TY - JOUR

T1 - The environmental and social impacts of modified wood production: effect of timber sourcing

AU - Roberts, George

AU - Skinner, Campbell

AU - Ormondroyd, Graham

PY - 2022/10/2

Y1 - 2022/10/2

N2 - This study assesses the environmental and social impacts of a modified softwood produced using radiata pine sourced from New Zealand or Chile. The LCA found that differing forestry and transport burdens associated with each location broadly cancelled each other out, giving overall product footprints that were very similar. Boiler gas and phenol-formaldehyde resin were the biggest emitters of GHG emissions, and normalization highlighted toxicity impacts as significant, largely due to the resin input. SLCA hotspots analyses suggest that the forestry sector in Chile has more potential social risks than the equivalent sector in New Zealand. However, each sector scored poorly in different social aspects making it difficult to recommend a sector without introducing subjective judgements. Combining LCA with SLCA is still novel, but this study found it added useful insights into a broader range of impacts associated with sustainable production, especially given the similarity of the environmental LCA results taken alone.

AB - This study assesses the environmental and social impacts of a modified softwood produced using radiata pine sourced from New Zealand or Chile. The LCA found that differing forestry and transport burdens associated with each location broadly cancelled each other out, giving overall product footprints that were very similar. Boiler gas and phenol-formaldehyde resin were the biggest emitters of GHG emissions, and normalization highlighted toxicity impacts as significant, largely due to the resin input. SLCA hotspots analyses suggest that the forestry sector in Chile has more potential social risks than the equivalent sector in New Zealand. However, each sector scored poorly in different social aspects making it difficult to recommend a sector without introducing subjective judgements. Combining LCA with SLCA is still novel, but this study found it added useful insights into a broader range of impacts associated with sustainable production, especially given the similarity of the environmental LCA results taken alone.

KW - LCA

KW - GHG emissions

KW - SLCA

KW - social lifecycle assessment

KW - social hotspot

KW - wood modification

KW - envrionmental impacts

KW - social indicators

U2 - 10.1080/20426445.2022.2117923

DO - 10.1080/20426445.2022.2117923

M3 - Article

VL - 13

SP - 236

EP - 254

JO - International Wood Products Journal

JF - International Wood Products Journal

SN - 2042-6445

IS - 4

ER -