Bamboo Flooring – The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

By Robert Thomson | May 12, 2009

With all the recent focus on the environment and “greener living,” bamboo flooring is getting quite the hype. Consumers are left wondering what to believe and what to do about it. If you are considering installing bamboo flooring in your home, here are some things you’ll want to know, and some things you probably didn’t. I’ll not pull any punches nor will I overstate my case.
Let’s start with the good part, all laid out nice and neatly for you.
Bamboo flooring is an attractive alternative to hardwood flooring. It comes in several shades or hues, and is available in several more “stained” colors. Natural bamboo is light-colored, having a light, almost Maplewood appearance. To darken bamboo, it must be heated with steam. Steamed bamboo can be almost as dark as walnut, or any shade in between, given the length of time it is steamed and the temperature at which it is steamed.
Bamboo flooring does have environmentally-friendly aspects. It is a grass, not a tree, so it matures much faster. Bamboo can produce in 3 to 7 years what it takes an oak tree 100 to 150 years. And it can do it again in 3 to 7 years. It is a much more sustainable resource. Some bamboo flooring comes from natural groves, requiring almost no fertilizers or other chemical in the growth process. It contains fewer voc’s and utilizes far fewer toxins in its production than other types of flooring. It is certainly “greener” than carpeting.
Bamboo flooring isn’t really any harder for the homeowner to install, or care for, than its hardwood flooring cousins. There are snap-together varieties that can be laid in a matter of hours. There are also the “floating” varieties that take no more time to install than their laminate floating friends. No special care is needed. You can use your old trusty broom for everyday sweeping up, and the occasional damp mop for eliminating messier dirt and grime. No waxing is required. In fact, waxing can damage and dull the finish.
Bamboo flooring is readily available in most areas, and the advent of many online bamboo flooring suppliers almost guarantees that you, irregardless of location, can have access to it. You may have to wait a bit longer, but you’ll get it eventually.

Now, let’s have a look at the not-so-good side of bamboo flooring, shall we?

While bamboo flooring is a good alternative to hardwood flooring, it isn’t a hardwood. The darker the tone, the harder the bamboo, but you’ll never get that oak-hard toughness from bamboo. Dings, dents and scuffs can and will occur. Pets and children can have quite an undesirable effect on bamboo flooring. High heels are its nemesis, sure to leave their mark. Be sure to put scuff pads or sliders under any furniture that is moved around frequently, to prevent marking and marring of the surface.

The environmental friendliness of bamboo flooring is up for debate, too. Sure, it’s a renewable grass -a renewable grass grown in China, where environmental issues are taking a back seat to profits. Large bamboo plantations are cropping up, using chemicals and fertilizers to grow abundant bamboo. These plantations often deforest surrounding areas to make room for more bamboo. They also denude the undergrowth to keep their bamboo stands free from weeds and other plants. This can lead to erosion and poor soil conditions. The production of bamboo flooring does involve some solvents and other toxic chemicals. Granted, the amounts used are lower than in other types of flooring, but they are still present. Stained bamboo carries with it all the nasty stuff present in other stained woods, as well.

While bamboo flooring doesn’t differ much in installation or care, the homeowner might feel a squeeze in his wallet from choosing bamboo flooring. The cost of bamboo flooring is significantly higher than that of other flooring choices. This higher cost may actually put off some homeowners from deciding to use it in their homes. Bamboo flooring is still relatively new to the home construction/renovation scene, and like anything new or trendy, is often priced higher than it has to be. Bamboo flooring is more “picky” too about where it can happily coexist with other aspects of your home. Being porous, it doesn’t like water or moisture or even slight dampness, so baths, kitchens, basements and other sub-grade areas are pretty much off-limits for it. Also, entryways are not a good choice, as the moisture brought in on wet shoes can have disastrous effects on your bamboo flooring. It doesn’t like the sun much, either. Direct sunlight fades it out, and rather quickly, too. Bamboo flooring should not be placed in sunrooms or other areas of the home that receive a great deal of natural light for this reason. If you do decide to use it in a bright and airy room, you’ll need to keep the blinds or draperies drawn during the day to protect the floor.

Lastly, the “ugly” bit: Now, I don’t want to offend anyone’s sensibilities or decorating tastes, but some of the stains available in bamboo flooring leave much to be desired. With stain color choices with names like moss green and butterscotch pink, need I say more?

Bamboo flooring can be a beautiful addition to any home, but not all homes. Some may find it too impractical for their active, busy families. Others may find it the perfect choice for certain areas of their home, but will have to accept that other areas will need alternative flooring. If you’re considering it solely for its environmental “friendliness” you may want to research your manufacturers a bit to find one that is truly as “green” as they can be. All in all, bamboo flooring is like the rest of us – it has its good points and bad points. And a few ugly bits as well.Bamboo Flooring – The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

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Cheat Sheet: Biodegradable

by Haley Paul

Biodegradable. It’s a term that’s thrown around a lot these days. And with items ranging from disposable flatware and diapers to bags and balloons now available under the auspices of “biodegradability,” it is important to get the facts on what it all means.

Who Says?

Companies such as Coca-Cola, Solo Cup, International Paper, Glad, Whole Foods and Dixie Cup have all come to the biodegradable scene in recent years. According to the Biodegradable Products Institute (BPI), a leading third-party certifier of biodegradable claims, the word has gone “mainstream,” but with little oversight and legal regulation of what it really means.

Products carrying the term “biodegradable” are only compostable in a commercial composting system. Photo: Amanda Wills, Earth911.com

Biodegradable means a substance is capable of being broken down, especially into innocuous (safe, not harmful) products by the action of living things, such as microorganisms.

For its part, the European Union considers a material biodegradable if it will break down into mostly CO2, water and organic matter within six months of being put into a composting facility.

The Federal Trade Commission, which regulates advertising and product claims in order to protect consumers from “unfair and deceptive acts or practices,” states that “an unqualified claim that a product or package is biodegradable should be substantiated by competent and reliable scientific evidence that the entire product or package will completely break down and return to nature, that is, decompose into elements found in nature within a reasonable short period of time after customary disposal.”

The FTC’s Environmental Marketing Claims Division uses these general guidelines for regulating biodegradable product claims. As “green” products have flooded the marketplace in recent years, the FTC is trying to keep up.

In a recent display of its authority, the FTC halted a retailer of rayon towels from claiming its product was biodegradable. The FTC alleged that the company’s products usually ended up in landfills, incinerators or recycling facilities, making it is impossible for the product to biodegrade within a reasonably short time.

Biodegrading vs. Degrading

Why are some biodegradable claims misleading, anyways? The above example of the rayon towel manufacturer shows that biodegradation is not something that just happens once a product is thrown out. Biodegradable products must be put through a specific chemical process at commercial composting facilities for their potential environmental benefits to be realized.

Thus, biodegradability and composting go hand-in-hand. When something is biodegradable, oftentimes a commercial composting facility is needed so that the materials residing in biodegradable products can be sufficiently heated, broken down into elemental compounds and eventually, returned to the ground as humus, a nutrient-rich soil amendment.

The definition of biodegradability is important to keep in mind because materials that remain after biodegradation are generally safe, as they have been broken down into elemental compounds such as:

• Phospholipids and sulpholipids (fats)
• Sugar amines (nitrogen-composed basic organic compounds)
• Polysaccharides (carbohydrate compounds)
• Carbon-composed basic organic compounds
• Water

Many of the inaccurately labeled “biodegradable” products do actually experience a significant chemical breakdown. Yet that degradation is incomplete. This lack of a full organic decomposition is the reason companies cannot claim biodegradability of certain products.

Biodegradable products are typically derived from natural, plant-based ingredients. Flatware made from potatoes, corn and wood is popping up at grocers around the country. Photo: Amanda Wills, Earth911.com

Some products that make biodegradability claims only degrade, which can leave potentially harmful materials behind. Take plastic, for example.

According to Global Environmental Polymers, because plastic is a non-naturally occurring substance, a plastic that is designed to degrade is one that undergoes a significant change in its chemical structure under specific environmental conditions, resulting in the loss of some of its original properties.

For example, because it only loses some of its chemical properties, plastic will never break down as biodegradable materials do (to the point where only elemental compounds remain).

The materials we use every day degrade and biodegrade slowly over time; it’s a part of life. However, when inaccurately labeled “biodegradable” materials inadvertently go through municipal composting facilities, they can contaminate water and soil because of the chemical compounds they leave behind, according to the BPI.

Common Perceptions and Misunderstandings

Additionally, according to the BPI, there is a common misunderstanding that products labeled “biodegradable” (even properly labeled ones) will decompose in the landfill and are therefore better for the environment.

However, due to the oxygen-poor and dry conditions associated with most landfills, rather than decompose, materials tend to stay relatively well preserved.

Here’s a perfect example: A trash study project conducted by the University of Arizona dug through more than 20 landfills across North America, and found “hundreds of undecomposed hot dogs, corn starch and lettuce dating back to the 1960s.” How did they know how old the food was, you ask? They used some of the still readable 2,425 newspapers they found to get the exact dates.

This is why commercial composting is a crucial step for biodegradable products to be environmentally effective. Once biodegradable products hit the landfill, they are as good as any other trash material.

Options Abound

Despite the difficulties in fighting improperly labeled products and keeping them out of the landfill, there are a plethora of biodegradable products helping to reduce the solid waste stream.

Biodegradable products are typically derived from natural, plant-based ingredients. For example, flatware made from potatoes, corn and wood is popping up at Whole Foods grocery stores and vegetarian restaurants across the country.

Some other biodegradable products include:

• Compostable trash bags made from corn
• Sugar cane and wheat fiber bowls, platters, and trays
• “Agro-resins” – Plant-derived resins used for injection into molds as well as compostable bags and films
• Compostable packaging materials made from cellulose

More examples of certified biodegradable products are available through the BPI.

Haley Paul

Haley Paul is an Arizona State University graduate student studying sustainability with particular interests in food systems and in what encourages people to make more environmentally-friendly decisions.

Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs (CFLs) and Mercury

Mercury is an essential element in the operation of fluorescent lighting; it allows the bulbs to be an efficient light source. Because CFLs contain trace amounts of mercury, it is important to educate yourself on proper use, recycling and disposal of these products.
The Facts about CFLs and Mercury
Learn More
CFLs and Mercury

* CFLs and Mercury Fact Sheet PDF (77KB)
* EPA: Mercury Information

Recycling CFLs

* Earth 911: Find a Recycling or Reuse Location Exit ENERGY STAR
* Recycleabulb.com: Find a Recycling Location Exit ENERGY STAR
* EPA: Mercury-Containing Light Bulb Recycling

ENERGY STAR Lighting

* CFLs
* Light fixtures

* Because CFLs use less electricity than traditional light bulbs, they reduce demand for electricity; that reduction means less mercury is emitted from power plants.
* CFLs contain a very small amount of mercury — an average of 4 milligrams in each bulb.
* No mercury is released when the bulbs are intact or in use.

Why the EPA, DOE and others are promoting the use of CFLs

CFLs use significantly less energy than traditional light bulbs (75% less). If every home in America replaced just one incandescent light bulb with an ENERGY STAR qualified CFL, we would save enough energy to light more than 3 million homes and prevent greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to that of 800,000 cars. And even though CFLs contain a small amount of mercury that could ultimately end up in the environment, that amount is significantly less than the amount of mercury avoided as a result of the energy savings.
Recycling and Disposing of CFLs

Like any other product containing potentially hazardous materials that you use in your home, CFLs come with some special instructions.

Learn what you should do if a CFL breaks in your home PDF (27KB), and get EPA’s recommendations for recycling and responsibly disposing of CFLs at the end of their life cycle.

You may have heard that the government is requiring all light bulbs to be more efficient in the next few years. Learn more about how the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 will affect the sale of light bulbs.

Product Description

With rising energy costs, homeowners are beginning to examine the energy efficiency of their own homes, asking questions about where energy comes from and how much it costs, how to choose new appliances and what options exist for renewable energy.

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Electricity

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The Home Energy Diet involves readers in learning about their own homes by: measuring, metering, investigating and considering habits related to household energy use; learning how to quantify energy consumption and cost and making informed decisions about cost-effective improvements and upgrades. The book explores the misunderstood concept of efficiency versus cost by comparing fuel costs and equipment choices, including the possibility of using renewable energy for meeting home energy needs. This authoritative guide makes efficiency fun through personal anecdotes and humorous “tales-from-the-basement” energy misadventures.

Since energy efficiency is an investment that offers returns greater than Wall Street, readers can earn several hundred dollars every year just by following the advice in this book. As a bonus, many of the energy-saving strategies described can make for improved indoor air quality and healthier, more comfortable homes.

Paul Scheckel is an energy auditor who has visited thousands of homes, educating people about energy efficiency, cost-effective improvements and indoor air quality. With a passion for efficiency and renewables, he walks the talk by living in a solar-powered house and driving a car powered by vegetable oil in his home state of Vermont.

About the Author

Paul Scheckel is an energy auditor who has visited over 3,000 homes, educating people about energy efficiency, cost-effective improvements, and indoor air quality. With a passion for energy efficiency, he walks the talk by living in a solar-powered house and driving a car powered by vegetable oil, in his home state of Vermont.