The Foresf and our Environment

by Lowry Wyatt vice president Weyerhaeuser Co.

despoilation of the environment, both physical and biological."

I would rephrase that and say,'oln the creation of necessary products, we must use the process with the fewest undesirable side efiects."

Obviously, a nuclear explosion is not the most desirable way to create light, even though it is uncommonly bright. There are more rational processes that don't have the undesirable side efiects. But any process does have side efiects.

All these things are a matter of balance.

When civilization began all men had to work to produce the necessities to sustain life: Food, clothing, shelter, and protection from whatever threatened. We now produce the necessities of life in greater quantity with less labor. But most men must work to produce wealth. They change something in nature to a more valuable form so that all men can live. This means everything from changing a chemical into a wonder drug to fashioning a special piece of the earth's crust into a tool.

Without prejudice- because we need all materials in some measurelet us examine, in terms of environment, the efiect of our efforts to produce the materials you must have to create buildings and the other kinds of shelter and amenities that 'men need.

A good deal has been said about the steel two-by-four as a substitute for the usual one made of wood. Consider this simple element in a structure.

of water and dispose of huge quan. tities of waste for which we have no use, Plastics? Petrochemicals? Masonry? Concrete? The story is the same. We must take away from the earth -we must use, once and for all, the treasures that were born with the earth and others it has taken the sun millions of years to store in the form of fossil fuels.

Story st s Glqnce

Excerpts from an excellent speech by Wyatt, telling how environmentalists who ignore the logical soundness of cutting and us ing the f orest's wealth, do so at society's peril.

It is true that a logging site is unsightly. But the period is brief, in the life of the forest. Soon new growth takes over the plain or mountain. But no new mountain replaces the one that yielded its iron and it's hard to hide the scars of the open pit that once held coal.

The forest does not just produce wood, howevero or water, or wildlife, or a pleasant place to camp or walk or sit by a brook. While the steel mills-and you, and your automobile, and your furnace, and your electric plant-gobble oxygen and produce carbon dioxide, young forests utilize that carbon dioxide to make wood, and return oxygen to the air.

fT may sound obvious to say that r every product requires a process, but I would like to explain that statement in a context that may not be so obvious.

The President, several Congressional Committees, the Environmental Quality Council, and many authoritative sources are saying over and over in difierent ways that we must ooconduct our operations and activities in such a way as to minimize pollution of air and water to avoid the

Ore is mined. Heavy equipment, burning fossil fuels, is used to deliver the ore. The ore goes to the mill, where it is reduced by heat, again produced by fossil fuelg either directly or through the intermediary of electricity, which must somehow be generated. Waste products must be disposed of: on the land, as slag and ash; in the air. as soot and other particulates, and in the water, as acid and dirt. This process is dependent upon prior processing of depletable natural resources in monumental quantities.

To produce the gleaming structural member, we must gouge at least one hole in the earth-perhaps as part of the elimination of the whole mountain. We must generate enormous heat in some way, use large quantities

You are going to hear more and more about the environmental consequences of using certain products and processes; the engine in your car is front and center now. W'hat about the air pollution from heating and cooling your house and office? This consideration alone will emphasize the value of wood as a building product. In addition to the strength, versatility, beauty and other values you know so well" a wood structure insulates against both heat and cold. Wood has an important effect on protecting against environmental pollution through just that property. Heating a wood structure requires consumption of less energy-so does cooling. Obviously, by conserving energy, a wood structure conserves the fuel needed to produce the energy, and eliminates the undesirable byproducts of combustion. Building with wood is environmentallv sound.