FEATURES - ENVIRONMENT AND SUSTAINABILITY
Environmental benefits aside , recycling timber can also be profitable . And , in this ever volatile economy of ours , an additional source of income is welcome .
WASTE NOT , WANT NOT
Tons of waste wood and timber is disposed of every year . Recycling this wood is highly beneficial , especially since timber can be reused without felling more trees . Not only that , but the improper disposal of timber be hazardous to the environment .
The timber recycling process is fairly simple . Waste wood and timber can be sent to recycling plants for processing . The pieces are loaded into a powerful wood shredder , which breaks them up in varying size of wood chips . Different sizes are then used for different purposes . The oversized pieces are re-circulated and the fine material is used as animal bedding . The process is efficient in ensuring that the products are not wasted . In the absence of a recycling plant , waste wood and timber is simply relegated to a landfill or dump . Recycling and reusing construction timber is not common practise in South Africa yet . Very often , the only people who reuse and recycle timber and wood are artisans who use it to make furniture and other household items .
In the UK , however , using recycled wood has become quite a trend in the past two decades . In an article – ‘ The Opportunities and Challenges for Re-use and Recycling of Timber and Wood Products Within the Construction Sector ’ – by Graham A Ormondroyd , Morwenna J Spear and Campbell Skinner , published in Environmental Impacts of Traditional and Innovative Forest-based Bio-products in 2016 , the authors explain that a number of factors have influenced this growing trend . Those factors include early adoption of standards for the quality of recycled wood in the particleboard industry , clear segregation of waste wood by origin and level of expected contamination and , more recently , the development of the biomass energy market .
“ The construction sector [ in the UK ] presents several challenges when reclaiming , re-using or recycling timber , however , significant progress has been made
" The construction sector presents several challenges when reclaiming , re-using or recycling timber ."
by the introduced legislation , and through initiatives , best practice and the development of waste transfer stations and businesses utilising waste wood .” One way that timber is repurposed in South Africa is as medium-density fibreboard ( MDF ). MDF , which is typically made up of wood fibre , urea-formaldehyde resin glue , water and paraffin wax , is quite common in South Africa . MDF is created by putting layer upon layer of compressed wood chips together , to create the thickness required . And , while MDF is not recycled timber in the strictest sense , it is a good example of how wood that would otherwise be discarded has been repurposed into a useful and financially-viable product .
CHALLENGES TO OVERCOME
One of the biggest problems with recycling timber is that the collected wood comes from multiple sources . Construction sites especially are , and can be , major contributors of timber . Unfortunately , this wood is usually a mixture of every variety available . Pieces of solid wood will be mixed in with laminate material , plywood and even treated timber . This poses a big challenge when it comes to recycling because the material must be sorted and separated . It is a labour-intensive process that is also timeconsuming .
In South Africa , however , there is an abundance of unskilled labour and , perhaps , timber recycling plants could help to alleviate this .
Timber reclaimed and recycled from demolition is a viable and environmentally-efficient commodity that can be reused structurally and as processed into other forms . The challenges for the industry in South Africa is to make effective use of this untapped resource .
Africa Biomass Company has been in the forefront of the development of Biomass harvesting , processing & Bio-fuels production in Africa .
LAND CLEARING
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CONTACT US Tel : 023 342 1212 Email : info @ chipper . co . za Website : www . chipper . co . za
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