Richard Catt, CEO of the Contract Flooring Association, introduces the 2024/25 CFA Guide to Sustainability – following a year in which the climate indicators seem to have become ever more urgent, but also a year in which CFA member businesses and others have continued to take important steps forward towards meeting the goal of Net Zero Carbon by 2050.

This version of the CFA’s Guide to Sustainability is somewhat back to basics, returning to its roots in seeking to offer guidance that the reader can apply to improve their sustainability activity.
And so that has been part of my thinking in offering input and an outline for the type of articles we might seek in development meetings. I’m currently seeing flooring sustainability through three main lenses. The first is the drive to net zero and how we can help our members to improve their carbon footprint. The second, is the circular economy and products lens.

I accept that they are linked, but in terms of input, the former relates to things that contractors can do today and the latter includes wider industry issues that we need to think about. Circular flooring needs development across the supply chain and beyond even to a political and legislative level. I said three subject areas and the third is legacy products, but I’ll come on to that later.
In the pages of this year’s guide you will see articles that remind our members of the many ways that they can “green” their business.

Solar panels on buildings to reduce energy costs and support the supply of renewables. Information on EV vehicles and ensuring that journeys are direct and kept to minimum with car/van sharing. Recycling of waste produced outside of flooring as well as on projects and how that can be best be dealt with. It is no co-incidence that there are more schemes now available from a large range of suppliers, many of course sponsored or supported by CFA manufacturers. Clearly, more businesses are taking this seriously.

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