ANSI, who is said to be the official secretariat of this initiative. NSI technical director, Chuck Muehlbauer, currently serves as chair of the committee, while test laboratory manager Scott Scallorn chairs the U.S. TAG committee and a working group on test methods—offering additional input to the committee.
TC 327 is nearing completion of its first set of deliverables, which include global standards for stone testing and terminology. These standards are intended to clarify what governing documents are to be used when utilizing natural stone in a project that involves multiple countries—for example—quarried in one country, fabricated in a second and installed in a third. The ISO standards are believed to be vital in such an example, versus an instance where a product was quarried, fabricated and installed in a single country.