Category Archives: Wood, Paper & Green Building

Mark Ross

NEW ZEALAND — Timber industry leaders have taken umbrage at the government’s belief that cement has no practical substitutes and needs to be supported with up to $60 million in taxpayers’ funds to maintain operations at the Golden Bay Cement factory. Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced last week the government would grant up to $60m for the company to undertake at least $150m in investments to support cost-effective production to 2040. Willis said cement has no “practical substitutes”. But that view has drawn a sharp response from Mark Ross, head of the Wood Processors & Manufactures Association (WPMA). “Minister Willis only needs to look out the window,” he said. He was referring to the soon-to-be-completed six-storey Parliamentary building in Wellington standing alongside the Beehive, which is being built from NZ-made engineered wood products. …Ross said there is a tendency from the government to support high-emitting producers over renewable, carbon-storing wood products.

For more than a decade, the Two Sides Anti-Greenwash campaign has challenged misleading environmental claims that unfairly slander the environmental performance of paper communications and paper-based packaging. Today, the campaign has reached another milestone, with 1,500 organisations worldwide removing or amending unsubstantiated anti-paper statements following engagement with Two Sides. From banks and utilities to retailers, insurers and public sector organisations, businesses have increasingly used environmental messaging such as “Go Green – Go Paperless” or “Choose e-billing and save a tree” to encourage their customers to switch to digital communications. While often presented as sustainability efforts, these messages frequently lack credible evidence and are primarily used to reduce operational costs rather than environmental impact. Consumers do not support nor want these forced digital switches. …Misleading anti-paper messaging has real-world consequences … it reinforces misconceptions about a renewable and highly recycled material while encouraging decisions based on inaccurate environmental information.

AUSTRALIA — According to Architecture 2030… we’re in the midst of the largest wave of building and infrastructure growth in human history. …Closer to home, this global pressure is reflected in Australia’s own urgent need for supply; with a national target to build 1.2 million new homes over the next five years. …WoodSolutions, Australia’s leading resource for timber information, suggests that to genuinely tackle this urgent carbon issue, the industry must look upstream, to the projects’ earliest design stages. The idea that the biggest carbon reductions come from a holistic approach to a project isn’t new – Kevin Peachey, Head of Built Environment Programs at Forest & Wood Products Australia at WoodSolutions suggests that whole-building carbon optimisation is well understood, and tools like the Whole-Building Lifecycle Assessment (WBLCA) are well supported. …T3 Collingwood – the national headquarters for WoodSolutions – is a prime example of how timber’s unique whole-building potential can scale into multi-level commercial construction.

©Diageo

In a world where fossil-based, single-use plastic packaging is viewed as the antithesis of a circular, resource-efficient future, paperisation has become a hot topic of debate. Paper has an impressive 87% recycling rate across Europe, and is derived from a resource that is … renewable. Consumers tend to view it as a “green” choice. A survey by Pro Carton found that 72% of UK consumers prefer cartonboard or cardboard packaging over plastic. …Yet a ‌2023 report by a coalition of environmental groups describes paper-based food packaging is a “false solution”, because the addition of coatings and composites make them difficult to recycle. …Jamie Stone, a sustainability partner at UK-based PA Consulting, agrees that pivoting to paper or fibre comes with complex challenges. …For businesses … [paper packaging] is a bit of a minefield. Weighing up deforestation concerns, cost and overall sustainability is one thing. Navigating evolving regulations is another. 

IRELAND — Timber construction is moving from the margins of Irish residential development to its mainstream. An Estate Agent Today analysis published in July 2026 sets out why timber homes are attracting growing investor and self-build interest, citing a 49% surge in Ireland’s prefabricated wooden buildings market in the 12 months to January 2026. New buildings must be zero-emission by 2030, high BER-rated sustainable architecture commands measurable premiums, and green building standards are embedded in Ireland’s regulatory framework. For building and architecture leaders, converging policy, demand, and economics are creating one of the most coherent new residential briefs in the sector. The financial case for timber rests on construction cost and energy performance. …The 49% growth in Ireland’s prefabricated wooden buildings market confirms a structural shift already underway.

©EUmiesAwards

In a city with a deep-rooted history in masonry and concrete, a quiet revolution is taking place. One built from timber, driven by community, and led by women. Magdalena Pios, an architect based in Warsaw, is the founder of Ambient, a sustainable architecture firm. She recently designed Warsaw’s very first public timber building and the city’s first Warsaw Green Building Standard (WGBS) certified project: the Choszczówka Library. Magdalena is proving that the future of the construction sector in Poland is far more diverse, ecological, and human-centred than many might expect. …Magdalena saw a chance to return to the historical tradition of wooden architecture that once defined Warsaw’s suburbs. However, introducing a bio-based public building in a market unaccustomed to timber was no small feat. …The success of the Choszczówka Library serves as a powerful proof-of-concept. It has catalysed a noticeable shift in how the city and other Polish architects view timber construction.

©Pit-to-Table

An estimated 1.2 million metric tons of crushed olive pits, also known as stones, are generated each year during olive oil milling, supporting a growing range of uses and an evolving supply chain. According to the Spanish Biomass Association (Avebiom), many of Spain’s largest olive oil mills separate the pits from the rest of the pomace, using them to generate thermal energy for heating mills and water or selling them as fuel for industrial boilers. About one-third of the pits are cleaned and processed to reduce their moisture content before being sold at a premium over unrefined pits for use as renewable fuel in domestic boilers. However, a growing number of companies across the olive oil sector are turning pits into construction and design products, responding to demand for sustainable building materials and capitalizing on the material’s distinctive properties.

NEW Zealand — Increased trade is key to driving an innovative wood processing and manufacturing sector that will strengthen regional communities, reduce emissions, and build a more resilient and prosperous New Zealand, according to Mark Ross, Chief Executive of the Wood Processors and Manufacturers Association of New Zealand (WPMA). …“This includes supporting trade policies that open markets for high-value wood products, backing programmes such as the Value-Added Wood Exports Growth Accelerator, along with encouraging investment in domestic wood processing to grow the sector,” Mr Ross said. …The policy also highlights leading value-added wood and forestry trade missions into Asia and the Gulf region. The seven priority markets are Brazil, Switzerland, Argentina, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Uruguay and the European Free Trade Association (Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway). …The Building the Future: New Zealand’s Next Billion Customers’ can be found here.

UK — The Building from England’s Woodlands project, funded by the Forestry Commission’s Woods into Management Forestry Innovation Fund, has demonstrated that England’s broadleaf forests could play a role in delivering low-carbon buildings, supporting biodiversity and strengthening domestic supply chains. The project, led by the New Model Institute for Technology and Engineering (NMITE), Edinburgh Napier University, Built Environment – Smarter Transformation (BE-ST), Ecosystems Technologies and dRMM Architects, explored how English-grown timber can be used more effectively in modern building systems. It found that English hardwoods can play a significant role in structural applications when selected and specified appropriately. The project also developed hybrid engineered timber products that combine hardwood and softwood within the same structural element. …The use of hardwood in key structural zones also allowed for material savings of approximately between 10% and 15%. …A summary of the research by Timber Development UK is available here, and the full research here.

AUSTRALIA — The completion of the 6-Star Green Star Design redevelopment marks the first mass-timber social housing project in New South Wales, and one of the state’s earliest Class 2 timber apartment buildings. Completed in April 2026, the redevelopment delivers 75 new social homes for 130 tenants across two eight-storey towers and a separate three-storey terrace. …Since the initial concept, the project underwent several development application amendments to accommodate the use of mass timber. …One of cross-laminated timber (CLT)’s greatest advantages is speed. At Glebe, the eight-storey apartment floor was erected in as little as two weeks, while the three storey-terraces were fully completed in just three weeks. More than 2500 cubic metres of CLT and glulam were used in the construction. …The integration of a traditional brick façade introduced a slower, labour-intensive layer that disrupted sequencing. …While Australia is not short on sustainable building ambitions, regulatory frameworks have not kept pace with mass timber construction.

A new international alliance Science and Timber Construction Alliance (SITCA) is aimed at accelerating the use of timber in construction. The initiative is coordinated by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis — IIASA. Among the founders of the alliance are binderholz, EGGER, Stora Enso, WIEHAG, Hilti, Austrian Federal Forests — ÖBf, and IIASA. The first additional industrial participant has already become HASSLACHER Group. Unlike many industry initiatives that primarily focus on promotion or lobbying, SITCA positions itself as a scientific platform. Its mission is not just to promote timber as a building material but to form an evidence base regarding its role in reducing emissions, carbon storage, sustainable forest management, and the development of modern wooden structures. …The composition of the alliance participants shows that SITCA covers almost the entire value creation chain in the forestry sector — from forest owners and scientists to manufacturers of structural timber and construction technologies.

Saarbruecken, Germany — Urine and ash are two prominent waste materials produced globally and in considerable amounts each year. Both contain substances that are so far de facto lost or may even pose a threat to the environment. Urine from industrial-scale farming, for instance, is responsible for significant pollution of soil and groundwater with nitrogen and phosphorous, yet N and P are also high-demand substances in agriculture and industry. Similarly, ash is rich in several metal ions, but is still usually disposed of in a landfill. Using a sequence of simple yet effective biological and chemical processes, it may be possible to convert these two unwanted materials into “green” ammonia and calcium phosphate, both valuable high-demand substances with numerous applications… Eventually, and after considering some of the logistics of the process … this “urinash process” may be upscaled to effectively reduce waste by turning it into renewed value…

Richard Hyett

AUSTRALIA — Russian fibre still runs through timber sold on the Australian market, frequently accompanied by certification paperwork that cannot be legitimate because every Russian FSC and PEFC certificate was terminated when the war began. That is according to Source Certain, the forensic science company behind the DAFF-commissioned testing cited throughout the Senate’s sanctions inquiry, which has doubled down on its findings in a statement welcoming the committee’s recognition of scientific origin verification. “Source Certain can confirm that it continues to detect Russian fibre in products at its service locations around the world, including in Australia,” the company said. “This timber fibre frequently enters the market accompanied by supply chain documentation and due diligence indicating the product is traceable to a sustainable source certified under third-party certification schemes.” That paperwork, on the company’s account, cannot be genuine. …The answer, on the company’s telling, is chemistry alongside the paperwork rather than instead of it.

©ACSPublications

Scientists have developed sawdust-based foams that could offer an alternative to fossil fuel-based materials used in protective packaging, such as polystyrene (PS) packing peanuts and box inserts. Published in ACS Applied Polymer Materials, the prototypes incorporate cellulose binders and other additives to create rigid or flexible materials. According to the scientists, some versions matched PS strength and impact resistance, while a beeswax coating improved water resistance. …The team blended fine processed wood powder or coarse unprocessed mill waste with cellulose binders and cross-linking ingredients. Then, the researchers poured the mixtures into molds, froze them, and freeze-dried the foams to remove all the moisture. A final heat-drying step activated the cross-linked networks. The properties of the prototype foams can be different depending on the type of cellulose binders. Carbomethyl cellulose versions were stiffer than PS, while hydroxypropyl cellulose produced a softer material, according to the research.

Join us for the 16th edition of this flagship event—the only conference of its kind this year offering such a comprehensive view of the Cellulose market, covering the entire value chain from upstream to downstream. CelCo started up the conference Investing in Cellulose in 2011. Since then, it has been running every year in London, in November, the first Monday of the London Pulp Week. Its objective is to gather the entire cellulose value chain: from specialty wood pulp and cotton linters pulp suppliers to all viscose, acetate, ether & MCC, nitrate, cellophane, tyrecord, sausage casings, and sponge applications, as well as final converters up to “Brand levels” (textile, hygiene, pharmaceutical, cigarette, automotive, food, construction industries, etc.). The one-day conference includes a full-day event with 8 speakers, a breakfast, formal lunch, coffee breaks, and a cocktail the previous evening. The event will be held on Monday, November 9, 2026, from 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the luxurious Waldorf Hotel near Covent Garden. …This event is organized by CelCo, a cellulose consulting company registered in Switzerland, led by Christian Chavassieu, and assisted by its partner, Numera Analytics.

London – Greater use of sustainably sourced wood could help reposition the construction sector from a major greenhouse gas emitter to a driver of climate change mitigation, according to a new report from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and Bauhaus Earth. The findings come at a time when the built environment accounts for 37 percent of global energy and process-related emissions. With the global urban population set to double by 2050, a substantial part of the world’s future housing still needs to be built, mostly in Asia and Africa. Launched today during London Climate Action Week 2026, Wood products in the bioeconomy: scenario-based assessment of the potential for engineered wood products in climate change mitigation examines the potential use of wood in construction to reshape demand across the forest sector. In particular, engineered wood products are gaining momentum in construction, offering reduced carbon emissions compared to conventional materials such as steel and concrete. 

A proposed change to England’s fire-safety guidance could make it much harder to use timber in load-bearing structures above 11 metres. The consultation on changes to Approved Document B, the fire-safety guidance used under the Building Regulations in England, closes on 1 July 2026. Under the draft text, load-bearing elements of structure in buildings with a storey more than 11 metres above ground level should be made from materials or products achieving at least class A2-s3,d2. Most structural timber and mass timber products do not normally meet this reaction-to-fire classification. The proposal would move the debate beyond external walls and cladding. It could affect the structural frame itself in a much wider group of mid-rise residential, commercial and mixed-use buildings. This matters because mass timber and CLT are increasingly used in projects where developers want faster construction and lower embodied carbon compared with concrete or steel.

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Architecture studio Hello Wood has completed Remise Rosa, a colourful dining and events complex built from cross-laminated timber on a former railway freight yard in Switzerland. Located in Zurich West, the 2,500-square-metre development was designed and built by Hello Wood to house food stalls, bars, and event spaces, connected by brightly coloured staircases, walkways and bridges. At the heart of the project is a prefabricated structure made from cross-laminated timber (CLT). Hello Wood managed the project from initial design through to construction, with most of building’s parts manufactured off-site and assembled on location. “The CLT structure was assembled using CNC-based prefabrication for precision, minimal waste and fast, clean on-site construction, meaning the entire project was completed in just five months,” Hello Wood lead architect Balázs Szelecsényi said.

SINGAPORE — The Alliance to End Plastic Waste today published The Quest for Quality: Scaling Advanced Mechanical Recycling to Meet Recycled Content Targets for Flexibles, which provides a comprehensive technical and economic assessment of a 50,000-tonne-per-year advanced mechanical recycling plant for flexible plastics. The report demonstrates how high-quality recyclates can be produced from post-consumer household flexible plastics and identifies the conditions needed to scale these solutions commercially. …The Quest for Quality comes at a critical moment as brands, retailers and packaging producers prepare for the EU’s Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation, which mandates 35% post-consumer recycled content in non-food packaging by 2030. Flexible plastic packaging, which accounts for more than half of the global plastic packaging market, remains one of the most difficult packaging formats to recycle into high-value applications, underscoring the need for scalable recycling pathways. …Find out more at endplasticwaste.org 

Mass timber is often promoted as an environmentally friendly building material, and in many cases that reputation is deserved. A grounded way to view that claim is through actual building systems, and RedBUILT offers a good example of how engineered wood suppliers document sustainability, fabrication, and structural performance. The honest answer is that mass timber can be highly sustainable, but its environmental value depends on sourcing, design efficiency, transportation, and how intelligently the material is used in the final building. …So, is pulpwood environmentally friendly? In most well-executed cases, yes. It is based on renewable wood sources, stores carbon emissions, can reduce tangible emissions, and supports extensive low-waste prefabrication. It also aligns perfectly with sustainable structure when manufacturers provide transparent documentation and provide teams with knowledge of effective design, construction, and challenge delivery . 

The Wood Solution Thailand Forum, recently held in Bangkok, explored practical solutions for Thailand’s timber industry by connecting Swedish forestry expertise with the country’s forest sector. The forum was part of the Wood Solution Thailand Program, which brings together researchers, foresters, architects, investors, and policymakers from across Thailand and Sweden to build a sustainable timber construction ecosystem. …Speaking at the forum, H.E. Mrs. Arunrung Phothong Humphreys, Ambassador of Thailand to Sweden, explained why Sweden’s experience offers a powerful model. …The engagement phase is supporting “pioneer initiatives” across the full value chain, from forest management to construction, demonstrating practical wood-based solutions. The forum showcased more than ten such initiatives. One flagship model is the Phrae Sustainable Wood City initiative. Reflecting Phrae’s long association with teak, the project has already trained around 150 postgraduate students as future forestry, resource and environmental managers – and it is emerging as a potential model for nationwide development.

DUBAI — More than 400 exhibitors from over 45 countries will gather in Dubai next week for the Dubai WoodShow 2026, an international trade exhibition focusing on the automation and digital supply chain technologies reshaping the global timber industry. The three-day event, running from 22nd to 24th June at the Dubai World Trade Centre, features over 600 international brands and five dedicated country pavilions. With the timber trade becoming increasingly shaped by supply chain shifts, evolving sourcing strategies, and the growing need for speed, visibility, and operational efficiency, this year’s edition of Dubai WoodShow places strong focus on AI, automation, smart logistics, and digital supply chain systems that are transforming how wood products are sourced, moved, and delivered across markets.