Heated concrete floors are green?

Being an Earth Advantage S.T.A.R. graduate, I wanted the home I was building to be as green as possible. Flooring materials are usually hardwood or engineered hardwood. Sometime tile, carpet, or laminate can be used, however they are usually made and shipped from distances that are not as acceptable for a green home. Carpet-eliminated, I could just see the dog and kids coming in from the mud and rain, the upkeep would be a nightmare. Tile? Cleaning grout was not a fun way to spend time. Laminate or vinyl floors were eliminated due to the appearance and VOCs.

This left me with hardwood, but I decided to be adventurous and use concrete. For indoor air quality, concrete has no noticeable VOCs and it is usually produced locally eliminating wasted energy involved in manufacturing and shipping.

A little time spent researching floor coverings will save you much confusion and " surprise costs" after it is too late to make changes. Concrete is comparable in cost to white and red oak at about $3-6 a square foot. Now add a radiant heated concrete floor and you have an easy care, long lasting,toasty floor that warms toes and kids and animals love the heat! The radiant heat system will add a cost of approximately $1400 upwards, depending upon the number of temperature controls and size of home.

Color choice is wide and variable and while it is best to think about your wall, rug, and furniture colors to blend with your floors, it is also very important to think about what will be coming into the house. I chose Mesa Buff, a khaki, one color added to the concrete.This color fits my lifestyle as my home is surrounded by fir trees whose needles are constantly coming in with every person that steps through the door. Therefore choosing a color close to the fir needles Mesa Buff was a great match. There are any number of colors you can add to the concrete or it can be stained with other colors. There will be quite a bit of variations in the color itself. Just as hardwood has variations in color my floor has quite a unique pattern. This was achieved by only coloring the concrete and pouring.

What happens in the summer? Turn the heat off, and the concrete cools down. Your flooring becomes this wonderful slab of coolness in the hottest of NW weather.