Bed

See all tips to
GreenYour Bed

Buy a bed made with reclaimed or recycled materials

Add
This feature is only available to GreenYour members. Please sign-up.

Green your dreams in a bed made from recycled or reclaimed content. These bed frames and headboards are constructed from salvaged materials that would otherwise go to the landfill. Choosing a bed made from reclaimed or recycled wood also ensures new materials are not harvested from forests to make a new piece of bedroom furniture.

How to choose a bed made from reclaimed or recycled materials

Reclaimed wood furniture isn't as easy to come by as conventional options in regular home decor and discount stores. But with a little legwork, you should be able to find some beautiful, historic pieces.

  1. Do a little research: Search your local phone book and the Internet for furniture companies that sell beds made from recycled materials. When looking for reclaimed wood beds, use these key words: recycled wood, reclaimed lumber, reused wood or rediscovered wood.
  2. Certified recycled: Visit SmartWood for a directory of certified rediscovered wood products. The Rainforest Alliance's SmartWood program provides certification to identify wood products that use salvaged, reclaimed, or recycled sources. Look for SmartWood's "Rediscovered Wood" logo.

Find it! Reclaimed or recycled wood bed makers

Believe it or not, your next bed may be made from 100-year old barn planks or reclaimed wood from the bottom of a lake. But don’t worry, these bed options are durable, well-weathered, and beautiful, too.

Before you buy

Many eco-friendly furniture designers develop their creations abroad, so although suppliers are available nationwide, choice of recycled-content furniture in your locale may be limited. You’ll also pay a premium for some recycled-content pieces, especially wood. The process of salvaging wood from demolition sites is time- and labor-intensive. In addition, most of the wood salvaged is originally from old-growth forests—a threatened resource—and is considered a high-quality product.

Recycled wood needs to be properly processed before it is reused. Reclaimed or salvaged wood is often treated with various chemicals to protect against rotting from insects and microbial agents. These chemicals include chromated copper arsenic (CCA) or ammoniacal copper arsenate (ACA), which contain toxic arsenic and chromium and are considered hazardous wastes by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). A better option is reclaimed or salvaged wood treated with ammonium/copper/quaternary ammonia (ACQ), which is free of these hazardous substances and has been registered for use on lumber, timbers, landscape ties, fence posts, and other wood structures.

Also, check that the wood has been planed and kiln-dried to ensure it will not warp and that insects are destroyed. To be sure these steps are performed in an environmentally responsible manner, seek products certified as "Rediscovered Wood" by SmartWood.

Choosing a bed made from recycled or reclaimed wood helps you go green because…

  • Reusing already-harvested wood prevents virgin resources from being extracted from the earth, protecting wild spaces and wild creatures.
  • Making use of existing products that would otherwise go to the landfill saves energy and keeps valuable resources out of the dump.

A surge in reclaimed wood furniture is occurring across the country, with bed frames, headboards, and dressers, being constructed of recycled content. This has helped to stem the tide of wood waste, totaling nearly 6 million tons in 2003, being sent to landfills.[1] The EPA recommends reusing and recycling wood to divert it from landfills or incinerators, thereby helping to protect human health, as well as land, air, and water resources. In addition, wood recycling prevents greenhouse gas emissions from landfills and reduces the need for new disposal facilities.[2]

Wood recyclers divert wood from landfills and remanufacture it into new products. They salvage hardwoods, such as chestnut, hickory, cherry, and oak, from old houses, barns, and warehouses that are slated for demolition. They also use trees removed from old orchards or urban areas due to disease or death. Others specialize in reclaiming logs from the bottom of rivers and lakes that sank decades ago during logging operations.

Using recycled wood also reduces the need to harvest trees from the world’s forests. For example, salvaging 1 million board feet of reusable lumber from an old warehouse can offset the need to harvest 1,000 acres of forest. The harvest of trees negatively impacts the earth’s biodiversity when habitat is destroyed and affects its ability to absorb greenhouse gases. Trees absorb carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, and "exhale," or release, oxygen. It's estimated that an acre of trees can grow 4,000 pounds of wood per year while consuming 5,800 pounds of carbon dioxide and producing 4,280 pounds of oxygen.[3]

Controversies

Reclaimed or recycled wood, salvaged from old buildings or construction projects, can be an environmentally responsible choice, but the labeling of products made from these types of woods can be misleading. For instance, reclaimed wood taken from a lake or river without sufficient care can cause significant ecosystem damage, and therefore should be avoided. Truly sustainable reclaimed or recycled wood will include a label indicating the source and extraction methods used to obtain it.

Glossary

  • recycled wood: Post-consumer wood that has been processed (usually by mechanical means) to be used in the manufacture of a new product.
  • reclaimed lumber: Post-consumer wood that has been used for another purpose and is being salvaged for a new use. Almost all reclaimed wood is a high-grade wood as it was originally harvested from old-growth forests.
  • reused wood: Wood products or materials that, after serving their original function, are used again in their present form.
  • rediscovered wood: A term used by Rainforest Alliance’s certification program to describe wood that is recovered, recycled, and reused.

External links

Footnotes

  1. US Environmental Protection Agency - Basic Information about Wood Waste
  2. US Environmental Protection Agency - Organic Materials
  3. American Forest and Paper Association - Benefits of Wood Use