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PVC And The Environment: 4 Ways Vinyl Helps The Environment

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Is PVC Good Or Bad For Our Environment?

Many consumers and businesses are starting to embrace the responsibility of making buying decisions that help, not harm, our planet. It is important to choose products and solutions everyday that are beneficial to our environment and the world we live in.

So, the question at hand is: do vinyl/PVC products help or harm our environment? Over the past 20 years, dozens of life cycle studies have been performed on PVC to see how manufacturing and using vinyl products affects our environment. The short answer is that vinyl products have a positive effect on our environment - there are at least four specific ways that using PVC is beneficial to nature.

Requires Less Resources To Manufacture

Manufacturing PVC products requires less energy and fewer expendable resources when compared to alternative products.

Saves energy. By requiring less energy to manufacture, PVC helps reduce energy usage and CO2 emissions. Manufacturing vinyl products requires 20% less energy than other plastics.

PVC products also help conserve energy when they are used. Here are several examples:

  • ENERGY STAR PVC roofing membranes reflect solar energy to reduce cooling costs

  • ENERGY STAR vinyl window frames conserve energy, reducing both heating and cooling costs

  • PVC pipe requires less energy to pump water


Conserves resources. Using PVC products conserves limited fossil fuels, since the principle raw material vinyl is made from is salt. Nearly 60% of the raw materials used to create the final product is chlorine, derived from salt.

Durability Benefits The Planet

PVC products are highly durable, which translates to several benefits for the environment.

Longer lifespan - since vinyl products have such a long life span, fewer replacements are needed, which translates to reduced usage of resources.

Fewer chemicals - since vinyl products are highly durable this reduces the need for toxic chemicals such as cleaners or paints.

Vinyl Recycling Helps Reduce Waste

More than one billion pounds of pvc products are recycled every year. Many carpet, roofing, and building supply manufacturers have highly successful vinyl recycling programs.

For more information about recycling vinyl and pvc products, visit this lens: PVC Recycling: Examples Of Recycled Vinyl

PVC Conserves Water

Did you know that over 2.3 trillion gallons of treated water are lost every year (just in the USA) because of leaks from older, corroded pipes? That's right!

Using PVC pipes can cut this waste to nearly nothing, because PVC pipes never corrode, and they have among the lowest leak rates of any type of pipe.

More Information On Vinyl & The Environment

Vinyl & The Environment
PVC products benefit our environment in many ways. This information from The Vinyl Institute outlines the studies that have been completed and what they mean for vinyl and our planet.

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