Renewable Flooring Options for Your Green Home

When looking at renewable flooring there are a number of natural resources that are available for use. Several of these types of flooring are made from coconut palm wood, cork and bamboo. Each of these products comes from a sustainable and renewable supply which is generally of plantation origin. The coconut palm product is produced from the older trees that have outgrown their useful life as a coconut producer, before it was used in flooring the trunk of the palm was generally discarded and was basically a waste product of little use. With it being found an ideal product for flooring this has opened up a supply from areas where different varieties of palms grow naturally in many parts of Asia.

When using the coconut palm tree as renewable flooring it is sourced from palms that may have a diameter of around twelve inches and have a height of approximately one hundred feet. The wood on the outer part of the palm is harder and darker than most other timbers, but is soft and light colored in the centre section. The timber is processed in a specific way of cutting, drying and laminating. During the laminating process, adhesives that are non toxic are used and this helps to retain its value as an environmentally safe product.

Cork is another renewable flooring product which is becoming more popular and is sourced from the bark of the Cork Oak tree. The bark is generally harvested in a particular way when it is a certain thickness and is peeled from the lower branches and trunk using a certain type of tool. Only the outer bark is removed by this process, leaving the inner bark to continue to grow over a number of years before it can be harvested again.

A further type of renewable flooring is bamboo which is a species of grass. Bamboo is a product which has been used for many things for a very long time. It is a fast maturing, sturdy species and can regenerate from clumps or runners, requiring very little maintenance in its natural state. When used in flooring bamboo is perceived as being able to last longer than cork, but when properly cared for cork is said to last just as long.