For those of you trying to live more green, J and R’s Carpet Cleaning found an article on how to choose green flooring.
How to Choose Green Flooring Options
Green Flooring Options: Carpet and Linoleum
Not all carpet is bad for the environment. Carpet can be made from natural materials, such as wool made from the hair of sheep or llamas. Wool carpet provides an extremely durable, fire-resistant, stain-resistant, and hypoallergenic options in comparison to synthetic carpets.
This type of flooring is great for high-traffic areas because of its spring fibers, which bounce back naturally after pressure. Wool rugs can be vacuumed, but care should be taken when cleaning with certain chemicals. They look and feel luxurious, but there’s a cost for that luxury: Wool carpeting is significantly more expensive than other carpets.
- A less-expensive yet still environmentally friendly option is a rug made from any of several plant fibers.
- Sisal – is a fiber from the leaves of the agave plant that result in durable, easy-to-clean and sound-absorbent flooring.
- Seagrass – Seagrass is another option. It grows underwater, is inexpensive compared to other plant fibers and is easy to care for. It’s a bit darker, so it might be the best bet to hide dirt tracked in by kids and pets.
- Jute – Jute is the softest plant fiber, but also the least durable and one of the most expensive.
Other fibers include abaca, which is a knotty material that’s in the banana family, and coir, which is harvest from coconut husks. Coir dries quickly, making it a good option for a room with moisture, such as a bathroom.
Linoleum
If plants aren’t your thing, you may want to look at linoleum, a blanket term that includes vinyl flooring. You might not think it, but linoleum is actually a natural product made from linseed oil, cork dust, wood flour, tree resins, ground limestone, and pigments. Natural linoleum costs more than vinyl but lasts 10 to 20 years longer. It’s easily cleaned, although it does require regular waxing. If you scratch linoleum, you can buff out the offending mark, and it works well in kitchens and bathrooms.
Earth and Cork Flooring Options
Cork
“Floating on air” could be used to describe the feeling of walking on cork flooring. Cork flooring feels extremely soft because it’s made up of tiny pockets of sealed air. The air pockets hold up over time so that if you get a dent in the floor, it will eventually spring back up. Cork also absorbs noise and provides good thermal insulation. It’s fairly water resistant, making it a good choice for kitchens and bathrooms.
With proper care, cork can last four to five times as long as vinyl flooring. Comparable in cost to hardwoods, cork is one of the easier floorings to self-install, particularly with cork tiles that click into place. It’s harvested from the bark of the cork oak tree without harming the tree, and the bark regenerates itself.
Earthen
Earthen flooring is made of a mix of clay, sand, and lime that’s pressed into the floor. It takes a few weeks to dry, and the floor is sealed with linseed oil and beeswax. The seal makes it water-repellent so that mopping doesn’t result in a big pile of mud, but earthen floors are still not recommended for rooms that see a lot of moisture, like bathrooms or kitchen.
These floors can cut heating costs because of the good thermal mass provided by the earthen material. Thermal mass measures a material’s ability to hold in heat and radiate it out when the house begins to cool. The method is inexpensive, with earthen floors costing $5 a square foot in comparison to $15 or more per square foot for hardwoods.
Sustainable Wood Flooring
Hardwood
Does a hardwood floor bring to mind images of a clear-cut forest? There’s an easy way to soothe your environmental conscience. Wood certified by the Forest Stewardship Council meets strict criteria related to forest management and ecological concerns. FSC-approved wood is stamped and even has a special number so you can trace it back to the forest it came from.
Most people love the beauty of hardwood floors, which are durable and easy to maintain. However, hardwoods can be noisy if not properly insulated, and they’re easily scratched. Hardwood floors do present cost savings because you can install them yourself.
Bamboo
Bamboo is a giant grass that’s very strong. It’s one of the fastest-growing plants in the world, and it can be harvested every few years, as opposed to the longer life cycles of hardwoods. In addition, the harvest doesn’t affect the roots of the bamboo plant. To create flooring, the hollow rods are sliced into flat strips and treated with preservatives so that they hold together. Installation of bamboo flooring is similar to that of hardwood flooring. Bamboo floors can carry heavy loads and are more durable and resilient than hardwood floors. However, they might be a few dollars more expensive per square foot.
This article was originally published on How Stuff Works.