I’d like to start this column by thanking the Board and all FRA members for electing me Chair of this great organization for the coming two years. It’s a great honor and a great responsibility at such a time of great change.
The prevailing wood procurement practice in the U.S. forest industry depends on a working relationship with a myriad of supplier business enterprises. The quality of that relationship is highly important to the function and efficiency of the forest industry supply chain. It needs to be clearly understood that the term “relationship” is not about everybody “feeling good” about each other. The overriding focus of the Wood Supply Research Institute’s Supplier-Consumer Relationships Project, which I undertook during the past year, is about the cultivation of a mutually beneficial business environment that translates into operational and cost efficiencies. It is about a dependable and sustainable wood supply chain.
After 14 years—and 20 completed research projects— WSRI has matured into a 501(c)3 organization. That status change brings us many advantages in asset management and fundraising, but it has also increased our overhead costs. We now carry General Liability and Directors and Officers Insurance, and a forthcoming full audit is also part of the cost of “growing up.” The Executive Director is now an employee of WSRI, rather than a consultant, which also adds costs, in the form of employment taxes.
INTRODUCTION: Bioenergy companies—many of which originate in, or rely on off-take agreements with, utility companies—will require long-term supply agreements in order to manage their supply risk. Long-term supply agreements are business-as-usual in the energy industry.
INTRODUCTION: Covering and uncovering of tarps on open-top chip trailers is a time-consuming and sometimes dangerous process. Wall Timber Products Inc. of Fairfax, South Carolina has overcome this challenge by equipping his new chip trailers with an automated, hinged tarp system similar to the automated tarps used by some dump trucks and trash haulers.
INTRODUCTION: Danny Sandusky, owner of Sandusky Trucking in Collinwood, Tennessee, improves his logging operation’s productivity by using small patches of standing pine timber as natural delimbing gates on plantation clearcuts.
INTRODUCTION: International Paper’s Prattville, Alabama woodyard has devised a simple solution to the problem of a cable hook snagging on the top of the load during the log truck unbinding process.
GENERAL FEATURES: The device is simply the top six inches of a 12-inch traffic cone. To install the traffic cone section, remove the hook and clamp from the cable and thread the cable through the small end of the funnel-shaped traffic cone. Then replace the hook and clamp.
Wood energy facilities tend to prefer clean, dry raw material to maximize energy content and to minimize the ash remaining after combustion. Most traditional forest industries (paper and building products) purchase their raw material today on a green-ton basis. Freshly felled trees have a moisture content of approximately 50% (wet basis), but allowing harvested material to dry for a few weeks before delimbing and processing (transpirational drying) can reduce moisture content significantly, thus increasing the energy content of the wood. However, under green-ton payment systems, drier material results in lower truck payloads, higher per-ton trucking costs, and reduced revenue for the harvesting contractor. The basis of payment—green ton, dry ton, or energy content (million BTU)—has a dramatic impact on whether drying material in the field is worthwhile.
INTRODUCTION: Madden Timberlands has developed a mobile log loader using a retired skidder as a carrier coupled with a knuckleboom loader. The skidder carrier is operated by a remote-control unit located in the cab of the loader. The Maddens adapted the technology to their loader after observing building products delivery trucks operate their loader booms with remote control units. They have built three of the loaders, using them in the log yard and in the woods.
INTRODUCTION:
Planning & Analysis in Timber Harvesting (PATH) is a free spreadsheet utility created by Northeast Forests, LLC. PATH was funded by a grant from the by the Wood Education and Resource Center (WERC), Northeastern Area State and Private Forestry, U.S. Forest Service. PATH is intended to help loggers benchmark their costs and compare cost structures of alternative mixes of equipment and utilization rates. PATH has had close to 6,000 downloads and has been well received in workshops.
