APA Prepares For 75th

(Continued Jrom previous page) product mix and geographic range of its membership, the association changed its name again in 1994, to APA-The Engineered Wood Association. The "APA" was retained in the name because it was so widely known and respected in the marketplace.

A number of f'actors have contributed to the rise of this new era of engineered wood products. One of the chief reasons is the rapidly changing wood fiber resource base, the result in part of government-imposed constraints on timber harvests. With less traditional timber available for wood products, producers have had to improve existing processes and invent new ways to make more with less and with alternative wood fiber resources. That necessity, in turn, gave rise to innovations in manufacturing technology.

A related reason for the growing use of engineered wood products is that they are rightly viewed as environmentally superior. Engineered wood uses more of the available resource with very little waste and, in many cases, can be produced with fast-growing, underutilized, and less expensive wood species grown in managed forests and on tree farms. Old growth and other forests that society has chosen to preserve are thereby safeguarded. f IKE thlt little gir'l in Longlcllou's lrtttttttts lloenr. tllc l-lhr)r.r\ln! rr[rlket errn be rcrv gc'rotl rvhen it's good. btrt also ut tirnc.s rather horricl. Latcll it hls been ilt a cleciclccll1' tirul moorl. rvith sirtgle arttl Inr-rltil'lrrrtilv strtt.ts this rcrtr firrccast to bc ofT roLrghlv 157 frortt 2(X)6. Tltat translrttcs t() a sLlbstantial dccline itr clcmancl litr ancl siLles ol utlotl ploclucts. ll'clm rlirttcnsionul lumbcr and plyu'ttod to OSB. wood l-.joists. unrl glulltttt tirttber.

Engineered wood products also compare very favorably with non-wood products based on such criteria as embodied energy and emissions of carbon dioxide and other pollutants during manufacture.

And, of course, they are made from the only truly renewable building material resource-wood.

Still another reason for the popularity of these products is that they satisfy marketplace demand for superior performance in all types of demanding structural applications. Engineered wood actually improves upon many of the inherent structural advantages of wood. Cross-laminated plywood and oriented strand board. for example, distribute along-the-grain strength of wood in both panel axes. OSB eliminates knots and knotholes. And glulam beams and wood I-joists can carry greater loads over longer spans than is possible with solid sawn wood of the same size.

All of these factors-changing resource supplies, manufacturing innovations, environmental considerations, and superior performance-suggest that structural engineered wood products will occupy an increasingly important place in the building materials market of the future.

And as it has for the past 75 years, APA will be at the forefront of industry quality assurance, application research, and market development efforts.

INITIALLY PLANNED as concrele and stee1. APA sta{f consulted with wood structure used 900.000 sq. fl. of plvwood and OSB.

Tlic LI .S. nortlcsidcrttial cttnstructiott tlarkct. on thc other huncl ri hich last vcar postccl an inf'lation-rrtl.lLrstctl the architects for this senior living facility in Germantown, Tn, The resulting spending increase of 6Vo, is expected to do even better this year. Leading segments this year, according to an American Institute of Architects forecast, will be office buildings, up 9Vo; hotels, up 137o, and hospitals and health care facilities, up 7Vo. If that forecast proves accurate, 2006-07 will become the best two-year period for nonresidential construction since the late 1990s.

In the longer term, commercial construction presents a significant opportunity not only to substantially increase wood product demand but also to lessen manufacturer, distributor and dealer reliance on new residential construction.

Taking up that challenge is the Wood Products Council (WPC), an alliance of wood products industry associations whose charter members include the American Wood Council of the American Forest & Paper Association, APA-The Engineered Wood Association, Canadian Wood Council, Southern Forest Products Association, and Western Wood Products Association.

After more than 20 years as an ad-hoc vehicle to develop and coordinate wood industry market education and promotion programs in North America, the council officially incorporated as a U.S. nonprofit organization late last year in order to more effectively facilitate industrywide initiatives to increase wood product demand.

The council is governed by a board of directors comprised of 15 senior executives from the organization's five charter associations and their members. (See sidebar on next page.) Funding is being sought from U.S. and Canadian government agencies with matching support

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