Treesearch

More than 73 million acres of our national forests and millions more in public and private forestlands are in need of some form of restoration. Our forests are declining in health because of major changes over the years in forest structure and composition. However, restoration of these overstocked stands is extremely expensive. If new, economical, and value-added uses for thinned material can be found, forest restoration costs could be offset as the threat of catastrophic wildfires is reduced. This is the third document that tells the story of several wood product businesses and communities...

The characteristics and properties of wood fiber is one of many factors of critical importance to the performance of wood-plastic composites. In commercial thermo-mechanical pulping (TMP) of wood chips to produce fibers, high temperatures (>100°C) are used to separate the fibers during TMP refining. These mechanical pressures and temperatures are usually modulated to achieve the desired fiber characteristics and properties. However, relatively high total electric energy is required to produce these TMP pulps. Recently, an oxalic-acid pretreatment of wood chips prior to TMP refining has...

This paper addresses the economics of forest fuel thinning programs on federal lands in the U.S. West, and presents a model of regional timber and product market impacts. The issue of economics is vital to the debate about fire management, and this paper presents market implications of two alternative silvicultural strategies, even-aged and uneven-aged thinning. Projections are based on are regional market model called FTM—West (Fuel Treatment Market model—West), which uses the method of price-endogenous linear programming to project annual market equilibria for softwood timber and wood...

Wood can be modified by compressive, thermal and chemical treatments. Compression of wood under thermal conditions is resulted in densification of wood. This study evaluated decay and termite resistance of thermally compressed pine wood panels at either 5 or 7 MPa and at either 120 or 150°C for one hour. The process caused increases in density and decreases in thickness of the panels; however, laboratory decay resistance tests using one brown rot fungus and one white rot fungus revealed that thermally compressed wood was not resistance against the fungi tested. More interesting results...

Wood-plastic composites (WPCs) continue to make inroads into the decking market. One of the main drawbacks from the consumer’s perspective is that they can fade during weathering. It has been shown that WPCs fade more when exposed to a combination of light and water spray than when exposed only to light. This suggests that the loss of the color-imparting extractives from the wood could be partly to blame for color fade. Pigments are routinely added to only the plastic matrix to combat WPC color fade despite the fact that change in color could be due primarily to changes in the wood...

Exciting new opportunities are emerging for sustainably meeting many global energy needs and simultaneously creating high value biobased consumer and construction products from wood, forest and agricultural residues, and other biobased materials. In addition to traditional value added biobased products, such as lumber, paper, paperboard, and composites, opportunities are now on the horizon for biorefining to produce electricity, transportation fuels, chemical feedstocks, syngas, and nanocrystalline cellulose. In the near future, nanocrystalline cellulose, produced as a high value byproduct...