Action 9 tests Lumber Liquidators flooring for formaldehyde

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Many eyes are on the flooring giant, Lumber Liquidators, since a national report aired, saying the company's Chinese-made laminate flooring had high levels of the cancer-causing chemical, formaldehyde.

Now, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is looking into whether to issue a recall, the Justice Department is considering criminal charges, and some local customers are worried whether their floors are safe.

Free Test Kits

Since this all came out, Lumber Liquidators has begun offering customers free kits to test their floors. Anyone wanting to order one of those free tests, CLICK HERE.

The Herbys

Local customer Jenna and Keith Herby spend a lot of time on the floor, playing with their son and dogs.  So they worried when they heard about the national news report, claiming that certain Lumber Liquidators flooring, including the kind they put it, may have unsafe levels of formaldehyde.  Jenna Herby's immediate reaction to hearing the report was, "Oh gosh, what have we done?"

So they took the company up on its offer and asked for one of its free test kits.  The kits test the air above the floor to see how much formaldehyde the floors give off.   But, since the store was supplying the test, the Herbys weren't sure they'd trust the results.

"If they're hiring it and they're providing it, there's a little bit of hesitation with that," Jenna Herby said.

Action 9's Test

So Action 9 bought its own air test from a certified south Charlotte lab it has used before, EMSL Analytical, which doesn't have any ties with Lumber Liquidators.  Stoogenke hung that test kit next to the free one the Herbys ordered.  It was the same kind of test, hung at the same time and for the same amount of time.  Then Action 9 and the Herbys waited.

"If it comes back and it's above the acceptable limit, the floor's going. No questions asked. It doesn't matter how much it costs. Or if we have to lay another 900 square feet of flooring by ourselves, we're not going to have something in our house that's not safe," Jenna Herby said.

• The store's results were .025 parts per million of formaldehyde detected.
• Action 9's results were .033 parts per million detected.

Both are in the safe range, and the difference is small in science terms, but the fact that the one that looks more favorable for Lumber Liquidators in the one the store provided raises questions for the Herbys.

Lumber Liquidators Responds

Lumber Liquidators defends its test, saying, "As part of our indoor air testing program, Lumber Liquidators engaged parties that utilized accepted industry testing methods and protocols, and the results are generated by laboratories accredited for this method of formaldehyde analysis.  We can't speak to the specific protocols used by the other lab, how it calculated or validated the result or the variability of its testing.  However, the test results are similar and both fall well below the World Health Organization guidelines."

The WHO and CDC guidelines say anything below .1 PPM is in the "low" range. CLICK HERE for more information from the CDC.

Lumber Liquidators also defends the objectivity of the lab it used.

"EDLab is the laboratory we chose to receive the test kits and to process results and send them out to customers. EDLab partners with laboratories that are accredited for formaldehyde analysis to analyze the test kits and generate results. EDLab and its partner labs are independent and their only relation with us is to provide these testing services," a spokesperson emailed Action 9.

More Expensive Test

Action 9 also did a more expensive test that actually tests the wood, not the air around it.  The results were .05 PPM, which is higher than the air test results, but still only in the middle of the "low" range.

Lumber Liquidators responded, saying, "The wood sample test is not more sensitive to formaldehyde. It simply measures something different, and the two tests are not comparable. The air test measures formaldehyde levels in indoor air people are actually breathing. The wood sample test does not evaluate the indoor air in a home or replicate real life conditions. We believe people are most interested in understanding real life conditions in their home.  However, as part of our testing program, if the air quality test results show levels in excess of World Health Organization guidelines, those customers are contacted directly for further investigation, which may include additional in-home air testing and testing of floor samples.  Because formaldehyde can come from many things commonly found in homes, these extra steps are meant to determine whether the flooring could be contributing to the elevated levels."

WSOC