dangers of vinyl stair coverings

[franksolich]

http://www.healthybuilding.net/pvc/must_reads.html

Oh my.

But nothing about how they harbor dirt and germs underneath them, or how the dirt trapped underneath them acts as a sort of sandpaper, wearing away the natural wood.

Making the Case Against PVC: The Healthy Building Network's "Must Read" List

1. PVC FACTS: Healthy Building Network

HBN's factsheet is a quick introduction to the major environmental issues with PVC from the problems of its toxic additives, to the creation of dioxin, the most potent carcinogen known to science, during production and disposal. And it's fully referenced.
 
2. Update on the Environmental Health Impacts of PVC as a Building Material: Evidence from 2000-2004 (PDF) by Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D. for the Healthy Building Network

In April, 2004, the Healthy Building Network submitted an update of the scientific evidence published since its December 2000 submission to the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) on environmental health effects of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) building materials. The document is intended to serve as a reader's guide to the primary documents, reports, and data submitted to the USGBC's Technical and Scientific Advisory Committee (TSAC) in response to its November 2003 solicitation for evidence.

3. Affidavit of Judith Schreiber, Senior Public Health Scientist with the New York State Attorney General's Office from the case Resilient Floor Covering Institute v. New York State (2003) (PDF)

In 2003, the vinyl flooring trade group, Resilient Floor Covering Institute, dropped its lawsuit contesting New York State's refusal to grant a green building tax credit for vinyl flooring. Dr. Schreiber's affidavit cited a threedecade trail of studies from around the world demonstrating the adverse health effects to workers in vinyl chloride monomer and PVC production facilities, residents near those facilities, first-responders at fires involving PVC, and consumers living and working in buildings with PVC components.

4. "Should We Phase Out PVC?" - Environmental Building News

In this 1994 article, Environmental Building News provides background on the PVC issue and concludes by stating, "For builders and architects, our recommendation is to choose non-PVC applications where affordable and clearly superior products exist, but to keep an eye on the PVC debate."

5. Environmental Impacts of Polyvinyl Chloride Building Materials: A Healthy Building
Network Report, by Joe Thornton (2002) (Summary of findings, HTML version)

This November, 2000 report exhaustively reviews the science behind the environmental health problems created through out the life cycle of PVC as used in building materials. Available in print. Summary of findings (PDF) Full report (1.5 MB PDF)

6. Final Rebuttal: Environmental Impacts of Polyvinyl Chloride Building Materials (PDF) - A Briefing Paper for the U.S. Green Building Council

In this document, written by Joe Thornton, Ph.D., for the Healthy Building Network, Dr. Thornton analyzes and refutes each authority cited by the Vinyl Institute regarding the environmental impacts of PVC building materials. This is essential reading for anyone considering the merit of the vinyl industry's defense of PVC. This December, 2000 document is part of a comprehensive packet filed by the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems and the Healthy Building Network, in response to the U.S. Green Building Council's invitations for comments on proposed Materials Credit 9 for LEED Commercial Interiors.

7. Pandora's Poison, by Joe Thornton (MIT Press, 2000)

The British scientific journal Nature called Pandora's Poison a "landmark book which should be read by anyone wanting to understand the environmental and health dangers of chlorine chemistry." PVC production is the largest use of chlorine gas in the world, and PVC is the only major building material that is an organochlorine, a class of chemicals that have come under scientific and regulatory scrutiny because of their global distribution and the unusually severe hazards they tend to pose.
8. The Economics of Phasing Out PVC (PDF) by Frank Ackerman, director of the Research and Policy Program, Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University.

Vinyl may have a cheap look and feel, but this report released by Tufts University researchers concludes the economic advantages of PVC are overstated, and that substituting PVC with safer alternatives is cost-effective and practical.

9. Toxic Data Bias and the Challenges of Using LCA in the Design Community, by Tom Lent of the Healthy Building Network

Current life cycle analysis (LCA) fails to address a range of toxic chemicals and their related human health issues. The report uses case studies to demonstrate how this problem can lead LCAs to improperly weigh environmental impact and give an apparent environmental blessing to materials with high toxic impact, including PVC. Recommendations are made for redesigning LCAs to account for these issues.

10. Blue Vinyl: A Toxic Comedy

With humor, hope and a piece of vinyl siding in hand, Blue Vinyl picks up where Judith Helfand's Peabody award-winning film A Healthy Baby Girl left off - to explore home, family, industry-sponsored science and a culture that pits economics against human health. Selected for the 2002 Environmental Messenger of the Year Award, Blue Vinyl has played a strategic role in the development of the phase out PVC movement, from a "consumer revolution" to new initiatives with fenceline and faith communities.
Leading corporations from General Motors to Herman Miller, Kaiser Permanente to Nike are moving away from PVC.

[Wineslob]

Considering how much PVC is used in everyday items around our homes, we should all be dead.


 

[franksolich]

Considering how much PVC is used in everyday items around our homes, we should all be dead.

Actually, this wasn't the kind of stuff I had hoped to find--but as it was all I could find, it'll have to do--about the dangers and stupidity and germ hazards of vinyl stair covers, so as to illuminate the nocturnally foul one, who's putting them on the stairs of his house in New Jersey.

The nocturnally foul one's a Democrat and a liberal, but he's no primitive, and he's one of us, and so I care.

If one needs some sort of thing to give a person better "traction" on wooden stairs--an elderly person, for example--I kindly suggest putting down those stair-width "strips" of what look like sandpaper face-up; two or three 1" strips per stair.

They're more aesthetically pleasing.

But for any normal adult or child unhindered by physical problems, it's simply best to leave the stairs alone, to let the glory of its authentic wood shine.  Even plain ordinary cheap scrap wood has a naturally aesthetic value, and so it's a crime against God and Nature to hide it.

These vinyl stair covers remind me very much of houses from my childhood; houses inhabited by affluent old widows (the sort who buy perfumed-and-lotioned toilet tissue these days, that not having existed when I was a child) who had all sorts of things fluffy and frilly and ruffly in their houses.

It seems really dowdy.

It's sort of a throwback to the 1950s, I guess; a decade not known for its taste in aesthetics; perhaps that taste still rules in New Jersey.

It's also an embarrassment because the nocturnally foul one is from New Jersey, and since the 1870s, New Jersey has owned Nebraska.  I have no idea why this happened, but every year when surveys come out, they disclose that New Jersey owns more of Nebraska than anybody else excepting we Nebraskans ourselves.

This of course is because there's so much here, and so few people here to own it, that it attracts outsiders, absentee owners.  People from New Jersey don't come out here often, perhaps thinking of wild Indians and desolate prairies; as long as Nebraska sends them their checks, they tend to not visit.  Which is fine.

And here's a case where "massa" has worse taste than those he owns.

It's embarrassing to us, being owned by kitschkopfs.

[RobJohnson]

My Great Aunt and Uncle had them on steps that very very steep...the steps would of been really slick without the covers..plus it was a good place for my Aunt to hide money from my Uncle...when we moved them to the nursing home, we found money everywhere.

[The Night Owl]

These vinyl stair covers remind me very much of houses from my childhood; houses inhabited by affluent old widows (the sort who buy perfumed-and-lotioned toilet tissue these days, that not having existed when I was a child) who had all sorts of things fluffy and frilly and ruffly in their houses.

Keep in mind that we are talking about basement steps. 

Anyway, thanks for the interesting read.

[Chris_]

Considering how much PVC is used in everyday items around our homes, we should all be dead.


 :bs:

Maybe you all are and you continue to exist as characters in my dreams.

Don't make any loud noises, lest you wake me up.

[The Night Owl]

These treads are pretty sweet...

http://www.flexcofloors.com/stair_treads.asp



I think I'm going to go with rubber. More natural. More durable. Unfortunately, more expensive.

[Click here to donate to the TNO stairs fund]

[Thor]

These treads are pretty sweet...

http://www.flexcofloors.com/stair_treads.asp



I think I'm going to go with rubber. More natural. More durable. Unfortunately, more expensive.

[Click here to donate to the TNO stairs fund]

Industrial stair treads in a house ?!?!?!? That's just butt ugly.

[franksolich]

Industrial stair treads in a house ?!?!?!? That's just butt ugly.

More than just unaesthetic, I wonder how much the manufacture of rubber (or vinyl) steps contributed to global climate change, and how long they're going to be around before they deteriorate and decay back into natural elements, like 212,500,000 years or something.

Wood doesn't do that. 

[The Night Owl]

Industrial stair treads in a house ?!?!?!? That's just butt ugly.

Like I said... basement steps. 

[The Night Owl]

More than just unaesthetic, I wonder how much the manufacture of rubber (or vinyl) steps contributed to global climate change, and how long they're going to be around before they deteriorate and decay back into natural elements, like 212,500,000 years or something.

Wood doesn't do that. 

Bah! You Christians have been pushing the wood products ever since Jesus took that job as a carpenter.   

:innocent:

[SaintLouieWoman]

These treads are pretty sweet...

http://www.flexcofloors.com/stair_treads.asp



I think I'm going to go with rubber. More natural. More durable. Unfortunately, more expensive.

[Click here to donate to the TNO stairs fund]

I go up and down two flights of steps every day with those rubber covers--at the office. When I go in to work late, I sneak up those back steps. When I'm on time, I use the elevator. 

Had ugly vinyl with horrible aluminum strips on the edges in my previous home. The home was one of those mid-century modern places. I was amazed at the beautiful wood trim when I pulled off the aluminum strips. But it was almost impossible to get that darned vinyl off the steps. The glue they had used was incredibly tough to remove.

[The Night Owl]

Had ugly vinyl with horrible aluminum strips on the edges in my previous home. The home was one of those mid-century modern places. I was amazed at the beautiful wood trim when I pulled off the aluminum strips. But it was almost impossible to get that darned vinyl off the steps. The glue they had used was incredibly tough to remove.

I wish I could leave the steps uncovered. Unfortunately, there is an uneven gap between the walls and the treads (the staircase is a closed staircase). Also, the steps are painted and there are ugly chipboard panels closing up the risers. I would leave the risers open but... I have cats. I have trouble imagining an uglier staircase.

[Chris_]

I wish I could leave the steps uncovered. Unfortunately, there is an uneven gap between the walls and the treads (the staircase is a closed staircase). Also, the steps are painted and there are ugly chipboard panels closing up the risers. I would leave the risers open but... I have cats. I have trouble imagining an uglier staircase.

Print this out & glue it to the steps.

[franksolich]

I wish I could leave the steps uncovered. Unfortunately, there is an uneven gap between the walls and the treads (the staircase is a closed staircase). Also, the steps are painted and there are ugly chipboard panels closing up the risers. I would leave the risers open but... I have cats. I have trouble imagining an uglier staircase.

Well now, this goes to the basement, right?

It shouldn't matter what it looks like if it goes to the basement; I assume it's pretty unlikely you haul guests and in-laws, or other people you might wish to impress, down there.

I could be wrong, but a wooden door leading to the basement might be cheaper than all this environmentally-hostile, nondecayable synthetic stuff.

[The Night Owl]

Well now, this goes to the basement, right?

It shouldn't matter what it looks like if it goes to the basement; I assume it's pretty unlikely you haul guests and in-laws, or other people you might wish to impress, down there.

I could be wrong, but a wooden door leading to the basement might be cheaper than all this environmentally-hostile, nondecayable synthetic stuff.

Well, the steps lead from the kitchen down to a finished office in the basement. When I get a chance I'll post a pic of the staircase so people can look at it and maybe recommend a way to dress it up.

I still like the rubber treads though... I think my inner communist craves a utilitarian aethestic in my surroundings.

[franksolich]

Well, the steps lead from the kitchen down to a finished office in the basement. When I get a chance I'll post a pic of the staircase so people can look at it and maybe recommend a way to dress it up.

I still like the rubber treads though... I think my inner communist craves a utilitarian aethestic in my surroundings.

There can't possibly be anything more utilitarian than wood.

Rubber, or vinyl, is practically indestructible, meaning your treads will be polluting the earth for 475,873,244 years or more, until they finally break down.

I see your point about having good stairs go down into an office, but I'm yet unconvinced rubber (or vinyl) is the way to go.