A research project led by Dr. Paul Crovella, Assistant Professor in Sustainable Construction and Construction Management, and Dr. William Smith, Professor and Director of the Wood Utilisation Service, will identify ways to connect the supply of wood from New York State’s unique forests to emerging wood product markets. In turn, these wood products can potentially contribute to the state’s energy and environmental goals. Listen to Paul Kremer talk to Paul Crovella about the project and what it means for East Coast US based mass timber.
Production by Deeelicious Beats
Music "Game Play" by Quality Quest
Podcast is a Mass Timber Construction Journal Production
www.masstimberconstruction.com
A research project led by Dr. Paul Crovella, Assistant Professor in Sustainable Construction and Construction Management, and Dr. William Smith, Professor and Director of the Wood Utilisation Service, will identify ways to connect the supply of wood from New York State’s unique forests to emerging wood product markets. In turn, these wood products can potentially contribute to the state’s energy and environmental goals. Listen to Paul Kremer talk to Paul Crovella about the project and what it means for East Coast US based mass timber.
Production by Deeelicious Beats
Music "Game Play" by Quality Quest
Podcast is a Mass Timber Construction Journal Production
www.masstimberconstruction.com
Ladies and gentlemen, we are live. This is the moment you all have been waiting for. It's time for the Global Sensation, the one, the only the undisputed heavyweight podcast in the world The Mass Timber Construction Podcast. And now here's Paul Kramer, your host.
Paul:Thank you very much for joining us. Thanks very much, bruce, for the fantastic introduction. We have a very special guest on our show today. He's on our editorial board. He's on the east coast of the United States And there's a growing movement of people that are passionate about Mass Timber on the east coast. So, without further ado, please welcome Paul Kovella talking to me about his project on the east coast of the United States.
Paul:You got 250,000 US dollars from the USDA, for it looked like, or it sounded like when I was reading it Utilization of New York, specifically forest resource.
Paul Crovella :Yeah, so essentially, when the USDA or the US Forest Service puts out these calls, they're really looking for folks to help stimulate the local economy and do it in a way that benefits our forest system, right? So what we actually responded with was a wood utilization team from New York State. So it's a group that we brought together of collaborators and we're working on a number of fronts and we're working at a number of levels, if you will, but the ultimate intent is to move forward with utilization of biobased products that can be forest based from throughout the northeast, if you will, of the US. So certainly there's different timber characteristics in different regions of the country, right, and we've seen the Pacific Northwest sort of take off and develop a strong supply chain. We've seen the southeast as well begin to develop their supply chain. So are you really talking about? what are the key components we need to put in place to build that same sort of supply chain infrastructure in the northeast?
Paul:And do you think that this will lead to a genesis of manufacturing of products to a greater extent? I know that there are smaller firms all over the US, but do you think this will attract some large investment European investment or local onshore US investment into mass timber products?
Paul Crovella :Well, we suspect, because of really the mixed characteristics of the forest in the northeast in terms of the scaling opportunities to take advantage of a monoculture, if you will, that's available in other regions It's very difficult for us to compete on a commodity basis, and so I think we're looking at a mid and small size industrial base to build up with, and what that would look like probably would be something that would be probably northeast to eastern seaboard based, if you will, and so we're really looking to try to sort of form a growth in that from.
Paul:And in Australia we have a divergence of species as well. We have hardwoods and we have the softwoods. Obviously is a major categorization. But within the hardwoods there is some specific growth patterns because the trees engineered naturally by nature And so some materials sit in the aesthetic sort of zone so they'd be great for visual appearance grade material And some are purely structural because they're not highly attractive from an aesthetic's nature And it's generally determined by the amount and the size of the knots in the timber, because that's the way the timber grows. Is your research looking at how you better utilize the resource that's available, because you can't transform that resource. You're going to assess what's there, unless you of course establish more plantations, and then you're going to try and look at how to utilize that better. So some might not even end up in structure, some might end up in visual.
Paul Crovella :Yeah, so really, you know, we have a similar situation with a mixed forest, and, in particular, the existing supply chain has lots of outlets for the higher grades, right? So we have hardwoods that are exported virtually all over the world right from these forests. The challenge is always a lower grade material, and so we're looking at a number of different options and a number of different directions, and so, among those, we have a project to look at existing buildings, and so we have a large existing building infrastructure. 80% of the buildings that will be here in 2050 are sitting on the ground here today, and of those buildings, you know, throughout the Northeast we have a very we have a much older housing stock than some of the rest of the US, right, so we have buildings that, typically, the majority of them, were built before we had any energy controls, any energy codes in place, and so for those buildings, we're actually developing a panelized energy retrofit system, and the basis of this would be, again, a non-structural layer of a three-layer CLT That would be the substrate that would be able to carry the panel, and then we're working on both a fiber-based insulation similar to European products like Gutex or Styco, but we're also working to develop a cellular phenolic, lignin-based, and so we have some chem engineers who are experts at those processes and looking to try to improve some of the material properties to get it. So it's a very high-insulation performance per unit of thickness. So we're looking at both of those And essentially, if we're able to push that forward, there is an enormous demand already in the market. We don't have to try to convince people to change the code. We don't have to try to convince people to try a new construction system. We don't really need to do anything other than to offer a competing product on a market that is already moving strongly because of our interest in reducing energy use in these buildings.
Paul Crovella :However, it's not just the existing buildings, i'll say. We are looking at some new construction approaches, but it's still with this low-grade material which is this challenging piece, and so we are trying to think about the existing supply chain And with that in place, there are softwood mills in place now. Some of them produce lumber that is structural, but some of them also produce non-structural softwood products And at the end of taking off all the high-quality material, they end up with this center of the tree, center of the trunk can't, which can vary in size depending on the incoming diameter of the hole. So we're taking that and we're trying to take all of that fiber and essentially make an NLT panel that has, if you will, a varying thickness across the bottom profile. So the top surface is planar, the bottom profile potentially could have an architectural approach to it. So you can imagine essentially a series of arches if you will. But what we're doing is we're really not trying to leave any of the wood on the shop floor when we produce these products, or what we're trying to take and produce really ring every scent out of every fiber that we're purchasing for.
Paul Crovella :So this is a low density material, it's a lower grade and so structurally it doesn't have some of the same characteristics as the current products in the market.
Paul Crovella :But there are certain structural systems, particularly multifamily housing, in which the essentially column grid is small enough or the layout is small enough that it works very well to use these types of products across those types of spans and such. So we're working kind of, you know, trying to put the pieces together throughout the supply chain to see if it can bring something like that through the tubes. We do have some interest in some four ply hardwood, softwood, clt layups right. So with some, you know there's been other research done on oriented center lamina. But certainly your point about you know hardwoods being attractive in certain instances and providing the opportunity to use a higher value product to provide a higher end product, you know that's also of interest to us. So, as you can see, we've got a number of little fronts we're working on with this grant and there's some other grants that are feeding into it, but they're allowing us to kind of push forward and hopefully push forward across scale, right, push forward with things where we're thinking about the supply chain and we're also thinking about the final product.
Paul:And a global phenomena that you've touched on and it's really encouraging to hear you talk about industry. A global phenomena in the last sort of 10 years has been that authorities or grant funding entities don't generally lend out any money to education institutions without having a significant industry involvement. Is the intention with this particular entity or research group to commercialize it through their own organizational structure, setting up its own company, or is it to push it through the auspices of industry that exist at the moment that has become collaborators with either in-kind contribution or financial contribution to make it work? Because it's a great noble idea, i love it And I've seen many projects get up, but they generally have this fail-safe mechanism that it's academic research. I'm hearing from you very strongly. This has got a very strong industry focus. Can you expand on that involvement in your project?
Paul Crovella :Sure. So we essentially part of the project was starting by working with the mills themselves, right, and better understanding sort of what does it look like for them in terms of what opportunities they have to market their products? right, what would they look for to have a future market for? That said, we have one current in-state mass timber manufacturer, a glulam manufacturer, and then we've been in discussions with another as well.
Paul Crovella :Both of them it's the chicken and the egg right? They'd love to see the demand, they'd love to see projects rolling across their board so that they can put these together. But they've both visited campus, we've talked them through kind of the work we're doing, and I think they're both at a stage where they realize the changes that are afoot and they need to sort of keep their finger on the pulse of where things are going, and so they've talked about potentially investing. But, again, we need to work on the demand as well, right? So what we don't have is a real library of projects that are just flowing through the stream at this point that they can jump in and start to get these pieces into.
Paul:So I guess that's a calling to anyone that's listening to the podcast, that is in New York and is hearing about this project and wants to get involved, probably to get in contact through you through LinkedIn or through the university and go from there. I think you've certainly captivated people's interest with the project itself, and I think the way that these projects become more robust and have significantly better outcomes than not is through constant communication and community involvement, and I think, if that comes true for you, and industry back what you're doing, so their own betterment. I think that's a perfect win-win outcome.
Paul Crovella :Yeah, no, i couldn't be happier, paul, actually just to be here today on the podcast with you talking about this very topic, because really one of the things you know in academia we have a tough time doing is stepping out, stepping out into the industry and making those connections that we need to maintain constantly to put true value on our research right. So you know that you've opened the door for me. I can't be more grateful for the opportunity just to put that out there.
Paul:No, excellent And good luck with the project. I'll get you back on again. You're part of our team. We'll just call on you every now and then to check in and see how it's going. But, yeah, fantastic project and thanks for coming on and giving that further explainer. I'm extremely excited by it and we'll give you a bit of a plug for your symposium coming up very soon once that's all sorted out. But that'll be great, fine news that we'll talk about very soon. Oh, mate, thank you Brilliant. Yeah, that's excellent. I'm excited by your project. I wish I was in the US, in New York.
Paul Crovella :Well you know, there's not enough hours in a day, but the good news is I've got a couple of really good graduate students coming on just starting in January, right, so this is this is. What I need is a little more manpower to run the engine, so it's good news.
Paul:Yeah, the movement is moving fast, rapidly, and the spread across the whole of the world is phenomenal, with the US coming online with Mass Timber now.
Paul Crovella :Well, i thought you were going to say and with the US coming online with Mass Timber finally.
Paul:I wasn't going to add that in, but he wanted to do it.
Paul Crovella :I applaud, you know, watching you simply by force of will, essentially making all this happen Right. So I stand in awe. As you know, i try to keep up with my day to day activities And it just seems like you've been, you've been, you've been able to just keep a lot of balls in the air and do it in a very professional manner.
Paul:So I love it And bye.