Time For Timber Manifesto Launched
To avert the worst effects of climate change, the global forest and timber industries are calling on politicians to urgently support the scaling up of the use of wood in a new manifesto. The manifesto, ‘Growing our low-carbon future: Time for Timber’, sets out the case for how we can make greater use of wood to transform our built environment, which currently is responsible for approximately 40% of global energy related CO2 emissions.
Achieving net zero CO2 emissions by 2050 requires construction to rapidly decarbonise whilst still meeting the needs of a growing urban population, the increasing demand for new buildings, and the urgent requirement to renovate existing buildings.
Wood is the only sustainable structural material which can enable a substantial decarbonisation of the built environment based on existing business models and proven technology: providing vast carbon sinks in our rural areas and carbon stores in our cities. The five recommendations included in the report seek to rapidly scale up the global forestry and timber industries and enhance the ability of the supply chain to minimise CO2 emissions across the lifecycle of any wood product:
• Embed mandatory lifecycle assessments and embodied carbon thresholds within local and national building plans.
• Increase the use of wood within new build and renovation.
• Drive the growth of the bio-based circular economy through sustainable public procurement.
• Facilitate resource efficient use of wood and wood recycling, especially collection and sorting in municipalities, and develop measures to gain access to post-consumer wood, an invaluable secondary raw material resource.
• Increase training to upskill workers and create new jobs to boost the development of a sustainable and circular bioeconomy.
Speaking at the launch of Time for Timber, Andrew Waugh (pictured) of Waugh Thistleton Architects said: “Wood and wood-based materials offer solutions based on existing business models and proven technology. This is ‘carbon capture and storage’ in action now – with no further research or technological breakthroughs needed. Sequestration in the forest and storage in the wood is a win-win, as at the same time as we capture and store, we are also substituting for fossil fuel-based materials.”
www.worldofwoodfestival.org/timefortimber
