Alberta's charcoal loggers: after the big fires of 1998, companies like Vanderwell Contractors were left to pick up the pieces. Strategies include a new mill sawline and a bush sort for burned and really burned wood

• Published in: Canadian forest industries p. 20
• Main Author: Johnson, L Ward
• Format: Magazine Article
• Language: English
• Published: Baie d'Urfé Annex Publishing & Printing, Inc 01.01.2000
• Subjects: Forest & brush fires; Logging; Alberta Canada
• ISSN: 0318-4277

The 1998 fires were a disaster for the Vanderwell operation. Over the short term, however, one benefit--if you could call it that--emerged: the availability of considerably more volume, as the Alberta forest industry ramps up operations to harvest as much of the burned wood as possible before it dries and cracks and becomes useless for lumber production. This means Vanderwell and other operations in the area will be processing little else but burned wood over the next couple of years. And Vanderwell now must plan for the standing green volume shortage that will follow once the burned wood is processed. Turning disaster into opportunity, Vanderwell put a third line into the sawmill to process the burned wood, which increased production to 750 000 cubic metres annually, from 500 000 cubic metres. The two green lines are fed by old inventory, purchased wood, industrial salvage, which includes wood from such oil and gas industry activities as well sites and pipeline right of ways, and small dribbles of the company's remaining standing green volume. Vanderwell has also launched an extensive program with the other operators in the area, to trade burned logs for future green logs. According to [Darrel Mackay], the logging methods didn't change when operations moved into the burned wood. "We put some quality parameters in place, but otherwise we just carried on as usual. We classified the logs into two categories: root burned--where the scorching occurred 10 feet to 15 feet up the stem; and black--where all the bark and needles are burned and the tree is completely black. With the extensive debarking we are doing at the mill, we are able to use a lot of the root-burned wood on the green line. In cases where the butt is severely burned but the top is untouched, we buck off the butt log and send the top through the green line and the butt through the black line. By using these two methods, we are able to divert quite a bit of the burned wood through the green line."