Wood v Aluminium v PVC

[Markanthony]

Hi
I'm planning to replace all my doors and windows in the coming months, My problem is I want to use the product that has the lowest environmental/ecological impact. I,ve searched and found plenty of opinions but can't find any conclusive evidance based on independant research... Any ideas?

 

[DCC]

You'll never get a proper answer to that as almost all environmental impact studies are deeply flawed e.g. comparisons of CO2 footprints of cars during their use that dont take into account how and where they are manufactured, what recycled/recycleable parts they contain, the type of plastics and paints used, the impact of the workers and their living/transport, the power source for the plant. etc, etc, etc ad nuseum. Also since nobody has a set of agreed 'impacts' we have no sane system for comparing them.

Most aluminium contains a good deal of recycled aluminium but its still *very* power intensive to produce it and leaves gaping open cast mines around the world - do you care more about the power (CO2) or the mines (ecological) impact?

On the face of it wood sounds good - its natural and easy to produce but will someone be hopping in a car 10 times during its lifetime to visit homebase and buy some (not very environmentally friendly) varnish - (how big an artic is that moved around in by the way?) to keep it in good condition?

Bottom line is nobody knows - if you are thinking greenhouse then CO2 is the tip of the iceberg - some of the nasty solvents used in industy are supposedly thousands and in some cases millions of times more harmful than the equivalent in good old CO2 - none of that stuff even shows in the headline figures. If you are concerned I think you'd do far better worrying about the stuff you can control namely the thermal efficiency of the windows themselves - triple glazed continental style ones would probably be a good start except ... they have to be shipped and uh oh back to square one.

 

[Markanthony]

Thanks for the reply DCC
You'd expect,as a carpenter, i'd opt for wood though I have to say i'm leaning towards High Quality upvc. Yes I know it's manufacturing process leaves a lot to be desired and when weighted up againest the life span impact of using wood not to mention the labour and monotony involved in painting. - no offense meant to any painters.
i've found a company making upvc that look's and feel's like aluminium they cover the paint finish in their warranty. i don't think there's a significant differance between the 3 please DCC correct me if i'm wrong here. oh and did i mention i save a fortune!

 

[mointainwalker]

Since you mention "paint" and "warranty", I'd be curious to know what the warranty is.

I have no personal experience of uPVC windows but all plastics are affected to some extent by UV and will crack sometime: depending on the plasticisers etc used this could be a lot of years even unprotected.

If however they require painting, then I could see that as a very regular task as the bond to the uPVC would not be great unless there is a special paint formulated for that.

 

[andytx]

I have no personal experience of uPVC windows but all plastics are affected to some extent by UV and will crack sometime: depending on the plasticisers etc used this could be a lot of years even unprotected.

If however they require painting, then I could see that as a very regular task as the bond to the uPVC would not be great unless there is a special paint formulated for that.

All plastics are not affected by UV, but most are. uPVC is the same stuff as plastic drain-pipes and gutters, I've yet to see any that have cracked through weathering. Also, I've never seen anybody paint them.

Andy