Green Building Topics

Green Building Materials Guide

RECYCLED CONTENT BUILDING MATERIALS

Considerations:

The material in our recycling bins, our used bottles, paper, cans, and cardboard, are the raw materials for recycled content products. Incorporating recycled-content building materials in your project not only reduces waste, it also eliminates the pollution and energy use of mining, harvesting, and purifying virgin ores and petroleum into useful raw materials. A wide variety of recycled content building materials are available including:

Recycled plastic lumber from recycled plastic and wood chips, which is ideal for outdoor decking
Insulation, such as fiberglass with some recycled glass, cotton made from recycled denim, or even newspaper recycled into cellulose insulation
Carpet made of recycled plastic bottles or sometimes from carpet itself (Share this at a cocktail party: Half of U.S. polyester carpet is made from recycled plastic.)
Tile containing recycled glass
Concrete containing ground up concrete as aggregate, as well as fly ash - a cementitious waste product from power plants
Countertops made with everything from recycled glass to sunflower seed shells
Products in almost every CSI division, with new options introduced all the time

When selecting a recycled content building material, consider:

Choose the highest recycled content available. Some recycled products may only be 10% recycled and 90% virgin material.
Seek the highest post-consumer recycled content available. Some “recycled” content is waste from manufacturing processes. Reducing manufacturing waste is a step in the right direction, but recycling post-consumer material is a much greater accomplishment.
Evaluate materials carefully; are they appropriate for your application? Are they durable?
Salvaging (reusing) whole materials is even better than recycling, further reducing waste, energy and water use, and pollution.
Look for materials that are not only recycled, but recyclable or biodegradable at the end of their useful life. Ideally, a material should be capable of being recycled again and again back into the same product.

Summary: Recycled Content Materials

Waste has a cost, and we all bear it. The extraction, manufacture and transport, and disposal of virgin building materials clogs our landfills, pollutes air and water, depletes resources, and damages natural habitats. Construction and demolition are responsible for 28% of California's solid waste stream according to the CIWMB, and more than 85% of that material, from flooring to roofing, is reusable or recyclable. Keeping a substance out of the landfill is only the first step to putting construction and demolition “waste” back into productive use. The material must be processed into a new high quality item, and that product must be sold to a builder or homeowner who recognizes one or benefits. By mining our “waste” as the raw material for new products, we increase demand for recycling, and convince manufacturers to use more recycled material, continuously strengthening this cycle.

Benefits of recycled content materials include reduced solid waste, reduced energy and water use, reduced pollution, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and a healthier economy. Yes, a healthier economy: Every 15,000 tons of solid waste recycled creates nine jobs, while sending that same amount of waste to a landfill provides only one job, according to the CIWMB. Using recycled content materials supports companies that make the effort to produce make environmentally preferable products.

For More Information:

RECYCLED CONTENT MATERIALS DATABASES

California Integrated Waste Management Board Recycled-Content Product Directory
Detailed information on recycled content of hundreds of products

Bay Area Build It Green

GreenSpec
A fee-based service searchable by the standard UniFormat. It is probably the most comprehensive single source of green building product information.

Oikos
A free website with information about a wide range of greener construction products

Center for Resourceful Building Technology
A free website with information about a wide range of greener construction products

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Monterey Area Green Building Directory
Prepared in cooperation with the County of Santa Cruz Public Works Department, copies of the MAGBD are available from Santa Cruz County Planning permitting counters, and the MAGBD is hosted online by local green architect Marilyn Crenshaw.

CIWMB Technical Manual for Material Choices in Sustainable Construction

CIWMB Resource List

Program Contact

Ecology Action

Phone: 831.426.5925
Fax: 831.425.1404
Email