December 8, 2004—Armstrong World Industries announced that its Ceiling Recycling Program has now diverted more than twenty million square feet of old acoustical ceiling tiles from landfills since the inception of the program five years ago.
Armstrong is the country’s largest producer of acoustical ceiling tiles. Since it introduced the recycling program in 1999, the company has reclaimed 20,088,000 square feet of discarded ceiling tiles, or enough tiles to cover 349 football fields. This total also represents 14,062,000 pounds, or nearly 7,100 tons, of construction waste that would have normally been dumped in landfills.
The program, which is still the only one of its kind, enables building owners to ship old ceilings from renovation projects to an Armstrong ceiling plant as an alternative to landfill disposal. Under the program, the company even pays freight costs for shipping the old ceilings, which it uses as raw materials in the manufacture of new ceilings. The old tiles do not have to be Armstrong products to qualify for the program.
Organizations around the country currently participating in the ceiling recycling program in order to reduce landfill disposal of building materials include Microsoft, Nike, Pfizer, Food Lion, the World Bank and the School District of Philadelphia.
All Armstrong ceilings contain recycled materials, and many consist of more than two-thirds recycled content. While a portion of the content is old scrap ceiling material, the company also uses waste products from other industries. Most of that waste is in the form of old newspapers and a by-product of steel production called “mineral wool.”
For more information, contact Armstrong.
