Healthy Forest
Responsible Forestry – Healthy Forest
Wood from responsibly-managed forests is one of the few truly renewable industrial resources.
A properly managed forest can provide raw materials to sustain generations of growth without resource depletion, while consuming less energy, polluting less and creating fewer long-term environmental problems than other major raw-material extraction processes.
- The United States actually has 70% of the forestland coverage that it had in 1600, and the vast majority of the reduction in forestland is due to clearing for agriculture and development. In fact, despite a 165% increase in population, the United Sates has about the same amount of forestland as it did in 1920.
- Each year 1.7 billion trees are planted in the United States – more than five trees for every man, woman and child in America – an average of 4.8 million seedlings each day.
- Scientists estimate lumber manufacturing consumes just 4% of the energy used by all raw material manufacturers. Steel and concrete manufacturers consume 56%. A steel stud requires 21 times as much energy to produce and releases 15 times the sulfur dioxide as a wood 2x4. Producing concrete emits up to 3 times more carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons than lumber production.
No Urea Formaldehyde - Healthy Home
Urea formaldehyde (UF) is used in the production of the majority of laminated wood products. UF may cause irritation and illness and in fact has recently been classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), part of the World Health Organization, as “carcinogenic to humans.” Private Reserve Handcrafted Hardwood Flooring is manufactured using an innovative new adhesive system that eliminates adhesive-related formaldehyde emissions during manufacturing and, once installed, will not off-gas UF in the indoor environment.
No VOCs - Healthy Planet
Private Reserve Handcrafted Hardwood Flooring is finished using 100% solvent-free coatings and therefore emits negligible, if any, polluting Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) into the atmosphere. In fact, we are one of the few engineered flooring companies manufacturing in complete compliance with Southern California’s air-quality standards, which are among the strictest anywhere!
By contrast, the state of the forest products industries in China and Indonesia, two of the leading hardwood flooring exporting countries, is abysmal. Some of the most destructive logging that takes place in the world is illegal cut-and-run logging where there is no attempt at forest management. Today, about a third of the world’s illegal wood is processed in China, and a USAID estimate suggests that 50% of the hardwood imported into the U.S. comes from illegal logging.
According to researchers, China’s increased wood trade is: "worsening the problems of deforestation, unsustainable harvesting practices, illegal logging, and marginalization of the indigenous and other poor communities..."
- Source: World Wildlife Fund's "Keep It Legal" Guide, 2007
China has exhausted the majority of its mature hardwood forests, and has for some time been plundering the tropical forests of other nations. According to Greenpeace, between 76 and 90 percent of the logging in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea is illegal, and is shipped to China to be processed into plywood, furniture or flooring and exported to industrialized nations. Every second tropical tree traded in the world is being sent to China. "Indonesia was still densely forested as recently as 1950. Forty percent of the forests existing in 1950 were cleared in the following 50 years. The rate of forest loss is accelerating."
- Global Forest Watch – Indonesia’s Forests in Brief
When you choose Private Reserve Hardwood Flooring you are not just buying the finest wood flooring available - you are also casting a vote for a healthy planet!