Bamboo is technically a grass. It is best known as a snack for panda bears. Don't let its panda-snack-grass-technically status fool you. It is a strong and sturdy building material that is heavily lauded and often featured on Renovation Nation.
One of the most amazing things about bamboo is how unbelievably fast it grows. Bamboo can grow up to four feet a day! Imagine how tall you'd be if you grew four feet a day. You'd be really tall! NOTE: It is impossible to grow that fast or that tall.
New technologies have come along that allow us to turn bamboo into lumber and other things. Anything that is created with conventional lumber can now be created with bamboo, and bamboo can be grown on almost every continent. Visiting a chemical-free bamboo forest that ships and manufactures locally could be a common activity of the future.
Because bamboo can grow so fast, it is ludicrously renewable. Bamboo growth varies from climate to climate and from soil to soil. It usually takes about three years to renew itself.
On the downside, bamboo can be a pest in its non-native environment. It may also require treatments with pesticides and other environmentally unfriendly chemicals. But one day, all our bamboo-dreams may come true.
Move over, oak. Step aside, pine. Bamboo is here. It is renewable. It is relatively clean, and if a panda comes to your dinner party unexpected, you can let him eat a part of your floor. Personally, I'd just call the Humane Society.
