- Revised December 29, 2025
Sustainable Ground Protection Mats
Sustainable ground protection mats and strong financial returns don’t have to be separate.
Definition – What Makes a Mat Sustainable?
Our definition of sustainable ground protection mats is a product that is made from natural materials, which can be recycled, repurposed, or re-used, and which products last a long time. For example, a wood based timber mat is made from natural materials, but if it only lasts 12 months and rots is that sustainable? You’d have to buy many, many 12-month lifespan timber mats to serve your purposes. True: Handled correctly, you could recycle the fiber into mulch or something similar. But, compared with a similar timber mat that lasts 5-7 years, the “sustainability score” will be a lot lower.
In other words, sustainable products use environmentally friendly inputs to create long-lasting products. A long-lasting product requires less raw material than a shorter-lived product and disposal happens less frequently. If the product biodegrades or can be reused, then one can repeat indefinitely with minimal harm to the environment. Some people refer to this process as “circular economy”.
Eucalyptus Sustainable Ground Protection Mats
In respect to World Forest Group’s Eucalyptus timber mats the aspects of stronger and standardized helps make Eucalyptus timber mats a more sustainable ground protection mat solution. 5-7 year lifespan, 20% more mats per truck, ability to reuse or repurpose mats at end of lifespan all contribute to a solid sustainable ground protection mat solution.
Plantation‑grown Eucalyptus is about five times faster growing than typical hardwoods and provides forest cover where there previously was none, improving the mat’s sustainability profile.
Humanity’s impact on the natural world is coming under ever greater focus, and we welcome this shift in the business world. Profit can co-exist comfortably with people and the planet. That’s why we started our business and that was our first definition of “sustainability”, which has been one of our guiding principles. (Our parent company, Sustainable Forest Systems, has managed tropical forests responsibly since 1991, and that ethos guides our definition of “sustainability” today.).
Specifically, a longer lived sustainable ground protection mat means less CAPEX, less replacements, and lower depreciation. A lighter sustainable ground protection mat means less truck freight.
We would not produce a product that we couldn’t objectively state was environmentally friendly. So how is A Better Eucalyptus Timber Mat good for the environment?
Why Longer‑Lived Mats Are More Sustainable
The ideal sustainable ground protection mat will exhibit:
- Less CAPEX and fewer replacements over the mat’s life
- Lower depreciation per year
- Lighter weight, which means fewer trucks and lower transport emissions
All Mats Have Some Sustainable Ground Protection Mat Value
Timber Mats
The most obvious answer is common to all timber mats: Our product protects the ground from heavy equipment during construction projects. This is the basic use of all matting solutions, helping to protect against compaction, soil erosion and protecting what’s under the ground such as natural gas pipelines or archaeological sites.
Our Eucalyptus mats go further than other timber mats in two key areas: sustainability of the fiber resource, and reduced carbon footprint. Biomass growth in our Brazilian Eucalyptus plantations is about five times faster than natural US hardwood forests, providing an excellent carbon sink and reducing pressure on US hardwood forests.
Our Eucalyptus mats are constructed from trees sourced from fast growing, constantly renewing Brazilian plantations, which provide landscape-scale forest cover to areas that previously had none. Biomass growth is about five times faster than natural US hardwood forests, providing an excellent carbon sink. Furthermore, the use of Brazilian plantations takes harvesting pressure off USA natural hardwood forests.
Eucalyptus is lighter than either oak or mixed hardwood alternatives; more mats can fit on a truck for transport. The use of fewer trucks for moving and repositioning mats lowers the carbon footprint.
Other Mats
Are HDPE Mats Sustainable?
Steel Mats and Sustainability
Steel mats, though expensive, are similarly long‑lived. Transport is less advantageous because of higher weight, and the resources and energy used in making steel are large. Data from the Inventory of Carbon and Energy (ICE) show that the embodied energy per kilogram of steel is roughly a quarter of that of HDPE, but steel is also much stronger and denser, so per‑mat comparisons depend on design, thickness, and use. That’s not quite a fair comparison as steel is ~10x stronger than HDPE
Ask Your Vendor
We also believe that vendors can make a meaningful contribution to owners and contractors by providing more sustainable product offerings. Customers and investors are driving this sustainability push forward and we’ll need to adapt as an industry. More information at https://eucmat.is/green
Questions? Contact us.
