How Long Will The Beetle Wood Last?

By 250 News

 The Provincial   Forester says  there are now 12 million hectares of B.C. forest impacted  by the mountain pine beetle     

The Provincial Forest Ministry says when the Pine beetle epidemic reaches its peak in 2015; 1 billion cubic meters will be infested in the province of British Columbia up from 530 million cubic meters in 2007.

The report says the hardest hit area of the province is the Vanderhoof, Burns Lake, Quesnel, 100 Mile House, Williams Lake, south to Clinton and west to the Coastal Mountains of the province where between 41 and 57% of the pine will be destroyed.

The Ft. St James to Mackenzie area and to the north will see 26 to 40% of the pine destroyed. Prince George to Dawson Creek 11-25 % and the Robson Valley 1-10%

The peak of the attack according to the report was in 2005 in this region. In 1999 Mature Pine over 60 years of age contributed 29% or 1.35 billion cubic meters of the total volume of the BC land base forest

In the Prince George Forest District 46% of the young pine 20 to 55 years old had been hit by the Pine Beetle.

The report says that there are regions of the province that will be bale to continue to sustain a harvest for a longer period then the Prince George district where salvaging stands is expected to become no merchantable in the near future.

The report goes on to say that this is contingent on the fact that forest companies are looking at new means to harvest the wood including bio-energy, wood pellets and strand lumber.

In 2006 the harvest was 45.9 million cubic meters. That is expected to be maintained for 4 years then be reduced to 37.2 million, then dropping to 25.1 million meters by year 11 as the remaining stands of beetle killed wood become uneconomical to harvest. It is estimated that 184 million cubic meters of wood will be left behind unused at the end of that period.

The report spells out four areas of concern;

(1)   Ability of Industry to utilize beetle killed wood.

(2)   The dependency of a community on the forest sector for its employment

(3)   The relative share of harvest associated with pine in an area.

(4)   Strength of the BC economy and the Job Market

The report has brought a mixed reaction. One Industry analyst put it this way;

"The  harvest level for the affected areas of the interior is set at 54 million meters per year today, will drop to 37 million sometime in the next few years and 25 million after that. Your average size mill today uses about 1 million meters per year so I guess that’s like saying 29 mills the size of Carrier / PG Sawmill / Winton/ etc will disappear over the next - what - 5 to 10 years? Each one of those mills employs about 400 people directly in manufacturing, logging, hauling,  administration etc.

I don’t want to sound negative but we should be more concerned about the fact that we are not even keeping up with the established (uplifted) cut and in 2006 the industry undercut by about 9 million meters. I would expect 2007 to be even worse. The concern there is that if this forest land is not being harvested then it extends the downfall period. In other words, the sooner we knock it down and replant, the sooner the industry re-emerges,  albeit 50 or 60 years from now.

Sustainable harvest levels are based on ’growth and yield’ levels - how many cubic meters is the forest growing by each year sets the allowable annual cut. Here’s a news flash - the 530 + million meters of dead timber isn’t growing anything.

I know it won’t likely happen but what we really need is a response team that treats this like the disaster that it is. The various Action Committees are doing the best they can with the limited influence they have and probably get bogged down in small local issues and do-good activities. Doug Routlege, bless his heart, is trying to keep the picture looking as rosy as he can or industry will lose their investors and employees, the government isn’t going to do anything rash until after the Olympics but just imagine the mess we’ll be in by 2011 ...... there must be examples
elsewhere in the world where there were significant natural disasters that needed high level, no red tape, radical action.

In general I think wildlife is the most adaptable although we will see shifts in population and species. The larger concern is soil erosion and hydrology, once that starts on a large scale, it’s going to be hard to turn
it back."

Yet another industry analyst had this to say;

"The hot summer of 2006 created a major problem of checking in the beetle killed wood. Industry people believe that this is about as bad as it will get.

In this area only 11 to 25 % of the wood has been affected. That leaves a substantial amount of product left. Some mills such as the Joint Venture mill in the Chilcotin being operated by Chilcotin Forest Products have been milling dead pine and running it in their mill that is 21 years old. Some of the wood has looked awful until it is run through the mill."   

This analyst says he believes that small companies such as Carrier , Dunkley, and Winton Global will not simply dry up and blow away , "They will look for a new means of technology to better use the fiber left in the forest. " 

He feels the industry will not take the hit that has been predicted.

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