home sweet home - flooring

I got this book from the library: Restore, Recycle, Repurpose – Create a beautiful home, It is a Country Living Book by Randy Florke with Nancy J. Becker, published by Hearst Books. Even though we don't have a country house or any house at all it has lots of information on decorating, sourcing your materials, furniture,and lots of other household items. It is trying to give sustainable options for every room of your home. Here is what Randy says about several flooring materials:    

-         Bamboo: considered environmentally friendly, grows quickly, needs little fertilizer, not as durable as hard woods, but typically from far-flung places so the shipping has a big foot print

-         Stone: durable, water resistant, renewable but takes millions of years to degrade and the excavation is damaging to the environment – slate and sandstone require a less intrusive form of mining than marble or granite that lie deep within the earth

-         Cork: more renewable resource than many woods because the trees are not destroyed when the cork is harvested. Insulating, microbial, with sound-proofing qualities

-         Reclaimed Wood: from trees that have fallen naturally due to storm or age and wood savaged from razed structures

-         Renewable Wood: woods like bamboo, cork and eucalyptus but consider the foot print of shipping, local maple or oak might be the better option

-         Concrete: manufacturing process creates large quantities of carbon dioxide, one source suggests that 7% of global CO2 emissions come from concrete. Hydrochloric acid is typically used as the base for concrete stain, but there are eco-friendly solutions available, like low-VOC acid-free soy-based stains. Check out Eco-Safety www.ecoprocote.com

-         Linoleum: is a natural product made from linseed oil solids. Durable, install with low-VOC adhesives, water-based adhesives are better than solvent-based

-         Marmoleum: looks like linoleum but it’s made of linseed oils, rosins, wood flour