Agriculture and Forestry
Buildings and Infrastructure

Domestic Mass-Timber Industry Expands with Two New Planned CLT Facilities for Maine

By

February 23, 2018

Within the last week, two companies, LignaCLT Maine, LLC and Montana-based SmartLam, LLC, announced they will be bringing cross-laminated timber (CLT) manufacturing to Maine. This is welcome news to a state whose economy historically has been heavily dependent on the forest products industry but has been struggling with lumber mill closures and the slow death of the American pulp and paper industry that accelerated during the 2008 recession.  

Cross-laminated timber (CLT) is an innovative wood building product that enthusiasts lovingly call “a lumber sandwich,” because it stacks together layers of lumber in alternating directions to create an incredibly strong and resilient building material. Common in Europe for decades, CLT has been taking the North American architecture and building sector by storm as architects and designers fall for its design aesthetics, structural properties, low carbon footprint and cost-savings.

While relatively few buildings in North America have been built using CLT, this is poised to change quickly. Announced earlier this month, the United States’ largest CLT building project, Riverfront Square, will be built in Newark, NJ by Canadian firm Michael Green Architecture.  Its’ three buildings with a maximum height of 11-stories will feature a concrete foundation and CLT panels to bring increased light into the buildings and reduce construction weight.

 

Maine -- from Paper to Pre-Fab

On February 13, LignaCLT Maine, LLC announced plans to construct a manufacturing plant at a pre-existing paper mill facility in Millinocket, Maine. LignaCLT is planning to manufacture CLT and glulam (where lumber is glued together in the same direction)  and expects to directly employ about 100 people at the $30 million facility beginning next year. Millinocket was selected because it was home to Great Northern Paper Co. for over one hundred years, and has access to the facilities that traditionally supported paper mills – hydroelectric dams (i.e. cheap power), good roads, and low-grade softwoods, primarily spruce.

LignaCLT Maine’s parent company LignaTerra Global is a Charlotte, North Carolina company.  On the decision to open a mass timber facility in Maine, CEO and co-founder Nick Holgorsen commented that “the type of trees that are important to the cross-laminated timber production process are plentiful here in Maine.  Second, we know that Maine has a dedicated, productive workforce with timber industry experience. We see this as an opportunity to provide jobs and help communities thrive.” After the closure of the Millinocket mill, the median age in town increased to 48 and median income dropped to under $30,000.  The hope is that CLT can help bring people and prosperity back to the region.

Just two days later, on February 15, Montana-based SmartLam announced plans to open a second manufacturing facility in Maine. The company was awarded $3 million from the Maine Technology Asset Fund 2.0 program, and the total project cost is estimated to be $23.5 million. While site selection is still underway, the facility is expected to bring 100 direct and 200 indirect jobs to the state.

The three-year old SmartLam is growing by leaps and bounds, producing more than 12 million board feet per year of CLT at its Columbia Falls, Montana factory.  To keep up with growing demand from architects and designers on the East Coast, SmartLam looked towards Maine’s woodbasket for a potential second manufacturing site.

Bringing the companies to Maine required several years of work from a dozen or more non-profits, universities and community colleges. The research on wood products occurring at the University of Maine and local colleges was also a critical factor in attracting the companies. 

 

Feeding the Growing East Coast CLT Market

On the East Coast, the handful of mass timber construction projects underway are mostly using CLT imported from the more mature European mass timber markets, but the new facilities in Maine are poised to be a game changer for the North American market.

SmartLam President and General Manager Casey Malmquist commented on the Maine expansion, stating, “We are seeing considerable demand for CLT on the East Coast as architects, builders and developers seek durable, sustainable building materials… Our new Maine facility will provide us with the perfect vantage point to supply customers with our premium CLT products while allowing us to lower the environmental impact and cost associated with shipping.”

According to an economic development organization, Maine & Company, the two CLT facilities will provide stable jobs and salaries, employees will range from quality control, engineering, 3D modelling, CAD and other high-tech manufacturing jobs, as well as more traditional roles, such as warehouse, administrative and sales staff.  While the facilities cannot absorb all of the job losses from the state’s paper mills, it can use a great deal of softwood that was previously going to pulp and paper facilities.

 

Mass Timber’s Mass Appeal  

CLT is just one example of a mass timber product.  Mass timber are large, solid wood panels that can be used in conjunction or as a partial replacement for structural steel and concrete. Other types include glue laminated timber (glulam), where lumber is glued together in the same direction (as opposed to alternating, as in CLT), nail laminated timber (nail-lam), where lumber is stacked together using nails, dowel laminated timber (dowel-lam), laminated strand lumber and laminated veneer lumber.

Each product has its specific applications, but CLT, in particular, has captured the attention of the North American architecture and building community because of its unique properties and seemingly limitless design applications.

Along with its sturdiness, the fire resistant properties of mass timber allow these new wood buildings to be much higher than traditional wood buildings. Because of its stability, CLT is particularly well-suited for multi-story buildings as well as floors, walls, and roofs in mid-rise construction, which typically ranges from 4 to 12 stories.

CLT panels are lightweight, prefabricated for easy installation, and offer beautiful and unusual design flexibility. They are also a cost-savings measure in the construction industry, shaving construction time by 33 percent as their prefabrication greatly reduces build time – so the nickname ‘lumber legos’ could apply, as well. In finished construction, the panels are sometimes left exposed, and sometimes covered, which is more of an aesthetic choice than anything else.  

 

CLT’s Environmental Footprint

Buildings have an outsized impact on emissions. In the United States, the built environment is highly energy-inefficient. Buildings account for 40 percent of domestic energy consumption, cause nearly half of U.S. carbon emissions, and consume 75 percent of generated electricity.

Given their high energy usage, buildings can and should be part of the climate solution. Many of the nation’s buildings will need to be built or renovated within the next 25 years, which presents an opportunity to both use materials with a lower lifecycle carbon footprint, while also greatly increasing buildings’ energy efficiency.

Concrete, one of the most common building materials, is incredibly carbon intensive. Besides water, concrete is the second most consumed material on the planet, with up to five percent of global carbon emissions coming from the concrete industry alone. Steel and glass are also energy intensive to produce.

As architects, engineers and planners increasingly turn towards buildings-oriented climate solutions, many are discovering wood to be a cost effective, low-carbon material. Using lifecycle assessment, designers can calculate the benefit of using mass timber versus traditional building materials by considering the amount of carbon stored in the wood, avoided emissions, and regrowth of U.S. forests. Sustainably managed forests with sustainable timber harvest rates are key to making mass timber a more environmentally friendly choice.

While wood will never completely replace steel and concrete in the built environment, its use in North America can achieve multiple goals – new markets for wood products, new jobs in rural areas, reduced costs in the construction industry, superior aesthetics and attributes, and reduced environmental footprint of the built environment. 

 

For more information see: