by Web Editor | Apr 18, 2016 | News
B.C.’s focus on heavy timber and mass wood construction is reshaping the construction industry, creating a new type of construction expertise, while also showing the private sector that mid and highrise wood structures can make economic sense.
“Since the beginning of this year, we are starting to see more interest from developers in these projects and the City of Vancouver is also interested in them,” said Eric Karsh, structural engineer and co-founder of Equilibrium Consulting Inc., a Vancouver firm that specializes in large timber, engineered structures. “We are now just beginning to see developers seriously consider eight-to-10 story solid wood buildings.”
The City of Vancouver is providing equivalencies such as reduced parking for the construction of wood buildings, which can translate into a plus for developers, he said, and there is the growing realization that the prefabrication approach offered by mass timber construction can expedite construction and reduce costs.
“We are developing details that show these buildings are cost efficient enough and developers are beginning to take notice,” he said.
That interest is a change from earlier attempts to kick-start private sector involvement. In 2012, wood advocate and architect Michael Green and Karsh published the Case for Tall Wood study, which advocated for wood highrises up to 20 stories and spoke with builders and developers regarding wood’s viability for mid-and highrise use.
From Journal Of Commerce: https://journalofcommerce.com/Resource/News/2016/4/BC-focus-on-wood-reshaping-the-construction-industry-1014906W/
by Web Editor | Mar 11, 2016 | News
Investigators remain at the scene of an explosion at a wood products mill in Quesnel, B.C.
No one was hurt March 9 when a blast and fire damaged one side of the West Pine MDF mill, at the northern end of the Cariboo community, about 600 kilometers north of Vancouver.
Quesnel Mayor Bob Simpson says the mill employs about 100 people and all the workers on shift at around 5:30 Wednesday were safely evacuated.
West Pine MDF, operated by Quesnel-based West Fraser Mills Ltd., uses sawdust and other materials to manufacture plywood-like boards known as medium density fiberboard.
Firefighters knocked down the blaze and spent the night dousing hot spots on the side of the plant where the sawdust is fed into the building. A cause of the explosion is under investigation and Simpson hopes the mill can resume operation in about a week.
From Canadian Manufacturing: https://www.canadianmanufacturing.com/operations/blast-west-fraser-mills-ltd-plant-halt-production-week-164096/
by Web Editor | Dec 21, 2015 | News
New WOOD MARKETS five-year forecast calls for continued volatility as North American and global lumber markets continue to recover and grow.
In WOOD MARKETS’ new five-year forecast, the short-term outlook is that North American and global economies, as well as softwood lumber and panel markets, are all forecast to improve, but at a much slower pace than has been expected. What has also short-circuited the prospects of stronger demand is a slowdown in China and Japan, impacting export markets. And the new wildcard that caused U.S. dollar prices to plunge in 2015, especially in softwood lumber, was the rapid currency devaluations of almost all major lumber producers as compared to the U.S. dollar. All of these factors have changed the WOOD MARKETS outlook to one that expects more lacklustre demand and corresponding price growth through 2018. After that, it starts to look very good.
These details and further analysis of commodity lumber and panels was released last week in the report, WOOD MARKETS 2016 – The Solid Wood Products Outlook: 2016 to 2020 by International WOOD MARKETS Group, Vancouver BC.
The supply-side dynamics feature eroding sustainable timber harvests in key provinces in Canada, resulting in dramatically lower lumber production than in the previous decade. Canada’s total lumber output will start to flatten out by 2018 with no further increases expected – just as U.S. and global demand are expected to gain momentum.
On the U.S. side, the U.S. West Coast region continues to watch log export prices in China and Japan, as many domestic log prices are correlated with export prices – this can quickly tighten the wood supply for sawmills and plywood mills as export prices rise. The U.S. South is forecast to be the only region where any significant lumber and panel production will occur, mainly due its ample, under-utilized timberland base of southern yellow pine. As lumber and panel demand increases, it is forecast that the current depressed log prices will start to move higher to feed incremental wood consumption of the expected additional panel and sawmill production.
From Wood Markets: https://www.woodmarkets.com/global-malaise-in-demand-coupled-with-rising-production-stalls-price-movement-in-north-america/
by Web Editor | Sep 4, 2015 | News
A precision-quality hardwood plywood core peeling line has been installed at Columbia Forest Products plant in Hearst, ON. Crews of engineers, electrical technicians, installation laborers and technicians from Japan collaborated on installing what is Columbia Forest Products newest Meinan lathe line – this time at Columbia’s plant in Hearst, Ontario.
Columbia’s interest in finding the hardwood plywood core peeling system that delivers the world’s absolutely best quality peel, thickness tolerances and recovery available took Columbia engineers and executives halfway around the world to Japan, where Meinan peeling systems are engineered and fabricated.
Andy Frei, lead engineer and project manager for the Hearst installation, noted, “The attention to detail on this system is so high that the entire 200 ft. long lathe line was assembled, tested and disassembled in Japan prior to shipping to Canada.”
Once disassembled, 36 containers holding the lathe, stackers and ancillary equipment were shipped to Vancouver, BC. From there, the Meinan system traveled across Canada via rail, was unloaded in Toronto and then transported to Hearst on 30 trucks.
“Finally, we now have our Meinan system in the plant,” Columbia Forest Products’ Canadian general manager Gilles Levesque commented. “As a follow-up to the more than $5 million investment in innovative capital projects at the facility over the past seven years, this $15 million crowning investment provides more than 200 employees in Hearst an integral piece of capital innovation that will enable us to compete well into the future – regardless of the exchange rate or foreign competition.”
From Woodworking Network: https://www.woodworkingnetwork.com/news/canadian-news/columbia-forest-products-installs-meinan-lathe-line-hearst-ontario?ss=news,news,woodworking_industry_news,news,almanac_market_data,news
by Web Editor | Jul 31, 2015 | News
Developer Hines has broken ground in Minneapolis’ North Loop on its all-timber office building, the first commercial property in the U.S. to use an engineered wood material for its interior and structure.
The Houston-based real estate company announced Monday the start of construction on the 220,000-square-foot, seven-story office building (being called T3 for its emphasis on timber, transit and technology) that has garnered national attention.
Hines hired Vancouver-based Michael Green Architecture, in conjunction with DLR Group, to design the building. Michael Green is among the world’s foremost experts in heavy timber construction and an advocate for timber as a sustainable building material. While old-growth timber — the kind needed to support the weight of a tall building — is unavailable for construction today, an engineering process that presses smaller pieces of wood together can re-create the load capacity of heavy timber.
Following the initial announcement in November, the Wall Street Journal showcased the project, saying it will be the tallest modern all-timber structure in the U.S. once completed. Hines said Monday that it expects the building to open in early fall 2016.
From the Star Tribune: https://www.startribune.com/developer-breaks-ground-on-modern-all-timber-office-building-in-north-loop-minneapolis/318684551/?utm_source=WIT073115&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=WeekInTrees
