Low environmental impact: Mannington’s environmental position is clear and straightforward: actions speak. They focus on improving operational efficiency and product performance while decreasing the impact on their surroundings and overall use of resources. This grew out of the company’s determination to be the best people to do business with in the flooring industry. It means looking beyond customer service and product innovation to legacy. And as a family-owned fourth-generation company, they know a little about legacy. It's more than a good marketing story; it is values and vision beyond the next quarter's numbers. And, as Mannington reaches new goals, their actions will continue to speak loudly enough to be heard.
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High indoor air quality and “green building” compliance: Sherwin-Williams applies the GreenSmart designation to its environmentally preferred products which takes into consideration product performance and other key criteria that impact the environment. Only those products that offer maximum performance, long-term durability, the highest indoor air quality ratings for low VOC and low odor, and meet or exceed the GS-11 criteria for coatings used in LEED-certified buildings earn the GreenSmart designation. (LEED certification means that certain "green building" standards are met, such as energy efficiency and indoor environmental quality.)
Duration Home™ Interior Latex has low VOC (volatile organic compound) and low odor properties. Its waterborne formula and patented cross-linking technology means superior washability, so you can wipe away most stains easily with water or mild soap. It also resists shiny burnish marks and mildew, providing the ultimate in quality and performance. Harmony® Interior Latex is designed with anti-microbial properties, and offers a zero-VOC, low odor and silica-free coating that allows immediate occupancy of newly painted spaces. This waterborne formula is available as both a primer and a topcoat in eggshell, flat and semi-gloss finishes. Both Duration Home and Harmony Interior Latex paints are on the walls at Style and Form.
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Reduced waste and emissions, highly recyclable, and sustainable methods: 3form believes that beauty in the world extends beyond the drawing board - and that good design includes environmental responsibility. That's why 3form is constantly striving to improve their already high level of environmental standards. As a formal sign of this commitment, 3form is a member the U.S. Green Building Council, and manufactures products which support LEED-accredited projects. Their strict manufacturing practice is OSHA-approved and free from harmful VOCs, solvents, and emissions. More importantly, 3form continues to invent and implement new and ecologically responsible ideas and practices for their industry. Less waste from start to finish: From recycling materials to using less energy, 3form puts environmental consciousness into action every day. They re-utilize packing and crating at every opportunity - panel products often leave the manufacturing facility in the same containers in which their raw materials arrived. And the company’s fabrication is designed to provide a greater yield and consume far less energy in transport than glass or stone.
They set the bar with their star product, eco resin, which was from the beginning designed to be environmentally friendly, utilizing at least 40% post-industrial re-grind content. Now, depending on the interlayer, 95% of the Varia collection is easily recyclable into the highest-level PET stream with consumer plastics - often becoming another usable product such as carpet fibers or industrial materials. These successes aside, 3form continues to strive for additional environmental gains. Product development goals include 100% top-level recycle-ability. Newly implemented changes include rapidly renewable organic elements such as bear grass and bamboo, and replacing former metallic inter-layers with lighter, more recyclable screen-printed alternatives. By continuing to join ever-more recyclable content with limitless design freedom, 3form endeavors to further environmental sustainability, economic feasibility, and social responsibility.
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Low environmental impact, minimal use of resources and energy, recyclability, high air quality, and low waste: Valcucine is the first Italian kitchen manufacturing company to have obtained the UNI EN ISO 14001 environmental protection certification. This certificate rewards commitment to the laws and rules in force regarding the environment, and for R&D of new methods to improve production processes that yield both sustainable economic growth and the conservation of our natural heritage for future generations.
For years Valcucine has researched innovative technologies that allow production with low environmental impact. It has created products that are:
- dematerialized (minimizing the quantity of materials and energy used)
- recyclable (facilitating the reutilization of discarded materials) and,
- long lasting (reducing the production of waste).
Longstanding research into materials and their limits of resistance have allowed Valcucine to reduce the structure of its products to the essentials, creating objects that are the utmost expression of design based on the philosophy of dematerialization. The most significant example of this is the micro layered and ultra-light door of the Ricicla program: it is composed of an aluminum structural frame designed to have a minimal cross-section while maintaining its sturdiness, and of a decor panel only 2mm thick, constructed using car industry technologies.
Valcucine has also dematerialized its worktops: they are made from an aluminum structural frame to which a thin laminate, cristalite or marble top is added. The spatial shape of the frame makes it possible to drastically reduce the quantity of material used for the top (e.g. the laminate top uses 60% less material). In nature substances “go around”, are transformed, and are all ultimately reabsorbed and reutilized. We must also learn to reduce the quantity of waste and favor the reutilization and recycling of materials in every possible way, because the resources at our disposal are not unlimited.
Valcucine has devised the most simple and total recyclability of its products by designing them so that the elements of which they are composed are easy to identify and separate when they are discarded. Plastic components are marked for quick identification at the end of their life cycle. Valcucine accepts discarded doors and fully recycles their components. Aluminum frames can also be 100% recycled. Recycled aluminum is an extremely environmental-friendly product because it is recuperated by consuming only 5% of the energy used for the production of the primary metal and without any emission of gas. The layered laminate panels are transformed and used in the production of elements for car dashboards or for the construction of various types of containers.
The air we breathe in the kitchen can be polluted by the toxic substances emitted by synthetic varnishes and adhesives used for furniture. Chipboard panels typically contain ureic glue that continuously emit formaldehyde for years. Valcucine products do not. They use natural substances wherever possible and perform random tests to check that the elements of its kitchens do not emit volatile substances into the environment that are health hazards.
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