Superior practices & processes

The British Columbia forest industry has a long history of supporting innovation, which has enabled it to evolve into a sector whose sustainable forestry practices, manufacturing processes and facilities are among the best in the world.

Canada-wide, more than $30 billion in capital spending science 1990 has delivered significant results, including the following:

Increasing demand for natural resources will give preferred status to jurisdictions like BC that manage them sustainably.
  • Bigger and faster paper machines and more process automation in papermaking have translated into lower unit costs and improved environmental performance, better resource utilization, lower water consumption, improved labour productivity and safer workplaces. The progressive upgrading of older mills has kept them open and competitive.
  • Investments in state-of-the-art sawmill process management systems, including computer guided precision saws, have allowed dramatic improvements in productivity and the efficient conversion of logs to lumber.
  • Forestry and mill residues, once considered waste, are now used to make pulp, paper, medium density fibreboard, particleboard, hardboard and softboard, or used as renewable bio-energy.
  • Recycling capacity that continues to increase. The industry has already surpassed its goal of 50 per cent paper recovery and is aiming even higher.

Each of these innovations has in its own way contributed to reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and the industry is continuing to invest in new practices and technologies that help to achieve its goal of carbon neutrality by 2015.

Forest Management

British Columbia has some of the most innovative and strictly regulated forest management practices in the world. With more than 44 million hectares of forest land recognized under one of three environmental certification programs, consumers can rest assured that wood-based products originating from BC forests represent a sustainable, socially responsible industry.

Harvesting less than one per cent each year of the 60 million hectares of forest land base in the province, BC forest companies are mandated to preserve a wide variety of forest attributes in their management strategies. Managed forests coexist side-by-side with the province's 13.8 million hectares of protected land, where resource extraction is prohibited and other ecosystem values are preserved.

Professional foresters in British Columbia are leaders in their field, often traveling around the world to teach other countries about various leading edge management practices. Supported by a number of forest research institutions and universities in BC, our professionals and practitioners have access to knowledge and resources at a critical point in time when maintaining forest ecosystem health in changing global climates is paramount to the future success of the sector.

Manufacturing

With advancements in technology and changes in social pressures, the forest sector in British Columbia has increased its ability to get the most out of every tree it uses. Many of the innovative engineered wood and paper products used around the world today were researched and developed in British Columbia.

A major contributor to the knowledge and product pool was the former industry pioneer MacMillan Bloedell Limited, who invented several engineered and wood composite products in wide use today.

The result is larger timber materials can be used to replace steel joists and beams in many building applications. Expanding the applications in which we can use wood—substituting out higher carbon emitting materials—allows us sequester even more carbon in long lasting products and structures.

In our wood mills, state of the art sawmilling employs advanced technology that maximizes the quality and quantity of boards that can be cut from every tree. Computer applications used in the wood-manufacturing sector are as advanced as those used in the aerospace and aeronautics industries with the widespread use of robotics, lasers, simulation and animation and ultrasound.

Fibre that is unsuitable for lumber production is further processed to product composite products such as OBS or fibre boards, paper, and more recently to provide the biomass for energy production. The result of these various processes is that today in BC, almost 97 per cent of every harvested log is converted in valuable products with very little waste.

In our pulp and paper mills, bigger and faster paper machines and more process automation in papermaking have translated into lower unit costs and improved environmental performance, better resource utilization, lower water consumption, improved labour productivity, and safer workplaces.

The progressive upgrading of older mills has kept them open and competitive. Investments in state-of-the-art sawmill process management systems, including computer-guided precision saws, have allowed dramatic improvements in productivity and the efficient conversion of logs to lumber. Residues are no longer simply burned or landfilled. Instead they are sent to make pulp, paper, medium-density fibreboard, particleboard, hardboard, and softboard, or used as biomass fuel for power.