Dive Brief:
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Home Depot announced Wednesday it will stop selling vinyl flooring that contains toxic chemicals known as phthalates.
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Although no federal law prohibits the sale of flooring containing phthalate plasticizers, the Consumer Product Safety Commission limits their use in toys and children’s merchandise to less than 0.1% of the total material makeup.
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Since CBS’s "60 Minutes" exposed the alleged unhealthy levels of formaldehyde in Lumber Liquidators’ laminates on March 1, flooring products have come under scrutiny by builders, homeowners and healthy home advocates.
Dive Insight:
Home Depot’s action is, in part, a response to pressure from the nonprofit Mind the Store Campaign, which released a report on Tuesday saying “most” vinyl flooring it tested from home-improvement retailers contained toxic phthalates. The report called Home Depot, the largest home-improvement retailer, “far ahead of its competitors” because of its decision to require all of its vinyl flooring suppliers to eliminate the chemicals by end the of the year.
Lumber Liquidators told CNN it is working toward removing phthalates from its vinyl flooring, but in a statement said: “To be clear, all our products—vinyl or otherwise—are safe for consumers." Lowe’s has not announced any changes to its vinyl flooring products.