Millions of us are renovating our homes every
year, spending more money annually on renovation than on new home construction.
Since buildings are responsible for 40 percent of worldwide energy flow and
material use, how you remodel can make a big difference to the environment. Kirk
Smith, founder of the Greenhouse Crisis Foundation in Washington, D.C., has said
that American homes and apartments account for the largest share of carbon
dioxide released into the atmosphere by all sources worldwide. Upgrading
insulation, furnaces, cabinets and fixtures like water heaters and toilets means
less fossil fuel pollution and reduced resource depletion. It can also save you
money in the long-run. However, renovations can be fraught with unintended
consequences like indoor air pollution. There are many aspects of home
renovation, but here are some tips for undertaking flooring and painting
projects in a healthy, environmentally friendly way.
Green Reno Basics
A green
renovation involves two interrelated concepts. One is to be as earth-friendly as
possible by using sustainable and/or recycled materials, and to reduce energy
and water use by employing measures like solar and geothermal heating,
high-efficiency lighting and green roofs. The other is to create a healthy
living space by using nontoxic alternatives to conventional building products.
The key to making a building green is to view the entire structure as a
system. While it may seem like every little environmentally-friendly
upgrading would be a good thing, it is also true that every aspect of the
home can positively or negatively affect the other areas of the home. For
example, sealing cracks and adding insulation affects how your heating
system functions and can negatively impact indoor air quality or create mold
growth. That is why it is important to think through your needs and budget,
and draft a long-term plan for your renovations.
The current interest in environmentally friendly building and renovating
has created a bit of a gold rush around the term “green”, with some products
being labeled that way that aren’t…or that are, at best, a very pale shade
of green. Fortunately, there are some certification and labeling programs
that can help the confused consumer sort out the green claims. Lumber that
has earned certification as sustainably harvested can be found at most
lumberyards; appliances such as water heaters and refrigerators carry the US
Department of Energy’s Energy Star rating labels; the Green Seal program
recommends products like carpet, floor care products, wood finishes and
stains, lighting and environmentally friendly room air conditioning; and
Canada’s Environmental Choice program certifies everything from bamboo and
other wood-substitute flooring products, carpeting, composting toilets and
water-saving showerheads to exhaust fans, wallboard, hot water tanks and
shingles.
Beyond labeling, use a common sense approach to purchase natural,
non-petroleum-based, recyclable materials that will last longer and save
landfills from being filled with poorly made junk. When choosing renovation
materials or fixtures, look for aggressive rates of recycled content,
absence or reductions of undesirable chemicals like formaldehyde and
products that conserve resources.
Lastly, check with your municipal, provincial/state and federal
government sources to see if there are tax credits, rebates or grants
available for energy-efficient retrofitting of your home.
Wood
Wood floors, trim and furnishings can add value to a home and give it a
warmth and natural aura. They are also generally easier to keep clean and
therefore healthier than carpeting. However, clearcutting forests for their
lumber can create loss of wildlife habitat, runoff into streams from
erosion, and decline in carbon storage capacity and an increase in biomass
carbon loss, severely impacting on climate change.
Fortunately, there are options for the environmentally conscious
renovator. You might want to consider using fast-growing bamboo harvested
from Southeast Asia or tiles of cork, made from the bark of trees in the
Mediterranean.
Another green option is wood that has been cut from forests managed
sustainably. This is wood that has been certified by the Forest Stewardship
Council (FSC), an international nonprofit organization whose certification
program is backed by industry and environmental organizations.
Wood carrying this certification must be produced in a way that minimizes
such environmental impacts as road building and erosion, keeps pesticide use
to a minimum, protects species and promotes diversity within the forest.
There is a paper trail, called a chain of custody, back to the forest where
the wood originated, so you know just how the wood has been grown,
harvested, milled, stored, etc. Certified wood comes from more than 50
countries, including from Central and South American tropical rainforests.
Another alternative, which avoids felling new trees altogether, is to use
recycled wood. Old reclaimed wood is often salvaged from large warehouses
and buildings, from landfills or urban tree salvage, and from old barns and
even riverbeds. Especially prized are the wide planks and massive hand hewn
wood beams, in sizes that are unmatched in today’s lumber yards. Old
recycled lumber is strong and dense; it is also dry wood and as such is
unlikely to twist, warp or shrink. It features deep, beautiful colors,
character features and a rich patina that can only be bestowed by time. And
it also has a history that lends it story to your home. Heart pine, old
growth oak, Douglas fir, cypress and black cherry, are all being
rediscovered after centuries of growth and almost that many more years of
aging. These “rediscovered” woods can be remilled into boards used for
flooring, moldings, stairs, cabinets and furniture. Getting this old rustic
used wood cleaned and ready to market is a labor-intensive job, so the price
of reclaimed lumber is comparable to or sometimes higher than that of new
wood.
Some recovered wood is certified. Under the FSC banner “SmartWood” a
recovered wood certification program authenticates the wood, providing a
chain-of-custody document that describes the origin and handling of the
wood. Such certification does more than trace the timber; it guarantees its
owner that the wood, the built environment from which it came and the
ecosystem were all handled with respect.
Some companies and trade organizations, such as the Reclaimed Wood
Council, offer their own documentation and wood histories. For instance,
wood obtained from a demolition contractor can be linked to an address and
photos. Lost timbers recovered from riverbeds can be identified by the
number of growth rings. Whatever the method, verify that the dealer is
reputable before investing in recycled wood.
Another category of options is sometimes referred to as “green wood”
products. These products include formaldehyde-free composite wood panels,
particle board made from waste wheat chaff, arsenic-free pressure-treated
lumber, engineered structural wood and plastic lumber. Most of these
products are not certified, although there is some certified particleboard
available and greater demand is leading to more certification. Often, green
wood products use small, second-growth trees of lesser-used species, such as
aspen and poplar, reducing the demand on species like Douglas fir and
southern pine, and helping preserve old-growth giants. They also often are
made by recycling waste material like sawdust from other wood milling
projects. Plastic lumber is produced from 100 percent recycled plastic
without toxic chemicals like the arsenic that is often found in regular
decking and materials used for outdoor construction.
Paint
Repainting your home is often the quickest and least expensive way to
freshen things up. But it can negatively affect the air quality in your
home. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), paints,
stains and other architectural coatings produce about nine percent of the
volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from consumer and commercial
products, making them the second-largest source of VOC emissions after
automobiles. VOCs are carbon compounds that evaporate at room temperature
and react in sunlight to help form ground-level ozone, an integral component
of photochemical smog. VOCs can cause respiratory, skin and eye irritation,
headaches, nausea, muscle weakness and more serious diseases, according to
the EPA. Formaldehyde, a VOC commonly found in paint, is a probable
carcinogen. The EPA has found that indoor concentrations of VOCs are
regularly up to ten times as high as outdoor concentrations, and can climb
up to a thousand times as high as outdoor concentrations when you are
applying paint.
Choosing paint based on its reportedly low level of VOCs can be
problematic. Government regulations tend to allow products to be labeled as
having zero or no VOCs even when they contain small amounts. Non-profit
certifiers like Green Seal set more comprehensive requirements, but some
paints may still contain harmful ingredients such as preservatives,
fungicides and biocides like formaldehyde. Since VOCs and other toxins are
often contained in the pigment added to paint at time of purchase, actual
emissions may be higher than those quoted for the base paint. And since
darker colors require more pigment, deeply colored paint may contain more
VOCs than paler colors. So check the quality of the pigment being used as
well as the base paint; requesting the Material Safety Data Sheet for the
pigment will help you to avoid obviously harmful substances like cadmium,
mercury and other heavy metals.
So-called “latex” paints have lower VOC levels than oil-based paints,
simply because they use water as the carrier rather than petroleum-based
solvents. Except for appearance, the latex used in paint is in no way
connected with the natural latex used, for instance, in some kinds of rubber
gloves, which can cause allergic reactions. Latex paint cleans up easily
with water, so you don’t need harsh VOC-emitting solvents to work with it.
There is an increasing availability of “natural” paints, composed of
materials such as citrus oil, lime, clay, linseed oil and chalk. Because
natural paints do not contain petroleum products, they emit few if any VOCs
and are healthy and environmentally friendly. They use linseed and soy oils
as binders, pine- and balsam-derived turpenes or citrus oils as carriers,
minerals as pigments, and lime and chalk as thickeners. Milk-based paint,
which is made from a milk protein called casein, is the least toxic and
least environmentally damaging paint. It contains no VOCs, lead,
formaldehyde, oils or biocides. You can buy milk-based paint premixed or mix
it yourself, which saves shipping-related pollution. However, it is unsuited
for kitchens or bathrooms because it can host mold.
Once you’re finished repainting your home, you will inevitably have some
paint left over, a problem shared by paint retailers, manufacturers,
contractors and others. The Product Stewardship Institute (PSI) estimates
that 34 million gallons of leftover consumer paint are generated annually in
the U.S. alone. PSI is working with governments, industry and
environmental/consumer advocates to develop leftover paint management
solutions that are both financially and environmentally sustainable. Some
recycled paint is now available for purchase and PSI has a list of recycled
paint sources on its website. Using recycled latex paint avoids the
manufacturing impact, but it may not be made of low-VOC paint, so it is best
suited to well-ventilated areas.
Rolf
Priesnitz is the Publisher of Natural Life Magazine. He also has over 45
years experience in the construction industry.
