STEP #27

Use Sustainable Flooring and Carpets

If we really don’t need oil for something, maybe we should find suitable alternatives. Flooring materials are a prime example. While flooring doesn’t need to be made from oil, much of the carpeting used today is filled with oil. It seems a shame that we take a resource that took millions ofyears to create and use it for items that will only be used for a few years before being discarded to sit forever in landfills. Alternatives are plentiful: think bamboo, cork, stone, recycled metal tiling and recycled wood.

Eco Friendly Flooring, www.ecofriendlyflooring.com, is one company taking steps toward sustainability. They offer several sustainable flooring materials from cork to reclaimed wood. Their Yellow Heart Pine and Douglas Fir flooring deserve consideration when you are looking for a truly distinctive and warm floor. These timbers are purchased from demolition companies and Wisconsin area farmers taking down their old barns. The huge beams used in construction in Wisconsin in the early 1900s are now being reclaimed for use in flooring.

One of the pioneering Green Patriots in hardwood flooring is EcoTimber, a member of the elite GREEN Patriot Green 100. Today, EcoTimber, www.ecotimber.com, is among the few companies supplying onlyfully certified sustainably harvested flooring.

HOW DO YOU KNOW, REALLY KNOW, YOUR PRODUCT IS GREEN?

A pile of boards is a pile of boards. Where did it come from? How did it get into the country? You can’t tell just by looking at boards if they are sustainably harvested flooring certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). Getting that green designation is more than a matter of stamping green on the packaging. We suggest shoppers do the following:

• Look for the Forest Stewardship Council certification on the wood flooring packaging, and also ask your flooring dealer to show you their invoice from their supplier which must state that the particular product is FSC certified (they can black out their cost; it’s just the FSC description in the individual line item that you want to verify). Just because a brochure or a display shows the FSC logo does NOT mean that the flooring you are buying is FSC—it only means that the manufacturer is licensed to produce FSC flooring—but what they are offering you may not actually be FSC flooring.
• If you are interested in reclaimed wood flooring, ask for verification that the planks really were recycled from old structures. Some reclaimed flooring is actually new wood, not FSC, and made to “look” old.

Another healthy petrochemical-free solution for floor coverings is offered by Forbo, www.forbo.com, best known for their Marmoleum linoleum, a natural product made from linseed oil, wood flour, pine rosin, jute and limestone. Often used in medical facilities, Marmoleum is ideal for those suffering from respiratory disorders. It is also exceptionally easy to clean and has natural antimicrobial properties, helping cut down on the breeding of microorganisms such as dust mites and allergy-causing bacteria. Considering the fact that floor coverings are often the most abundant source of toxins in the home, this is an exceptional record.

And to top it off, Forbo is just as committed to a healthy global environment as they are to a healthy indoor environment. And it’s not just lip-service. In a life-cycle analysis used to quantify the potential environmental impacts of a product system over the life cycle (i.e., from the extraction of the raw materials to the disposal of the product at the end of its useful life), Marmoleum ranked first as a nature-friendly floor covering, along with pure, unlacquered wood.

Another flooring company doing its part to reduce the nation’s addiction to oil is Interface. In 1973, Interface Flooring, www.interface.com, created the first legitimate “free lay” carpet tile, a non-sewn textile created by directly adhering fibers to a patented backing system. It was extremely stable and dense, allowing it to be installed with a minimum of adhesive and yet still perform extremely well. This was a step, perhaps unconsciously undertaken, in creating green carpeting, as it allowed for minimal waste in installation.

At Interface, the company continues to look for ways to encourage sustainability through their product and beyond. The designers think through the entire life cycle, from manufacture to reclamation and recycling. The goal is for all of their products to be sustainable. To make sustainability a reality in the long run, Interface has focused its green path on seven fronts including eliminating waste, benign emissions, renewable energy, closing the loop in recycling, resource efficient transportation, sensitizing shareholder and redesigning commerce.

And to top it off, Interface has been recognized on several occasions for their design and style. The company is currently developing carpet from hemp and natural dyes; hemp’s durability and quick growth cycle make it an excellent sustainable carpet material. The drawback: currently laws forbid growing industrial hemp in the United States.