Benefits of Cork Flooring

The idea of recycling corks is odd indeed. Seems like a lot of wine. I live in Napa County so cork is plentiful. I have always sensed the value of a cork, really. This article may have me storing up corks for the winter. Honestly, I will bookmark ReCork America, just for fun information and endless possibilities.

On page 2 or 3 you mention asking about volatile organic compounds - I think you meant volatile OUTGASSING compounds.

These are produced by some vinyls and plastics. If you have a new car with vinyl seats you may even notice a film on the inside of your windows. It comes from the outgassing compounds in the vinyl. It is unavoidable.

I suppose that, as would be entirely appropriate for a writer in Mother Earth News, you automatically typed "organic" once you hit the "o" key!

Great article about cork floors, I had not even thought of this.

Thanks for such positive feedback, all! In response to Sandra's observation that there are cork oaks in California, there certainly are, as I mentioned. But the bark they produce is not of suitable "corky" quality for commercial use.

In response to Anna, I strongly suggest you start your quest by calling some of the manufacturers listed. But water runs downhill, and something like 2/3 of all basements in this country have water in them from time to time. Good luck!

I have a floating cork floor in my basement. Its substrate is MDF. If this floor gets wet, the MDF curls. It must be replaced at that point. Given that it is a basement, I was told you could only put a floating floor on top of concrete (with a vapor barrier).

I have not found any floating floor with a MDF formaldehyde free substrate yet and I doubt a wood substrate would be okay for a basement. If anyone knows a floating cork floor with a no formaldehyde added substrate, I would love to know the brand.

One negative about the floor is that the finish scratches just like a wood finish. Actually, it scratchs much easier than a wood floor. This may be due to the activity that it gets. Speak to whomever you are buying your floor from and tell them about your lifestyle. I have heard people putting extra coats of poly on their floor for high traffic areas.

Despite that one negative item, I love my floors but they are going to have to be re-poly'ed.

Anna www.green-talk.com

Cork Oaks are used as street trees here (Upland, CA 91786) The are dropping their acorn now. Although your article states that they do not produce "cork" their bark is obviously cork, it may not be of industrial quality, but it is cork.

I really enjoyed your article on cork flooring. I have cork flooring and it is wonderful! It feels good on your bare feet, it's never cold. My feet used to hurt after a day of standing in my kitchen all day on a hard wood floor. Now that I have cork flooring it has made such an improvement for my feet. It’s so easy to clean, liquid spills just pool up on the surface and you get easily wipe it up with a sponge or a towel. It’s a pleasure a walk on and I really love the fact that it’s quiet to walk on. I’m now putting it in my bathroom and soon I’ll have cork flooring over my whole house!

But how easy is it to keep clean since surface is permeable.

Such a fine article about cork oak. Thanks for sharing this wonderful information. We'd like to link to it.
Also, the Amorim 2007 Sustainability Report covers in detail the issues that you address concerning energy use as relates to long-distance shipping, CO2 retention, and a complete eco-efficiency analysis. Your readers can find it here:
http://wicanderscorkoakblog.com or here: http://www.amorim.com/en/cor_sustentabilidade_relatorio.php
Cheers!
Team Wicanders