Steve Henry
Fort Mill, SC – Domtar Corporation announced today that President and CEO John Williams’ retirement date will be June 30, 2023. Williams has planned to leave the company after fourteen years in his leadership role; however, he will continue as a part-time advisor regarding strategic growth opportunities. Additionally, to continue Domtar’s forward momentum, Steve Henry, currently Senior Vice President of Packaging, has been appointed to the role of Executive Vice President (EVP) and Chief Operating Officer (COO) effective immediately. As EVP and COO, Henry will lead the pulp, paper and packaging operations and commercial functions at Domtar, while Williams will continue to lead all corporate functions until his retirement. …“I have relied on Steve’s expertise over the years, most recently as he engineered Domtar’s entry into the packaging business,” said Williams. “I am confident that Steve is the right leader for this time in Domtar’s history.”
Resolute Forest Products’ Menominee mill could remain idle until 2023. Following a fire at an adjacent warehouse on October 6, 2022, the 178k tonnes/year market deinked pulp (MDIP) mill at Menominee, Michigan has remained idle. Resolute 
BETHESDA, Md. — Enviva Inc., the world’s leading producer of sustainably sourced wood biomass, has been recognized as a 2022 “Enlightened Growth Leadership” award recipient by The Frost & Sullivan Institute. This award distinguishes global organizations that are committed to making the world a better place, addressing global priorities, and innovating to net zero, while remaining at the forefront of sustainable growth and transformation. This award is the only recognition of its kind that measures and evaluates companies based on the synergy between growth, Environmental, Social, and Governance, and Corporate Sustainability Reporting. …“Enviva demonstrates aspirational ideals beyond the simple goal of generating profits,” said Aroop Zutshi, Director at Frost & Sullivan Institute. “Enviva was identified as a ‘best-in-class’ growth company that has successfully leveraged technology, commercialized supply chains, and integrated a partner ecosystem that works to improve forest health and provide a renewable alternative to global industries and economies in support of the planet’s well-being.”
MONTICELLO, Arkansas — Canada’s Interfor Corporation, which owns a sawmill in Monticello, will reduce its lumber production output in the fourth quarter of 2022 by approximately 200 million board feet, or 17% of quarterly capacity. Current economic conditions and market uncertainty have led to reduced lumber demand. The temporary reduction in output is expected to be spread across each of the company’s operating regions, primarily timed around U.S. Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday periods, and used to accelerate ongoing capital and maintenance projects. The company’s lumber inventories are currently within normal volume parameters, and these plans are expected to maintain the balance between production and market demand through the remainder of 2022. The company currently expects to resume its normal operating schedule in January 2023, but will closely monitor market conditions and adjust its production plans accordingly. [END]
Charles Martin, a Chicago-based entrepreneur with years of experience in the forest products industry in North America, has an ambitious plan to turn a former sawmill in Bingham, Maine, into a plywood factory that could employ 100 people when at full production capacity. A major hurdle for the project is finding sufficient funding to purchase the equipment and getting it up and running. …A Martin’s goal is to get Maine Plywood USA operational by spring of 2023. To that end, Martin already has hired a general manager, project manager, and two other employees to get the factory repaired and equipment assembled and set up. Martin plans on using Maine’s abundant supply of poplar and red maple trees to provide the country with underlayment plywood.
Development plans are moving forward for two new apartment buildings with affordable housing units in Des Moines, and the City Council on Monday will consider financial incentives for both. A 33-story high-rise apartment tower [and] …a three-story, mixed-use building with 20 multifamily units and 6,500 square feet of retail space on the first floor. The $7.2 million Star Apartments would be the first in Des Moines to get a federal grant to use an eco-friendly building material called mass timber. …The $7.2 million building would be financed by construction loans and developer equity. It also would use a $250,000 grant from the US Forest Service for its use of mass timber, a sustainable product similar to wood beams found in some historic structures. …Construction is expected to begin in the spring of 2023 and be finished in 2024.
ALBANY, New York — Inadequate enforcement of building codes has had tragic consequences in New York, with lives of occupants and first responders lost in deadly fires linked to unsafe conditions, according to advocates for local government inspectors. “Most municipalities look at code enforcement as the grass and garbage police,” said Steven McDaniel, chairman of the International Code Council’s building code committee and the chief code enforcer for the city of Corning. Testifying before a panel of state lawmakers, McDaniel suggested one way to ensure code enforcement operations can offer sufficient protection is to institute minimum staffing levels. …McDaniel also suggested that steps be taken to set minimum credentials for building inspectors. How well building codes are enforced can have major impacts on the quality of life in local communities. …The adequacy of building code enforcement has been a concern of lawmakers for several years.
CENTRALIA, Washington — Last summer, our state’s wildfire season was below normal — a welcome relief for firefighters and smoke-choked Washingtonians, especially city dwellers. However, that all changed this fall. …The conflagration led The Columbian to editorialize for better forest management. “Reducing the (wildfire) threat requires not only addressing climate change and funding suppression techniques, but also properly managing forests,” the editorial board wrote. Twenty years ago, President George W. Bush signed the Healthy Forest Restoration Act of 2003 legislation into law. It was designed to reduce the threat of destructive wildfires, create jobs in rural communities and to improve air quality. It was to be the framework for land managers to cut through the mountains of red tape, stop interagency turf spats and streamline permitting. …Unfortunately, Bush’s plan drew fire from preservationists who dismissed it as another excuse to log. …Meanwhile, our air quality denigrates.
We assessed the net impacts of a wood-dependent pellet industry of global importance on contemporaneous local forest carbon component pools (live trees, standing-dead trees, soils) and total stocks. We conducted post-matched difference-in-differences analyses of forest inventory data between 2000 and 2019 to infer industrial concurrent and lagged effects in the US coastal southeast. Results point to contemporaneous carbon neutrality. We found net incremental effects on carbon pools within live trees, and no net effects on standing-dead tree nor soil pools. However, we found concurrent lower carbon levels in soils, mixed effects associated with increased procurement pressures and large mill pelletization capacity, and possible spillover effects on standing-dead tree carbon pools beyond commercial procurement distances. There is robust evidence that although some trade-offs between carbon pools exist, the wood pellet industry in this particular context and period has met the overall condition of forest carbon neutrality.