Eco-Friendly Building Material
Loggers World-December 2004
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A one million dollar study carried out by the Consortium for Research on Renewewable Industrial Materials, a non-profit corporation of 15 research universities in the United States, has confirmed that wood is one of the most environmentally-sensitive building materials for home construction.
It is so because wood uses less overall energy than other products, causes fewer air and water impacts and does a better job of the carbon sequestration that can help address global warming.
The research showed that wood framing used 17 percent less energy than steel construction for a typical house built in Minnesota, and 16 percent less energy than a house using concrete construction in Atlanta. And in both these two examples, the use of wood had 26 to 31 percent less global warming potential.
James Wilson, a professor of wood science and engineering at Oregon State University, and vice president of the research consortium said that the latest information about wood would be very useful for consumers and government agencies.
"There's a significant consumer movement and even some voluntary statndards that are interested in green, or environmentally conscious construction methods. We need to have a good understanding of the overall effects that different types of construction have in such areas as energy consumption, global warming, air and water impacts, or solid waste disposal." said Wilson.
"We've seen a general substitution for wood in many aspects of home construction for years, using less of it for sididng, windows, roofing , other purposes. Price and availability of wood were some of the factors involved, along with building codes. And about five years ago the steel industry began a big push for more use of steel in home construction, which hadn't seen a general substitution for wood in many aspects of home construction for years.
This push didn't accomplish as much as that industry hoped for, but did have some impact." he added.