Demand for recycled wood hit by boardmill problems

Speaking to letsrecycle.com today, board mills Norbord and Kronospan reported equipment problems just days after chipboard factory Sonae was forced to close last week after a fire (see letsrecycle.com story).

” There is a surplus of wood anyway and a pressure to get rid of it at the moment. If suppliers cannot get wood into one mill they are trying the next “
– John Rainger, Norbord
Norbord, which takes 125,000 tonnes of recycled woodchip a year at its factory in South Molton, Devon, has stopped taking any recycled wood since last Thursday following a difficulties experienced with its board press.

John Rainger, wood buyer at Norbord, said: “We had a problem with out press that took some time to repair. Normally we have a half empty yard on a Monday but we were not working over the weekend so we have got enough wood until this Wednesday.”

Meanwhile, Kronospan, which uses 350,000 tonnes of recycled wood a year at its mill at Chirk in Wales, was forced to use half as much recycled wood as normal for a week after one of its dryers broke down.

Richard Coulson, sawmill residues and recycled materials buyer for Kronospan, said: “We lost one of our dryers to take moisture out of the wood last week so we were at half usage of recycled fibre for a week.”

Normal
Both plants say that that their plants will be completely back to normal by next week, and that their equipment has already been repaired. However, the plants acknowledged that the market was swamped with recycled woodchip following the temporary closure of the Sonae plant.

Mr Rainger said: “There is a surplus of wood anyway and a pressure to get rid of it at the moment. If suppliers cannot get wood into one mill they are trying the next.”

Trelawney Dampney, founder of Eco Composting in Dorset, sends 1,000 articulated lorries of woodchip a year to particle board manufacturers. He explained that wood recyclers were being forced to stockpile material they could not get rid of.

He said: “It's a nightmare. Wood recyclers are being forced to stockpile wood. It's the first time for over a year we are having to do it and the difficulties are causing real problems for the industry.”

He added: “If this continues, wood recyclers may not be able to take it in in a couple of weeks.”

Dependent
Other industry sources warned that their sites were gridlocked with wood, with many suggesting that wood recyclers were still too dependent on the board mills for a market. While the UK board mills also have competition from chipboard made cheaply abroad, wood recyclers are speaking of the need to diversify their markets to avoid similar problems in the future.

A meeting of the Wood Recyclers Association in Birmingham tomorrow is expected to see the issue discussed.

Biomass energy plants, such as the Wilton 10 plant on Teesside, have been tipped as one way forward for wood recyclers, but the market is not yet fully developed as an alternative to the chipboard mills.

New research from Defra prior to the issuing of England's new Waste Strategy today suggested that waste wood should be burnt rather than sent for use in other applications (see letsrecycle.com story).