by Web Editor | May 22, 2018 | News
USDA Forest Service Interim Chief Vicki Christiansen recently announced the award of almost $8 million to expand and accelerate wood products and wood energy markets. The Wood Innovation Grants will stimulate the removal of hazardous fuels from national forests and other forest lands to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires, promote forest health, and reduce the cost of forest management. The investment of federal funds will leverage over $13 million in matching funds from 33 business, university, nonprofit, and tribal partners in 20 states for a total investment of over $21 million.
“These Wood Innovation grants advance state-of-the-art solutions to reducing wildfire risk and making our forests healthier and more resilient,” said Forest Service Interim Chief Christiansen. “The public-private partnerships leveraged with these grants also foster increased economic development in rural communities.”
Previous grants supported successful blast testing of cross-laminated timber (CLT) that directly resulted in the Department of Defense using CLT on its on-base hotels; and the funding of a feasibility analysis for a new CLT manufacturing facility to increase the amount of U.S.-made CLT.
This year the Forest Service received 119 proposals, demonstrating the expanding interest in using wood in both traditional and unconventional ways, such as an innovative building material and as a renewable energy source. Since 2005 more than 260 grants have been awarded to improve forest health, create jobs, invest in renewable energy, and support healthy communities.
Of the 34 projects funded in 2018, 28 focus upon expanding markets for wood products, and six seek to increase markets for wood energy. Some examples include utilizing small-diameter woody material in cross laminated timber (CLT) panels, addressing affordable housing in the northeast building market with mass timber, converting woody debris to renewable natural gas for transportation fuel, and using juniper biomass and biochar to filter heavy metals and manage storm water.
Read more on this from the USDA Forest Service at https://www.fs.fed.us/news/releases/usda-forest-service-awards-wood-innovation-grants-expand-and-accelerate-wood-products.
by Web Editor | Mar 19, 2018 | News
Forisk projects U.S. softwood lumber consumption of 49.8 BBFT in 2018. This represents a 3.7% increase from our 2017 forecast of 48.1 BBFT and is 5.4% higher than 2016 actuals of 47.3 BBFT. Softwood lumber consumption increased every year since 2009, but remained 26.4% below the 2005 consumption high of 64.2 BBFT. U.S. softwood lumber production is forecasted to increase 5.0% to 35.6 billion board feet in 2018. The South drives this growth with production expected to rise 6.4% for the year, reaching 19.5 BBFT. This would be a new high for the region, surpassing the 19.0 BBFT of production in 2005. In the Base Case, the South’s share of national lumber production increases 0.8% to 55% in 2018.
We project U.S. softwood lumber self-sufficiency to reach 71.4% in 2018 as imports level off, and U.S. softwood production increases relative to consumption. We expect net imports to remain stable in 2018 due to physical constraints on Canadian lumber producers and their inability to grow exports to the U.S.: raging wildfires; stagnant softwood lumber capacity; increasing domestic softwood consumption; two new tariffs imposed on Canadian softwood lumber imports in 2017; and reductions in annual allowable cuts.
In the Forisk Base Case, total structural panel consumption increases from 31.2 billion square feet in 2017 to 36.6 billion square feet by 2022, increasing at a compound annual growth rate of 3.3%. OSB consumption is forecasted to rise 3.1% over 2017, while plywood consumption is forecast to increase 2.1%. For context, our October 2017 forecast was 3.5% lower than actuals, while our initial January 2017 forecast came in at 0.9% below actuals.
Each year we update a multi-phased study for estimating U.S. structural panel consumption. We test variables such as housing starts, GDP, population and others. Outputs from all approaches – regardless of the approach, variables, or form – tend to correlate highly with each other. Simpler models performed better; our final model had an R-squared of 0.97. Then, we evaluate results of our model relative to history and research by the USDA Forest Service and APA-The Engineered Wood Association prior to incorporating the projections into price forecasts for timber and delivered logs across the U.S.
From FORISK Consulting: https://forisk.com/blog/2018/03/15/forisk-research-quarterly-frq-excerpt-2018-lumber-structural-panel-projections/
by Web Editor | Dec 4, 2017 | News
Congress Gears Up For A Fight Over Mass Timber Legislation
The battle over the 2017 Timber Innovation Act is gaining momentum in Washington, D.C., where two new Senate sponsors and four new Congress members have signed on to it since this past May. The pending legislation would provide funding for research into innovative wood materials and mass timber structures above 85 feet. The bill’s proponents are hoping that it will be an impetus for transforming cities and towns across the country with a bevy of mid-rise and high-rise mass timber buildings.
“I am very impressed with the large cross-aisle support,” Chadwick Oliver, director of Yale University’s Global Institute of Sustainable Forestry, said. “You have Bruce Westerman, a Republican congressman from Arkansas and Peter DeFazio, a Democrat from Oregon who has been on the side of environmental groups. This looks like a bill that is quite serious about moving forward.”
However, the concrete and steel industries are vigorously lobbying to derail the legislation, and have established a website called Build with Strength that contains a detailed critique of the new generation of wood buildings. “It is a piece of legislation that props up one industry over another and we think that it is misguided and dangerous,” Kevin Lawlor, a spokesperson from Build with Strength, said. “We don’t think that it is safe in three-to-five story buildings, and we don’t think that it is safer in taller buildings.”
The wood products industry, the U.S. Forest Service, and other advocates claim that technological advances make the new generation of tall timber buildings more fire resistant. In fact, according to Dr. Patricia A. Layton, director of the Wood Utilization + Design Institute at Clemson University, that is because of the way it chars in a fire: By insulating its interior, an exposed wood beam can actually be structurally stronger than a steel one. “Steel loses its strength at a lower temperature than does wood,” she explained. “If you expose concrete or steel it is combustible, and it does feel the effects of fire.”
Many of the act’s supporters say that allowing buildings to be built from wood technologies such as cross-laminated timber (CLT) will result in a host of economic and environmental benefits. Most of the Timber Innovation Act’s sponsors hail from states where the wood industry is struggling to recoup from the recent housing downturn and also suffering from the decrease in demand for paper that is a result of the increasing digitalization of the economy.
From The Architects Newspaper: archpaper.com
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by Web Editor | Nov 8, 2017 | News
WoodWorks, in cooperation with the USDA Forest Service Forest Products Lab and Softwood Lumber Board, conducted a second series of blast tests on three existing two-story, single-bay cross-laminated timber (CLT) structures at Tyndall Air Force Base—the same structures involved in a series of initial blast tests performed in 2016. While a full analysis will be published early next year, on-site observations are decidedly positive. All structures remained intact under significant explosive loading well beyond their design capacity.
“Last year, we tested the structures under their own self-weight,” said Bill Parsons, VP of Operations for WoodWorks. “Those tests were successful and, this year, we built on that effort by testing whether the design methods established as a result of those initial tests needed to be adjusted when the buildings carried typical gravity loads and included different connection configurations, increased panel thickness, and alternate mass timber wall systems.”
Four tests were performed covering a spectrum of blast loads. For tests one and two, the size of the blast load and configuration of the structures were the same as prior testing, except the structures had axially-loaded front panels. The loads applied were intended to simulate conditions associated with a 5-story residential or office building. For tests three and four, different variables were altered on each of the buildings. One building used 5-ply CLT front wall panels, the second used off-the-shelf prefabricated angle brackets, and the third included nail-laminated timber (NLT) front panels. Reflected pressure, peak deflections, and panel acceleration were recorded at front and side faces in order to compare results to previous testing.
As with the tests performed in 2016, peak recorded deflections were consistent with pre-test predictions indicating the effectiveness of design assumptions and methodology in predicting elastic response of CLT to dynamic loads. The second test also indicated a controlled response in which localized panel rupture was observed but connection integrity and load carrying ability were not compromised for any of the loaded structures. Of particular note, all three structures remained standing following the fourth and largest blast, intended to take the structures well beyond their design intent. While panel rupture was expected and observed on all front and side wall panels, the buildings maintained enough residual capacity to remain intact and safe to enter.
From The Construction Specifier: https://www.constructionspecifier.com/woodworks-leads-successful-blast-testing-loaded-mass-timber-structures/
by Web Editor | Sep 18, 2017 | News
A delegation from China’s Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (MOHURD) visited Tacoma, Washington-based APA-The Engineered Wood Association and toured wood-framed building projects in Seattle on September 11.
The delegation, led by Director General Yu Binyang, was the highest level foreign government group to visit APA in recent years. In addition to APA, the trade visit was hosted by the USDA Forest Service, Forest Products Lab (FPL), located in Madison, Wisconsin.
Representatives from the City of Bellevue, Wash. Planning and Development Department and U.S. Embassy Agricultural Trade Office in Beijing were also present.
The visit comes as China begins to formulate the nation’s timber structure construction development plan as part of the 13th Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development. In a meeting held at APA headquarters in Tacoma, Director General Yu Binyang and other MOHURD representatives discussed opportunities and challenges around building with wood in China. Considerations included the importance of sustainability, green building, codes and standards, and further development of trade relations with the U.S.
“We were very pleased to host this Ministerial delegation from the People’s Republic of China,” said APA President, Edward Elias. “The caliber of this mission, in both the quality of participants and content, demonstrates the effectiveness of APA’s efforts to expand the interests of the North American wood products industry within this key Asian market.”
From Woodworking Network: https://www.woodworkingnetwork.com/news/woodworking-industry-news/seeking-greener-construction-chinese-delegates-visit-us-wood?ss=news,news,woodworking_industry_news,news,almanac_market_data,news,canadian_news
