Growing concerns about national energy security, global climate change, and sustainability of natural resources have made the development of sustainable technology and products a priority worldwide. Our society has realized that environment-related problems should be viewed in a more global and systematic scale. Traditional industries, such as the carpet industry, are under pressure to develop more sustainable technologies and products. Life cycle assessment can be a powerful tool when a comparison has to be made among several products concerning environmental performance. Two carpet tile products: PVC-backed PERMABAC tile and polyolefin-backed ECOWORX tile from Shaw Inc. , are studied and compared using a life cycle approach. The cradle-to-grave environmental impact assessments are conducted using TRACI (Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and Other Environmental Impacts) (1). Based on the structure and composition of carpet tile product, carpet tile supply chain is grouped into four categories: face fibers, primary backing, polymeric backing system, and fillers. We find that the supply chains of carpet products play very important roles in the life cycle environmental performance of carpet products. Nylon fibers, as the economically significant component in carpet products, are also environmentally significant in the life cycles of carpet products. Carpet tile fillers, although the heaviest component in carpet tile, play the least significant role in the life cycle environmental performance of carpet tile product. PERMABAC tile consumes less natural resource energy in the tile manufacturing process than ECOWORX tile, but the life cycle natural resource energy consumption of PERMABAC tile is more than that of ECOWORX tile. As a result, the global warming impact of PERMABAC tile is more than that of ECOWORX tile.