ebuild Blog

Demand for green building products–buoyed by increased availability, environmental concerns, stricter building codes, and a rebounding construction industry–is expected to increase by 13% annually to create a $71 billion market in 2015, states to a forecast by the Freedonia Group, a Cleveland-based research firm.

According to the study, concrete made from recycled materials is expected to soar by 24% annually between 2010 and 2015. Meanwhile, green floor coverings, which include Green Label Plus-certified carpets and products made from fast-growing natural resources such as bamboo and cork, are expected to grow by nearly 12% annually through 2015. The study predicts, however, that flooring will not grow at the same pace as some other green building materials, in part because many flooring products already are considered green.

Through 2015, sustainable doors are predicted to increase by 12% annually, green windows will grow by 8% each year, and insulation and other green building products will jump 14% annually, the Freedonia Group study says. Nevertheless, green roofing materials will see the smallest annual growth (4.1%).

Brendan Rimetz is assistant editor for ProSales.

This article was originally posted on ProSales Online.

The American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA) released today five goals for the forest products industry to be more environmentally sustainable, including work to increase the amount of fiber procured from certified forest lands and to promote polices worldwide that reduce illegal logging.

AF&PA promoted its Better Practices, Better Planet 2020 document as a “continuing commitment to sustainability” that the association concluded was not being recognized by the public as much as it should. Along with its intent to buy more fiber from certified forest lands, the association also set these goals for 2020:

• Increase the paper recovery for recycling rate to more than 70%.
• Boost by at least 10% the industry’s energy efficiency in terms of purchased energy use.
• Reduce “the intensity” of industry greenhouse gas emissions by at least 15%.
• Improve the industry’s safety incidence rate by 25%.

“Sustainability has become a bit of a buzzword. For us, it’s the whole story,” Jim Hannan, chairman of AF&PA’s board as well as president and CEO of Georgia-Pacific LLC, said in an interview withProSales. “We rely on natural resources, renewable resources, and recycling as our business model. It doesn’t disconnect from our vision–it’s embedded in our vision. We just haven’t told our story.”

“Sustainable forestry is the key to our existence,” AF&PA president and CEO Donna Harman added. She said the new document shows how the industry is “raising the bar” in its commitment to the subject.

Unlike the other commitments, AF&PA’s goal of increasing the amount of fiber procured from certified forest lands doesn’t give a numerical target. It does note that all AF&PA members that own forestland must conform “to a credible sustainable forest management program,” while members that source wood fiber from the forest must comply with “sustainable procurement principles.”

But AF&PA’s call for members to participate in forest certification programs refuses to play favorites among the several wood-certification schemes available worldwide. That list includes the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI); the Programme for Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC), which boasts a global scope; and the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), another global program that is the only certification scheme recognized by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) for points in its LEED green-building program.

Many AF&PA members are known to prefer SFI, and the association’s list of certification programs not only cites SFI first but also notes–as part of its list of members’ past accomplishment–that more than 7,000 loggers have completed SFI-supported training on forestry best management practices.”

Late last year, a subset of USGBC members failed to give enough votes to a proposal to set benchmarks by which wood certified by other schemes besides FSC would qualify for LEED points. A letter from 14 environmental groups that FSC distributed during the voting argued that allowing SFI’s and related groups’ standards to qualify for LEED points would amount to sanctioning “status quo forestry.” SFI also urged voters to reject the idea, but for much different reasons. (Story)

Asked whether tacitly endorsing a number of certification schemes would open it up to criticism, Hannan replied: “I understand people may have different opinions about that. We think it doesn’t make sense to pick one program only. For us, we think that’s the right approach.”

AF&PA said it plans to report the industry’s progress through an annual report on paper recovery and a biennial report on sustainability.

This article was originally posted on ProSales Online.

Sawmills in the western United States produced just 10.39 billion board feet (bbf) of lumber in 2009, 20% below 2008′s rate and the lowest annual production since the Western Wood Products Association (WWPA) began keeping statistics, WWPA announced Thursday. Meanwhile, southern production dropped 19.5% to 11.79 bbf, the lowest number since 1986, and imports shrank 30% to 8.9 bbf, the lowest since 1976.

Output from Western lumber mills has fallen 46% since 2005, and current output hasn’t been this low since 1982, when 13.7 bbf of lumber was produced, the WWPA said. It based its numbers on a survey of 170 mills in 12 states. The dollar value of 2009′s production fell 26% from 2008 to reach $2.69 billion. Five years ago, the 19.3 bbf of lumber those mill produced fetched $7.7 billion.

Overall demand for lumber totaled 31.3 bbf, less than half what it was in 2005, the Portland, Ore.-based WWPA said. And of that total, the amount of wood used for residential construction dropped in 2009 to 7.3 bbf vs. 27.6 bbf in 2005.