The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has compiled a “white list” of materials that it deems acceptable for use in food and beverage industry seals. This list can be found in Title 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Section 177.2600. To meet FDA requirements, materials must be both non-toxic and non-carcinogenic. Elastomers that appear most often in white list compounds include silicone, fluorocarbon, nitrile, ethylene propylene, and chloroprene.

Founded over fifty years ago as the National Sanitation Foundation, NSF International fosters public safety and environmental protection by developing standards, certifying services, and testing products. For example, rubber compounds designed to come into contact with potables (such as drinking water) can be submitted to NSF for water extraction analysis and many other tests. The most well known tests are NSF 51 for articles contacting food and NSF 61 for articles contacting water. Materials passing such tests are certified as meeting NSF standards. NSF does both stand-alone and component testing, meaning they evaluate articles by themselves and as parts of larger designs.

R.L. Hudson & Company offers a number of NSF 61-certified compounds. These include N1030-70 (nitrile), E3030-70 (ethylene propylene), and S5030-70 (silicone).

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