{"id":110036,"date":"2022-06-01T07:20:00","date_gmt":"2022-06-01T05:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/?p=110036"},"modified":"2022-05-24T15:53:48","modified_gmt":"2022-05-24T13:53:48","slug":"wood-conservation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wood-conservation\/","title":{"rendered":"Wood conservation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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Wood conservation is a necessary and noble art. In itself, wood is an excellent construction material: in ample supply, often locally sourced, easy to process; its production requires little energy. But softwood will quickly deteriorate. It may rot by action of microorganisms or be eaten by insects. But there are new treatments, that render to softwood the properties of hardwood. Which means that we don\u2019t have to log the tropical rain forest in order to cover our needs.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Picea abies wood texture. Photo: ILoveAllTrees, Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Environmental effects<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

During the industrial revolution, demand for wood rose quickly. Telephone posts, railway sleepers, we needed them in the name of progress. But this wood needed to be conserved. Done by rather crude, and strongly polluting techniques of wood conservation. Like treatment with coal tar (creosote) or later with chrome salts. Agents that invariably end up in the environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But modern technology lends us methods of wood conservation without harmful environmental effects. With them, we can lend hardwood properties to softwood. If we remove knots and other weak spots, we will obtain a strong and durable material. We can reinforce that effect by gluing thin layers on top of each other \u2013 which will render us a strong material that we can bend into any form desired<\/a>. An ideal material for a building trade that looks for new avenues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Furfuryl alcohol<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

From a chemical point of view, wood is particularly vulnerable because of the large number of free hydroxyl groups. These are ideal points of attack for microorganisms. But a treatment with furfuryl alcohol will result in wood conservation. This compound will impregnate the wood cells, binding to them through the application of heat, radiation and\/or catalysts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Popular American Furniture Wood Types. Photo: DutchCrafters, Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

We can produce furfuryl alcohol by hydrogenation of furfural, a side product of the treatment of corn cobs or sugar cane. The substance has a low molecular weight and will therefore penetrate into the softwood. The treatment with furfuryl alcohol will render wood less vulnerable to moisture, it will swell less; the strong material will also be less susceptible to attack by insects. One of the companies employing this process is Foreco in Dalfsen <\/a>(the Netherlands).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wood conservation by acetic anhydride<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In another technology, we impregnate softwood with acetic anhydride. This technology is being applied by Accsys<\/a>, a company headquartered in London, with production facilities in Arnhem (the Netherlands) and Hull (UK). They use this technique for impregnation of fast-growing FSC\u00ae certified wood; in order to arrive at a construction material with better properties than \u2018non-natural construction materials\u2019 \u2013 like concrete. Materials, so they say, with a larger CO2<\/sub> footprint than wood. Moreover, such materials use a lot of resources and energy. \u2018Essentially, sustainable building materials produced in the biosphere (bio-cycle of the circular economy) have three huge \u2018green\u2019 benefits over techno-cycle materials:<\/p>\n\n\n\n