Information about formaldehyde release from wood flooring

Decorate home with wood flooring is now the choice of the vast majority of young people, and this is a fashion trend nowadays.But for wooden floors, formaldehyde issue is really a big problem, which annoys many people for the home decoation.Today we would like to share you with some information about formaldehyde in the aspect of wood flooring.

Formaldehyde superscale (excessive formaldehyde emssion),excessive Formaldehyde inhalation may result in severe irritation and edema, eye irritation respiratory tract, may also induce asthma. Headache, dizziness, weakness, nausea, vomiting, chest congestion, eye pain, throat pain, palpitations, insomnia, poor appetite, weight loss, and hypomnesis are minor wound, what is more, long-term inhalation of pregnant women may result in fetal malformations ,even fetal death. Men’s inhaling c Formaldehyde an cause male sperm abnormalities and death. 　　

Of course, don't be scared too much. In fact,formaldehyde content in a certain range will not harm our health, man's odor threshold is usually 0.06~0.07mg/m3 of formaldehyde content.First of all, let us have a look at the mandatory national standards of wood flooring. The emision limit of formaldehyde in the national standards of wood flooring(GB 18580-2001) : formaldehyde emission from hardwooden flooring must be less than or equal to 1.5mg/L, or E1 standard. Those qualified wood flooring with this formaldehyde emision, can be directly applied to the Interior decorations. To protect people’s health against formaldehyde, there are other higher starndard of the formaldehyde emsision around the world, which include European standards of E0 ≤ 0.5mg/L, and ther higher standards of F4 ≤ 0.3mg/L, Super F4 non-formaldehyde standard floor: 0.1mg/L

EI ≤ 1.5mg/L is the standard of desiccator method measurement. This desiccator method is as below: in certain temperature and humidity conditions , put 10 small pieces of wood flooring sample (150x50x15mm) into a container of 40 liters. At the bottom of the container,there is  a desiccator for measuring water level, the formaldehyde realese of wood flooring would be measured according to the formaldehyde dissolved in water.

There are another two methods of testing formaldehyde content-: the perforated-extraction method(≤ 9mg/100g), the climate Chamber method(≤ 0.12mg/m3).

Formaldehyde of wood flooring comes from the flooring adhesives,flooring production, and the flooring lacquer and painting. The major source is the glue used for wood flooring and laminate flooring in the production process. Because the wood flooring glue is made of the glurea-formaldehyde resins,which can emit formaldehyde. As a result, those wood floorings made with non-formaldehyde glue, could release formaldehyde content ≤ 0.1mg/L.

After having an understanding of formaldehyde release standards, we could ask the flooring suppliers which glue is used for the wood flooring and what is their standardards for the formaldehyde emision when you are buying wood flooring. Of course it is best for the suppliers to provide you with test certificates. 　　

It would not be a good idea for you to move in the new house at once after the wood flooring is installed. Open the windows to ventilate the new house and this will decrease the formaldehyde content in the air of your new house. PS: do not spray air fresheners, perfumes to try to cover up the smell of new decoration indoor. The chemicals in air fresheners reacting with harmful substances in the air, will cause secondary pollution, this will be more harmful to health.

Put in the house some greenery (Spider plant, sansevieria, Ivy, Aloe, Agave) to absorb formaldehyde.

With the above information, we hope you would have a beeter understanding of formaldehyde from hardwood flooring, and these information will help you build a green healthy home