Following its cancellation of the Phase 2 Request for Proposal (RFP) and bid selection in September, which caught everybody by surprise, the Forest Service “has gone back to work” on how to move forward with stewardship and treatment of the 520,000 acres that was included in Phase 2, which was part of the 4 Forests Restoration Initiative (4FRI) seeking to improve forest health conditions on more than 2.5 million acres across four Arizona national forests while establishing wood products manufacturing and biomass processing infrastructure.

The agency hosted an industry roundtable of 4FRI stakeholders on October 12 in Heber, Ariz. that addressed restoration strategies and “lessons learned.”

“Our critical work will continue with the goal of increasing the pace and scale of forest restoration across the 4FRI landscape,” the agency said, adding that the cancellation of Phase 2 does not affect any ongoing forest restoration or fuels reduction work, including stewardship agreements in place and plans to issue new timber sales in 2022.

“It was a surprise for sure,” comments John Godfrey, principal of Godfrey Forest Products, after the FS cancelled the Phase 2 RFP, just when it appeared the agency was about to award the winning bid on the 20-year, 520,000 acres stewardship contract.

Godfrey’s bid, apparently one of two in serious contention, included the construction of an 850MMSF oriented strandboard plant in Winslow, Ariz. Godfrey has developed several OSB facilities through the years.

The Forest Service cited “performance risk” concerns as a reason for the cancellation. The Phase 2 contract award announcement had been delayed several times since 2019 due to 13 contract modifications including reductions in stewardship acreage from as high as 800,000 acres during initial discussions. Upon the cancellation, the FS stated, “The requirements for meeting the restoration objectives (as currently defined in the RFP) are not reasonably aligned to industry needs. In addition, significant financial and investment risks remain which ultimately represents a performance risk to the government.”

In so many words, over a 20-year period what happens if FS timberlands dedicated to the project are somehow made unavailable due to fire damage or administrative withdrawal? How does the FS replace those resources and how are Phase 2 investors to be placated or compensated?

The FS statement added, “It is in the best interest of the government to thoroughly reassess the requirement so that any new solicitation issued would better address all risks to offerors and the government, including financial and investment risks.”

Gofrey remains committed to the process. In addition to a site for the plant, Godfrey’s OSB project has completed an engineering design, preliminary air work, and he has a number of contractual relationships lined up.

“It’s a great place to build a mill,” he says. “It’s in the middle of a big market. It’s also meaningful to be part of forest restoration, fire reduction and preserving the water supply. There’s no reason to throw this away. If it takes another year then that’s what it takes.”

News of the cancellation brought outcries from several stakeholders, including politicians and others. Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and other elected officials slammed the decision, citing the federal government’s inability to step up to address wildfire risks and protect Arizona communities.

The Phase 2 setback continues a tough run for the 4FRI effort: Phase 1, initially awarded in 2012 then transferred in 2013 to its current owner NewLife Forest Restoration, and including 300,000 acres over 10 years, has been hampered due to lack of logging and conversion capacity and is just now appearing to turn the corner on infrastructure needs while the number of acres actually treated remain well below initial projections.

NewLife, which is in the process of installing a sawmill at Bellemonte, Ariz., was apparently the other major bidder for the Phase 2 contract. There was some speculation that both Godfrey’s and NewLife’s bids would be partially or fully awarded.

A big sticking point in operating the Phase 1 contract (and the same for Phase 2) is a lack of biomass markets in the state, while the overall 4FRI will require producing mountains of the low-quality material. There’s only one dedicated biomass power producer in Arizona, Novo Power, which has utilizing material produced in ongoing forest health operations in the White Mountains area, but at 24 MW can only process so much.

Novo Power, operating at Snowflake, Ariz., participated in both the sawmill and OSB bids to take the biomass resulting from those two projects.

“I was stunned by the cancellation,” comments Novo Power President Brad Worsley. “I knew that there was always a possibility of cancellation but the stated reasons for cancellation were true a year ago; the US FS should have cancelled then if the gap could not be bridged.”

Novo Power has less than two years remaining on its current PPAs. “At this point we need resolution on our PPAs so that we can move forward, invest and maintain the critical employee base that we have today,” Worsley says. “We will support whatever comes in the future but our future needs certainty now.”

Funding for forest health and forest fire prevention programs and contracts is included the Biden administration infrastructure bill that is still under debate.

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CalPlant I, LLC, which took 25 years to develop and build a rice straw-based medium density fiberboard plant and produce its first board late last year in Willows, Calif., has voluntarily filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and intends to conduct a court-supervised sale process.

The company has entered into a Plan Support Agreement (PSA) with its senior bondholders, which provides for a comprehensive financial restructuring of the company’s debt and the investment resources to complete the commissioning of the manufacturing facility en route to the sale of the operation.

The company states it will continue to operate without disruption to its vendors, customers or employees, and will have sufficient liquidity to meet its financial obligations throughout the restructuring process.

Jeffrey Wagner, Cal­Plant Executive Chairman, comments, “The road to fully commissioning our plant has not been smooth. We started commissioning our facility in early March 2020, then the pandemic hit. Suddenly, the usual challenges and delays associated with a startup were compounded with navigating a startup using first-of-its-kind technology during a global pandemic. Still, our team remained dedicated, resilient and ready to pivot to continue our momentum towards completion.”

CalPlant is located in the Sacramento Valley, an area estimated to have an annual quantity of more than 1.5 million tons in rice straw waste. Once operating at full capacity, the company expects to process around 280,000 tons of otherwise non-recyclable rice straw from its surrounding regions per year to produce 150MMSF of MDF product. The pioneering operation was founded upon eliminating the need for post-harvest flood­ing, thus reducing water usage and methane emissions, en route to becoming the world’s first commercial-scale manufacturer of no-added-formaldehyde, rice straw-based MDF, a product line which it eventually started calling “Eureka.”

“We are confident that leveraging the benefits of the Chapter 11 process will allow us to emerge with a stronger financial structure that enables us to continue leading the manufacturing industry with innovative sustainable MDF,” Wagner adds.

The company states it has secured commitments for up to $30.1 million in Debtor-in-Possession (DIP) financing from certain of the company’s senior bondholders to support the business during the Chapter 11 process. Subject to court approval, CalPlant estimates that substantially all trade vendors who will have an ongoing business relationship with the company will be paid for goods and services in the normal course of business without interruption.

CalPlant expects that the deadline to submit qualified binding bids will be established at a later date pursuant to bidding and sale procedures to be approved by the court.

CalPlant and its predecessor company, CalAg, LLC, spent many years and millions of dollars researching, developing and patenting a process to make high-quality MDF using annually renewable rice straw as the feedstock, the disposal of which had posed environmental issues in California for decades. The post-harvest rice straw was burned at a nominal cost to farmers until California banned the burning due to air quality concerns, leading to greater expense for farmers to dispose of the straw.

CalPlant secured it raw material needs by executing long-term fixed price rice straw supply contracts.

The project went through a series of unsuccessful efforts to pull together funding, and then in June 2017 closed the deal with $92 million in equity from a small consortium of investors and $225 million in tax-exempt bonds issued via the California Pollution Control Financing Authority and subsequently sold to qualified institutional investors.

Following a separation with the initial general contractor, CalPlant began coordinating with machinery manufacturer Siempelkamp to complete construction of the plant, including the installation of a ContiRoll continuous press 10 ft. x 117 ft. However, in addition to scheduling issues caused by the pandemic, the plant ran into issues in the refiner system, according to a bankruptcy declaration by the company. The mill reportedly continues to wrestle with some front end issues but the remainder of the plant is reportedly running well, while areas of operation continue to be optimized or modified. “Plant acceptance” may be achiev­ed early next year, but full operating capacity is not anticipated for a while.

A source close to the operation reports the mill produced 3MMSF (3⁄4 in. basis) in September but struggled with uptime, averaging 40-45%. As of early October it had 700 truckloads in the market and the board is said to be performing well in the applications in which it is being used. Reaching 8MMSF month­ly at year end is a possibility and could entice an investor or industry company to come in and ramp it up to its full potential. The inventory of straw on the yard is said to be substantial.

A May monthly bondholder report pointed to lack of available liquidity and increased expenses such as with MDI re­sin. The project had taken on additional funding beyond the original financing. Reports of non-payment of scheduled interest began surfacing late last year.

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