Tacoma, Wash./August 22, 2006/PRNewswire/—A group of wood products industry trade associations and their members are poised to aid reconstruction of the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast.
"The wood products industry stands ready and able to assist in rebuilding; we're just waiting for government policy and regulatory issues to be resolved," said Dennis Hardman, president of APA-The Engineered Wood Association and chairman of the Wood Products Council (WPC), an industry alliance.
Comprised of APA, the American Wood Council, Southern Pine Council, Canadian Wood Council, and Western Wood Products Association, WPC has already sponsored a rebuilding summit in New Orleans and will be meeting again soon in Chicago to further refine its plans.
The New Orleans summit brought together industry representatives, builders, and experts and officials from FEMA, the insurance industry, and state government to review the status of new building code requirements, insurance issues, reconstruction funding programs, and related topics.
The wood promotion program, Hardman said, consists of several components, including consumer education on raised wood floors for mitigating storm water damage, training of builders on hurricane-resistant wood wall and roof construction systems, and collaboration with code officials and building inspectors to help assure proper wood product specification and application.
The raised wood floor component of the program is headed up by the Southern Pine Council, a joint promotional body of the Southern Forest Products Association and Southeastern Lumber Manufacturers Association. It is based in Kenner, La. APA, based in Tacoma, Wash., is primarily responsible for builder education and training, while the Washington, D.C.- headquartered American Wood Council is the alliance's chief building-code liaison group.
Wood construction offers numerous benefits, Hardman noted, including strength, affordability, availability of products, fast construction schedules, durability and aesthetic appeal. And unlike steel, he added, wood construction has a long tradition in the Southeast and Atlantic Coast regions, so the supply infrastructure, building trades' knowledge base, and consumer acceptance are already in place.
New codes make a big difference
Damage assessment observations by APA staff following Hurricane Katrina confirmed other independent reports that wood frame buildings meeting recent code requirements performed exceptionally well under the wind forces of the storm. APA participated on two damage assessment teams: one organized by the Institute for Business and Home Safety, a nonprofit insurance industry group, the other under the auspices of the National Science Foundation (NSF).
"Empirical evidence suggests that code changes implemented after Hurricane Andrew [in 1992] resulted in improved structural performance," an APA damage assessment report notes. Most of the observed damage, it says, was caused by storm surge. Roof sheathing loss, as in past hurricanes, was directly attributable to non-code conforming attachment schedules and practices. Observations also underscored the inadequacy of non-structural wall sheathing, such as foam, to resist high wind loads.
The full report, Hurricane Katrina: Structural Performance of Wood-Frame Buildings in the Aftermath, may be downloaded free of charge from APA's website.
Some 280,000 single-family and multifamily units were completely destroyed by last year's hurricanes in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas, according to APA estimates based on Red Cross damage assessments and other local sources. The estimated wood product demand for rebuilding is 1.8 billion board feet of lumber, 1.5 billion square feet (3/8" basis) of structural wood panels (plywood and oriented strand board), and 200 million board feet of engineered wood framing products, such as glulam timber, wood I- joists and laminated veneer lumber. About 20 percent could be added to those volumes to account for nonresidential construction and repairs.
Those requirements, although large, are well within the industry's ability to meet, according to Jonathan Martin, chairman and CEO of Roy O. Martin Lumber Company, Alexandria, La., and chairman of the APA Board of Trustees. "The forest products industry is particularly strong in the Southeast, with ample timber supply, dozens of wood product manufacturing facilities, and an established transportation infrastructure and distribution supply chain," he said.
In addition, the structural wood panel industry in the South is expected to add substantial new production capacity over the next two to three years, which will contribute to job growth and help stimulate the regional economy, Martin said. Among those new projects is a Martin Company oriented strand board plant that is scheduled to open this year in Oakdale, La.
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