Wanted: Project Partners for Wood Recovery Technology Development Project
Global warming is contributing to more frequent and more intense fires, hurricanes, pest infestations and other natural disasters that annually damage millions of acres of North American timber resources. When these annual volumes of victimized timber are added to the billions of board feet of previously damaged timber on a continuing basis, the total volume of potentially wasted timber becomes staggering. Based on the fact that a significant percentage of higher quality victimized timber is often recoverable and should be transitioned into the raw material supply chain for the wood products manufacturing sector, which would be the responsible economic and environmental approach, a pro-active collaboration between Auburn Enterprises, LLC and the Wood Education and Resource Center (WERC) has created technology concept to effectively capitalize on this essential opportunity.
In phase one, they developed the design for a cutting edge compact, portable, self contained, single operator, high production and small environmental footprint wood recovery and value adding system that can cost effectively convert random size logs into a uniform size high yield product that can be directly merchandised to the primary, secondary and specialty wood products manufacturing sectors. Processing occurs automatically and in a single pass, and 100% of the fiber is captured. Along with the design was developed a significant volume of projected performance and costing data and system operation and marketing material to provide the foundation for phase two.
Phase two involves prototyping and demonstration as the next step towards commercializing this likely trend setting technology. Partial funding has been provided as seed money for phase two and project partners are needed to help drive this project to a successful end. Outreach to a range of logging contractors, concentration yards, tree service companies, transfer stations, recycling facilities and other wood processing operations has established that there are numerous players in these sectors that have an interest in seeing this recovery and value adding technology demonstrated. Outreach to a number of wood product manufacturing companies who are looking to produce products for the rapidly expanding Green marketplace, along with building materials eligible for Green building credits, has clearly determined a significant interest in access to recovered wood. The significant missing link between the recoverable victimized timber, the processors and the marketplace is the availability of an efficient and cost effective recovery system for victimized timber.
The rationale behind developing this design concept is based on two significant emerging trends. First, the North American forest products industry is entering a new phase that will provide it with major opportunities and challenges. As “Environmental Footprint” becomes more the focus of consumers, and as they recognize that wood is the most environmentally friendly building and manufacturing material on our planet, the demand for products made from wood could grow exponentially. And second, as global warming continues to progress, more devastation will be inflicted on stands of timber making sustainable management of this vital natural resource an even bigger challenge in the future. The question is how can our industry successfully capitalize on this emerging opportunity while simultaneously facing the challenge of sustaining timber resources while forests are being victimized at a faster pace?
One of the key answers is the availability of the “After the Disaster - Rapid Deployment Wood Recovery System” that this project is focused on, shifting millions of board feet annually of CO² sequestering wood into the industry’s supply chain for solid wood products while simultaneously reducing harvesting pressures on healthy and CO² sequestering timber stands. Without a pro-active and responsible approach to dealing with untold billions of board feet of timber that will be left to die and decompose, billions of tons of CO² and methane will be released into the atmosphere over time, mountains of kindling and fuel for future infernos will accumulate, and vast breeding areas for inevitable greater pest infestations will materialize, all undermining the sustainable management of our forest resources as well as exacerbating already growing global warming problems,
Ultimately this proposed cutting edge resource recovery and value adding technology holds promise to generate a wide range of economic and environmental benefits as well as provide significant entrepreneurial opportunities throughout the wood product manufacturing and resource recovery sectors.
Anyone interested in this important natural resource recovery technology development project needs to contact Thom Labrie at either 207-946-3420 or thom@fairpoint.net.