Armstrong Flooring company has reached a milestone via its On&On Recycling Program: The company has recycled more than 100 million pounds of post-consumer flooring materials, and kept 50,000 tons of materials out of landfills.
“Sustainable consumption and production is about promoting resource and energy efficiency and that is exactly what our On&On Recycling Program does. It diverts material from the landfill and reduces resource use, degradation and pollution along the whole lifecycle,” said Amy Costello, Sustainability Manager, Armstrong Flooring. “The On&On Recycling Program enables our products to have lower environmental footprints while supporting our commitment to circular economy principles and closed-loop manufacturing.”
To date, the program has saved:
- 1.3 billion gallons of water or 2.7 million bathtubs full of water
- 44 million kg of greenhouse gases eliminated, which is equivalent to removing emissions from 25,000 cars
- 154 million kWh of energy, or enough to power 12,000 homes for a year
Since 2009, the On&On Floor Recycling Program has offered commercial building owners and contractors an alternative to traditional disposal and a flexible, end-of-life recycling solution for resilient flooring products. This program was the first program of its kind to recycle installed Armstrong flooring products as well as qualifying competitive products. It is available throughout the contiguous United States and Canada and is possible because of technological innovations developed by Armstrong Flooring.
What began as a recycling program for VCT has expanded into a comprehensive program that includes Luxury Vinyl Tile (LVT) and BioBased Tile (BBT). As LVT experiences continued growth in North America, this innovative product’s lifecycle becomes increasingly important, and Armstrong Flooring has committed to creating and perpetuating a simple, rewarding recycling option.
Eligible flooring is recycled in a closed-loop, post-consumer stream with reclaimed material incorporated into new flooring products. Regional recycling facilities in California, Illinois, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania handle the reclamation process, which includes both Armstrong Flooring products and qualifying competitive flooring products from demolition and renovation projects.
“The program’s success would not have been possible without the establishment of key strategic partnerships with contractors, distributors, flooring installers and partnerships with major corporations such as Target, Walmart, and Kroger that are committed to operating sustainably,” said Costello. For example, Armstrong Flooring partners with Linron Company, the nation’s leading national account distributor for retail chain stores. Linron, Armstrong Flooring Recycler of the Year in 2017, works with their retail customers to promote and implement the Armstrong Flooring On&On Floor Recycling Program.
Armstrong Flooring has a long history of recycling and environmental stewardship, starting with reusing cork waste for linoleum floors in the early 1900s. Over 100 years before the term “Circular Economy” was coined, the company’s founder and innovator, Thomas Armstrong, built a linoleum flooring manufacturing facility near the Armstrong Cork Company in Lancaster, PA, to use cork and bottle cap waste as a raw material feedstock for Armstrong linoleum flooring.
