Recently, we began a series on toxic building materials. Many building products found in both old and new homes are harmful to us. They can negatively affect our indoor air quality, cause long-term health conditions, or even worse. Since these materials pose a problem that affects almost everyone, let us arm ourselves. The following are some powerful tools to help identify problem-building materials.
Transparency Tool
The international architecture firm Perkins+Will has developed a powerful online tool called Transparency, a database-style platform for quick product research. Transparency is wonderful to use whenever you are unsure whether a building material is toxic or potentially harmful to your home or the natural environment.
The Transparency tool contains three categories of products, based on their potential for harm and availability:
Precautionary List - The place to start your research into chemicals/materials that are toxic for use in building construction. These correlate rather closely to the Red List materials that we will discuss later in this post.
Watch List - Substances that are under close scrutiny. Whether they are harmful or not has not been proven yet. Products containing these materials should not be considered safe.
Sunset List - Substances of limited impact to the marketplace. These are no longer in widespread use, and regulatory measures are often in place to assist in their elimination. One day, their hope is that all products from the other lists will be in this category.
Screenshot: Click the image above to launch Transparency
I like to use the "Products" tab as a quick reference when I am curious about potential toxins lurking in materials for my home. To get started, you might try searching for a common product, like paint or flooring, and see what comes up—this can help you quickly get a feel for how the tool works and what kind of information it provides. This tool is well worth poking around for a bit. I think it is one of the very best resources for understanding which toxins affect the places we dwell. I would love to hear your feedback in the Comments below about something interesting you discovered using this tool. I am learning too...
The Living Building Challenge: Introduction
What does a truly sustainable home look like to you? The International Living Future Institute envisions a future where our built environments function as cleanly as a natural forest. This vision is driven by the Living Building Challenge (LBC). While often associated with large commercial buildings, the LBC offers a blueprint for renewing your home from the inside out.
The LBC is the preeminent green building standard because it measures actual, real-world performance after you move in. It offers a holistic approach to sustainability through seven performance areas called Petals: Place, Water, Energy, Health + Happiness, Materials, Equity, and Beauty. A Certified Living Building operates like a living flower. I love this analogy. A home built to this standard has no net impact on the earth, leaving a beautiful legacy for the next generation.
Courtesy of Internatational Living Future Instutute, Green Building Challenge Petals requriments.
A great real-world example of a Certified Living Building is the Bullitt Center in Seattle. Often referred to as the greenest commercial building in the world, it was designed to meet all of its energy and water needs on-site, just as a flower survives only on the resources it gathers from its environment. Seeing how the Bullitt Center operates helps bring this living flower analogy to life and shows that such ambitious standards are possible in practice.
Each Petal of the Green Building Challenge is further divided into Imperatives. (See chart above.) The framework consists of seven Petals: Place, Water, Energy, Health and Happiness, Materials, Equity, and Beauty. These Imperatives vary slightly depending on the building's typology. For the Materials Petal, the key Imperatives are as follows: 10) Red List, 11) Embodied Carbon Footprint, 12) Responsible Industry, 13) Living Economy Sourcing, and 14) Net Positive Waste.
The Red List
The Red List is a collection of chemical compounds and materials that are considered harmful to human health and the environment. For example, substances such as PVC (polyvinyl chloride), formaldehyde, and phthalates are on the Red List and are commonly found in building materials such as flooring, adhesives, and insulation. These substances are restricted or prohibited in Living Building Challenge projects. Understanding the Red List is important because it encourages the use of safer, healthier materials in construction, reducing negative impacts on people and the planet.
Per the first Imperative on the Materials Petal, below are the Living Building Challenge Red List Materials/Chemicals (visit this link to get an overview of each listed item). Just like a red light, this list is composed of materials that must be stopped! They are not healthy to build with and are similarly unhealthy for our planet. Of course, this makes sense if you think about our lives and the earth intertwined as one. To help connect these ideas to everyday life, many of these chemicals are found in products we encounter regularly. For example, asbestos has been used in insulation and floor tiles; phthalates are often present in vinyl flooring and plastic products; and formaldehyde can be found in pressed-wood furniture and cabinetry. By recognizing how these materials show up in common building materials and products, it becomes clearer why eliminating them is so important.
Declare®: The Nutrition Label for Building Products
If you have ever flipped over a box of cereal to check the ingredients, you already understand the brilliance behind the Declare label. Created by the International Living Future Institute, Declare® acts as a straightforward "nutrition label" for building materials, designed to make sustainable material selections easier for homeowners, architects, and builders.
Instead of hiding chemicals behind complicated industry jargon, this voluntary platform encourages manufacturers to openly list exactly what goes into their products. Want to know if that new carpet or flooring is truly safe for your family? You can simply jump onto their free online database, use the search box for the specific material you are considering, and instantly see what is inside. It is an incredibly powerful, quick-reference tool to help you make informed decisions when renewing your home from the inside out!
Cradle to Cradle
Another product certification system/database worth mentioning is Cradle to Cradle product certification. If you have not read William McDonough and Dr. Michael Braungart's book "Cradle to Cradle", it is an absolute must-read!
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Back in 1992, McDonough and Braungart published The Hannover Principles: Design for Sustainability. By 2002, they expanded this into their groundbreaking Cradle to Cradle book, exploring a powerful new paradigm: what if we treated building materials as biological or technical "nutrients"? Instead of a traditional one-way trip to the landfill, they envisioned a framework where materials continually evolve and safely cycle back into use.
After two decades of working directly with companies to rethink how we make things, they realized they needed to scale up this transformation. In 2010, they generously licensed their certification system and methodology to the public by creating the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute. Today, this non-profit institute serves as an incredible agent of change, using open-source information to help us all build a healthier, more sustainable legacy.
Close
I hope that you have enjoyed researching potential building materials you have been considering for your home. Maybe if you are considering a remodel, you can avoid adding any additional toxic/biological burden for your family. I have been enjoying learning along with you.
Looking ahead, Part 3 will cover toxic materials in historic and existing properties.
What are your thoughts on these resources? If you have others to share, please leave them in the Comments below. Thank you for reading.