by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
The answer to this, in a way, depends on the products made from this grass
Although it is often thought in the environmental movement that bamboo is ever so green, nigh on greener than green, and is claimed to be a great replacement for hardwood as regards to flooring and even a replacement for cotton as it can be made into fiber from which garments can be made, this is not really the case.
Using bamboo in the traditional way and manner, especially when used to make items for use in the way they always have been done, such as is done in certain parts of the world, then bamboo has a green potential.
While it is true that bamboo is a grass and not a wood and it rapidly regrowth to full hight and maturity after harvesting it is not such a sustainable wonder plants as it is often made out to be.
Bamboo is, as said, great for many things, but bamboo for clothing (fiber) as well as for flooring, as a sort of replacement for hardwood floors, is something that we should most certainly avoid. Neither is green or environmentally friendly. In fact rather the opposite.
Bamboo fabric is created by use of a number of chemical and mechanical process and the chemicals used are not of the kind that are harmless to the environment and to life. So bamboo clothing is not a very good and clean and green option at all.
Everything about bamboo clothing is a lot of hype and especially greenwash with many of the environmental lobby being guilty and complicit in this. Knowledge is important when dealing with such issues and just believing industry as to sustainability and such is a bad course of action.
Clothing from bamboo is not environmentally friendly, so much is for sure, and those that claim that such garments are should take a close look at the manufacturing process and at the chemicals used.
I have not problems with bamboo being used as it has always been used for the making of a variety of safe traditional products but the likes of clothing and flooring, as in laminate kind boards, is not what we should be going for. When it comes to flooring the best option is and remains boards from native trees, hardwood ideally, such as oak and beech and such, and from sustainably managed forests and woodlands.
Bamboo cannot be cut into planks. The trunks are hollow. In order to make bamboo into boards sections of bamboo cut require a lot of treatment to be flattened and then, often, several of those are bonded together to create a thicker board. The bonding is done, obviously, with glues of the same nature that are used in the production of so-called laminate flooring.
The traditional use of bamboo and the traditional products fashioned from this grass as it has been and still is being used and fashioned in those countries where this plant grows naturally, such as in China, Japan, and other areas of South-East Asia, as we as on the Indian sub-continent and the Amazon and such areas is one thing and sustainable indeed, even if those goods made are produced for export to the developed world.
Making fiber from bamboo, in the current process, for the production of garments and such like, and the making of flooring, on the other hand, are neither green nor sustainable, despite what some might try to have the world believe.
Too many people conduct bad or no research at all...
© 2009
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Is Bamboo environmentally friendly?
