PVC: Fast Fashion?

PRESS RELEASE FROM THE PARQUET ALLIANCE, JULY 2020

PVC floor has “fast fashion” characteristics

The T-shirt for less than three euros, the jeans for an impossible price and the nice summer dress that you can't pass up for such a low price. Wear it a few times, throw it away and on to the next purchase. It may come as a surprise, but according to the American design agency Olympic Construction Services, the well-known and now quite popular PVC floor exhibits all the traits of “fast fashion”. Highly harmful to the environment, the cheap price is a license to quickly replace and PVC can hardly be recycled responsibly. All in all, it is not even remotely a sustainable purchase.

The American agency makes the “fast fashion” comparison in a blog on its website. They substantiate their view on the true nature of the PVC floor with extensive and convincing documentation. The Parket Alliance sees this blog as a firm confirmation of its views on the PVC floor versus the wooden floor. The wooden floor is distinguished by minimal environmental impact during the production process, has a very long lifespan, can almost always be recycled and is a sustainable storage place for CO₂!

The PVC floor is the counterpart of the wooden floor in all these respects. All disadvantages are magnified by the low price, which encourages short-term use and the rapid expansion of the waste mountain.

American situation
Of course the blog is based on the American situation. An environment in which the use of questionable raw materials and additives, heavy environmental impact and a low recycling rate is less under the magnifying glass than in the Netherlands. Here and in Europe we are fortunately a little further along and, among other things, the use of certain substances to soften PVC is already prohibited. Unfortunately, a lot of PVC floor covering still comes from outside Europe, where much less strict regulation is generally applied.

But all the objections that the blog raises against the use of PVC as floor covering remain topical in the Netherlands and Europe.

End of press release.