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Wood Utilization
Industry
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Why
OSB
"We chose
OSB as the economic engine to fund landscape scale restoration
in northern Arizona, because OSB is the engineered wood product
that provides the best combination of strong local market, long
term growth, and ability to add economic value to small diameter
trees to pay for the restoration treatments."
The AZFRP
Team
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 OSB
(oriented strand board) is made from a process in which trees
are cut into strands the size of bookmarks. The strands are then
coated with an adhesive mixture, formed in multiple oriented
layers, and pressed together to make large, uniform,
exceptionally strong boards of varying sizes and thickness.
Made of
small diameter trees
The first
critical advantage of OSB as an economic engine to fund
ecological restoration, is that OSB can be made from the small
diameter trees that are removed during restorative thinning and
that would otherwise be too small for traditional sawmilling. By
adding significant economic value to the small diameter trees
that have otherwise little or no value, OSB manufacturing allows
the utilization of the small diameter trees removed during
restoration to pay for the restoration treatments. |
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OSB resolves what
has progressively emerged
as the crux
issue of landscape scale restoration:
how to pay for the restoration
treatments.
Large economically
viable market
The second
critical advantage of OSB as an economic engine to fund
ecological restoration is that OSB is economically viable. Since its
introduction in the 1980’s, OSB has emerged as the superior
product in most construction applications. It is approved by all major
building codes, and it is now the material of choice in
commercial and residential new constructions and remodeling for
walls, roofs, floors, etc.
The North
American market consumes as much as 26 billion square feet of
OSB annually and the Southwest is home to approximately a
quarter of the entire U.S. household market.
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Projections
from the U.S. Census Bureau indicate that the Southwest will
continue to be a fast-growth area between 2000 and 2030 with
114% growth in Nevada, 109% in Arizona and 56% in Utah, while
California is expected to gain more than 12 million people. This
creates a huge regional market for OSB. |
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The high rate of population growth in the
Southwest creates a large demand for wood based construction
materials, primarily oriented strand board (OSB). |
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OSB is an engineered
wood product that has enough market demand and that can add
enough market value to the low-value small diameter trees
harvested during ecological restorative thinning to fund
landscape-scale forest restoration. |
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Clean
industry
The third
critical advantage of OSB as an economic engine to fund
ecological restoration, is that the new generation of OSB
industry is not only a green industry but a clean industry.
Thanks to breakthrough innovations in adhesive technology
and emission control technology, modern OSB
manufacturing is an ultra low emission and ultra low water
consumption industry.
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Resins featuring
Momentive's EcoBind technology can be formulated to meet or
exceed all global emission standards including US HUD, European
EMB and Japanese standards, as well as specifications recommended
by the Green Building Council and the State of California.
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