Any lateral thinkers here? What to do with 1000's of cords of 'waste' wood?

[KiwiBro]

All over this small but perky country are Pinus Radiata plantations being harvested and 1000's of cords of 'waste wood' being pushed over the sides of landings and eventually rotting away. It's low value wood at the mo' (costs more to process into anything and then truck it anywhere than what it could sell for) but I can't help but hope there is something that could be done with it.

Perhaps a mobile pellet-making facility could turn it into a high enough value product to justify the costs?
Chipping seems to be uneconomic unless there's a customer nearby.

When are they going to hurry up and invent a feasible mobile wood chip to lignan to diesel facility that can produce way more diesel than a digger needs to keep it fed with wood?

I dunno, just seems a shame to see all that wood with no place to go. Sure, nutrients are merely returning from whence they came but seems like it's crying out for a higher purpose.

 

[Circle B MN]

They actual truck chips a good ways from here to burn as biomass energy. What your lacking is a good ole guberment subsidy.....:msp_thumbup:





/thread

 

[KiwiBro]

Subsiwhat?

This is the way-too-open-and-free-trade NZ economy we are talking about here. Subsidies and most other forms of reverse duty/tariff were tossed aside in the mad scramble for the macroeconomic mirage otherwise known as 'free' trade agreements.

Not even any point trying to create and have partially funded, slave labour initiatives masquerading as firewood apprenticeships these days as the gummint haven't the $ for that sort of twaddle and I doubt we'd have a snowball's chance in hell of calling two years of load/chop/split/stack/load/deliver worthy of an apprenticeship. I'd say load/chip/deliver would have even less chance.

The greenwash movement may offer a glimmer of hope, if only there was some way of claiming carbon credits for the downstream processing of the waste wood. But again, I think the snowball should be afraid. Very afraid.

 

[BSD]

i was reading up on pinus radiata on wikipedia, it says that they're good pulp wood. lower grade materials typically are used in newspaper and particle board.

 

[zogger]

Fertilizer that lasts for decades

Biochar - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Needs to be turned under deep, but once there, good to go for a long time.

That's how the amazonian indians in centuries past were able to maintain soil fertility, whereas today, the slash and burn and farm guys can only keep land there usable for a few years. They lose so much tilth, then try to maintain productivity with expensive fertilizers, that eventually it becomes unprofitable to farm, so they go slash and burn some place else.

Firewood..weird thing about firewood that is lost to most burners is, pound for pound, it's about all the same. comparing *volume*, yes a lot of differences, but strictly on a dry/seasoned weight basis, about the same btus. close enough anyway.

Basically, that's why I am not a wood snob, if I have to cut it/move it/deal with it, it's worth it to stack it up. So, with some wood over some other wood, I have to load the stove more often

*shrugs*. No biggee to me.

Got this guy I knew, we were talking about small scale commercial market gardening. He had access to a lot of "junk" wood chips, similar deal, scrap wood, no one wanted it, it was a liability to someone some place, they wanted to get rid of it. I told him to grab it, spread it out, plow it under, wait a year for it to rot out a lot, come back and plant. He did just that, did up a large amount of watermelons, his first crop ever, made thousands of dollars.

One little minifarm I worked on, strawberries, not big, real small, guy made his entire living off a few acres with the berries. He used "junk" scrap sawdust he got free by the truckload. Made his beds eight feet apart, layered/mulched in this free junk scrap sawdust a few inches deep.

You had to pick and pick and pick and pick before you could make one step and go to more picking. Very little weeds, no other fertilizer, just kept adding to it every year with more free junk sawdust stuff.

Scrap biomass to something else is an interesting subject. It is always possible to do something with it to profit somehow.

Any leftover wood branches I get, that I don't want for firewood, get put into gullies or runoff areas for erosion control. It works. What I don't do is make a huge pile, douse it with diesel and burn it. I also drag punky logs and other oddball stuff around and do the same thing with it.

 

[KiwiBro]

Thanks for that link.

From it: "Modern pyrolysis plants can use the syngas created by the pyrolysis process and output 3–9 times the amount of energy required to run."

Requires more reading. Will get around to that. Thanks. Interestingly there may be a carbon sequestering element to such bio char.
"thermo-catalytic depolymerization using microwaves" piqued my interest also. Can I get a trailered processing facility that will run off my tractor PTO?

 

[KiwiBro]

i was reading up on pinus radiata on wikipedia, it says that they're good pulp wood. lower grade materials typically are used in newspaper and particle board.

Yeah, the SED can get down to as low as about 3" sometimes.

 

[SPDRMNKY]

I've been trying to figure out the same thing with all the Eastern Red Cedar here

pellets might be a good option, but...there's a brand new (built in 2007 I think) pellet-making-facility up on the auction block fairly close to here...hmmm? and pellets just seem like a lot of steps to be able to burn something that you could burn before you started.

the Lays potato chip place down the road doesn't take unsolicited biomass fuel supplier inquiries...?

about the only high dollar market is aromatic oils...but not a lot of customers

fence posts could be turned into a niche market...maybe...but I don't need two niches to create right now.

it kinda seems like we'll just have to wait for the fossil fuels to run out/get scarce before biomass takes off...or find someone with a lot of $$$$ to fund a biomass marketing campaign.

not a lot of help...I know... when I get a working biomass reactor figured out, that's feasible for small towns and farms, I'll let you know.

 

[zogger]

I've been trying to figure out the same thing with all the Eastern Red Cedar here

pellets might be a good option, but...there's a brand new (built in 2007 I think) pellet-making-facility up on the auction block fairly close to here...hmmm? and pellets just seem like a lot of steps to be able to burn something that you could burn before you started.

the Lays potato chip place down the road doesn't take unsolicited biomass fuel supplier inquiries...?

about the only high dollar market is aromatic oils...but not a lot of customers

fence posts could be turned into a niche market...maybe...but I don't need two niches to create right now.

it kinda seems like we'll just have to wait for the fossil fuels to run out/get scarce before biomass takes off...or find someone with a lot of $$$$ to fund a biomass marketing campaign.

not a lot of help...I know... when I get a working biomass reactor figured out, that's feasible for small towns and farms, I'll let you know.

There's no market for bug and rot resistant cedar logs and boards? Cedar chips and shavings?

 

[Whitespider]

Sorry, but this thread burns my butt… Biomass?!?!?!!!!!

Biomass, biodiesel, ethanol, solar, wind, and any other “green” energy cannot replace fuels derived from oil. It’s simply not possible to get a passenger airline jet off the ground without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to power a large, ocean-going, tanker or cargo ship without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to maintain our national (or global) economy without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to replace fuels derived from oil…

As long as any sort of “green” or “alternative” energy (including biomass) requires government subsidies or incentives to keep it alive, those taxpayer dollars spent on it are wasted. Those dollars should be put where they do the most good, put where they will actually work to lower prices of near everything to the American consumer… pumping more oil from United States lands and waters.

Here’s a little publicized fact…
If you figure the average daily energy output of ALL the wind & solar power this country has in place today, it does not quite equal the average daily energy output of just one single average oil well. If you figure all forms of alternative energy, and subtract for the money spent daily on subsidies or incentives… the total becomes less than half the average daily energy output of just one single average oil well. “Green” or “alternative” energy is a poor business investment, guaranteed to lose the investors money… that’s why the only people stupid enough to invest is our government.

I flat refuse to use alternative fuels and energy sources… I flat refuse to be part of the problem. When you buy ethanol blended fuel, or biodiesel, you pay for it twice, once through your taxes and second at the pump… it ain’t no bargain, even at cheaper pump prices it ends up costing you more when you run all the numbers. Our government has dumped trillions of dollars into the wind and solar industries over the years, only to see near every company eventually file for bankruptcy… and then our stupid government just gives more money away, to another entity, so they can start-up the same cycle of idiocy all over again… stupid.

 

[zogger]

Sorry, but this thread burns my butt… Biomass?!?!?!!!!!

Biomass, biodiesel, ethanol, solar, wind, and any other “green” energy cannot replace fuels derived from oil. It’s simply not possible to get a passenger airline jet off the ground without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to power a large, ocean-going, tanker or cargo ship without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to maintain our national (or global) economy without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to replace fuels derived from oil…

As long as any sort of “green” or “alternative” energy (including biomass) requires government subsidies or incentives to keep it alive, those taxpayer dollars spent on it are wasted. Those dollars should be put where they do the most good, put where they will actually work to lower prices of near everything to the American consumer… pumping more oil from United States lands and waters.

Here’s a little publicized fact…
If you figure the average daily energy output of ALL the wind & solar power this country has in place today, it does not quite equal the average daily energy output of just one single average oil well. If you figure all forms of alternative energy, and subtract for the money spent daily on subsidies or incentives… the total becomes less than half the average daily energy output of just one single average oil well. “Green” or “alternative” energy is a poor business investment, guaranteed to lose the investors money… that’s why the only people stupid enough to invest is our government.

I flat refuse to use alternative fuels and energy sources… I flat refuse to be part of the problem. When you buy ethanol blended fuel, or biodiesel, you pay for it twice, once through your taxes and second at the pump… it ain’t no bargain, even at cheaper pump prices it ends up costing you more when you run all the numbers. Our government has dumped trillions of dollars into the wind and solar industries over the years, only to see near every company eventually file for bankruptcy… and then our stupid government just gives more money away, to another entity, so they can start-up the same cycle of idiocy all over again… stupid.

Oil has been heavily subsidised over the decades, including the stealth tax of a huge ongoing military presence in the middle east. Billions, who knows how much, in stealth taxes, you don't see it at the pump, comes right off your check instead. Same with nukes, not a single alleged "private" nuke plant out there that has total private insurance, the government takes up the slack, guaranteeing them, the insurer of last resort. Centralized energy delivery via pipeline or powerline, again, government mandates "right of way" there isn't any private party negotiations to do a capitalist fair price deal there with the individual land owners. No one I know or ever met got a nickle for a powerline crossing their land, so what's that? It's a government subsidy of a sort, for some big for profit companies. Pipelines, all of that, socialised costs, private profits.

Now, I am against corn ethanol as well, but looking at the big picture, virtually every form of energy supply we all use has benefited from the public larder in some way or another over the years.

As to discussions of biomass, we were talking about stuff that is scrap/waste products now, why not figure out some good uses for it? How about the one zillion beetle killed dead pine trees out there? figure out how to use them, maybe divert to coal plants at least, or just wait until yet another mega western forest fire occurs and whole square miles just burn up? I think big biochar facilities would be a great way to use some of that wood. Or generate electricity, anything but just let it go up in smoke, like what happens every freeking summer. Put a hundred thousand guys back to work logging and hauling maybe. would it take a little gov incentive or tax breaks to get it rolling? Maybe, but in the longer run it might be better for the economy overall.

Headline on drudge right now, a buncha east coast refineries closing. They can't stay open. Designed for crude we don't have, or it can't get there any way practical right now. All this natgas they "fracked" up...they are building huge ships to haul it to china, the demand here isn't large enough to use it all.

 

[Whitespider]

zogger, it’s just flat not true that oil has been subsidized… and it never has been. Oil companies get tax breaks, just like every other company in this country, for things like creating new jobs and such. Tax breaks are not subsidies!

Let’s make a comparison…
After all the tax breaks, big oil pays about 40-cents of every profit dollar in taxes.
After all the tax breaks, Apple Computer pays about 20-cents of every profit dollar in taxes.

Apple Computer, the highest profit company in this country, gets more tax breaks and pays less in taxes than big oil. So why is it nobody ever claims Apple Computer is being subsidized? Simple answer is that Apple isn’t subsidized… AND NEITHER IS BIG OIL! Big oil doesn’t get anything more than every other company in this nation… and in many cases actually gets less!

What has happened is that liberals and liberal tree-huggers have targeted big oil… twisting word meanings and facts to support their selfish and ridiculous cause. Big oil is not the “bad guy”… and is probably our only hope to climb out of the mess this current political agenda has put us in.

But go ahead and believe whatever crap you want.

 

[Philbert]

Sorry, but this thread burns my butt… Biomass?!?!?!!!!! Biomass, biodiesel, ethanol, solar, wind, and any other “green” energy cannot replace fuels derived from oil. . . It’s simply not possible to power a large, ocean-going, tanker or cargo ship without fuel derived from oil…

Sorry about your burned butt. Burn it on hot oil?

Kinda don't need as many large, ocean going tankers if we are using less oil, right? Had big ocean going ships before we had oil, right? Oh yeah, and those REALLY BIG ocean going ship, uh, aircraft carriers and submarines, don't they run on something other than 98 octane?

I flat refuse to use alternative fuels and energy sources… stupid.

I agree. That is stupid.

Perhaps a mobile pellet-making facility could turn it into a high enough value product to justify the costs? . . . I dunno, just seems a shame to see all that wood with no place to go.

Well, you wanted 'lateral thinking', right? How about bringing hamsters and guinea pigs to the wood shavings? Sell them in Argentina for food. Mix the hamster poo and remaining wood chips to create a rich mulch. Grow legal marijuana in it as sell it to California. Bring California pot heads out to settle. Create a demand for local wood.

Could work?

Philbert

 

[dingeryote]

Dang...

I read the OP and thought about a Contractor buddy who is in Liberia doing the PSD Gig for a group of Americans and European high rollers.

It seems there is Huge $$$ in Biomass in Africa. But there's a catch, as It's all subsidized by our tax dollars through the U.N. so there is a market, and the end user(Soros outfit) of said Bio-mass is subsidized by the U.N. to the tune of Billions.

The locals make a couple bucks a day, the Eurotrash big wigs that own the former rubber plantation make billions, Soros makes Billions, and the primary consumers of the biomass energy...Chineese mining industry, make billions.

I am sure there is a use for all the biomass. Just gotta get the UN to subsidize it enough to make it cost effective.

Dang shame all the wood is going to waste. There HAS to be some use for it. Has to be. The man above didn't put anything on this planet that is useless...except maybe Liberals.

Stay safe!
Dingeryote

 

[lmbrman]

shavings mill ?

 

[Guido Salvage]

I've been trying to figure out the same thing with all the Eastern Red Cedar here

pellets might be a good option, but...

Animal bedding... many animal beds gave cedar chips in them. The other option is to put them in small, frilly decorative bags and sell them to rich folks as aromatic devices for their dresser drawers.o

 

[KiwiBro]

Well, you wanted 'lateral thinking', right? How about bringing hamsters and guinea pigs to the wood shavings? Sell them in Argentina for food. Mix the hamster poo and remaining wood chips to create a rich mulch. Grow legal marijuana in it as sell it to California. Bring California pot heads out to settle. Create a demand for local wood.

Could work?

Philbert

Precisely the left-field, hackneyed, lateral, out there type of brain surge I was hoping for, thanks. Somewhere, someone has got strains of bacteria or some such bugs that chow down on wood chips and excrete almost pure bio-oil. Wouldn't it be great to feed a 1 cord hopper with wood chunks every few hours and fill up the digger/hauler/tractor/associated machinery with diesel from the other end of the processing facility?

Or, like you say, site pens or fence off some areas of suitably qualified animals to fatten up eating the wood chips?

Perhaps there's turpentine in them thar hills of pine?

 

[StihlKiwi]

Sorry, but this thread burns my butt… Biomass?!?!?!!!!!

Biomass, biodiesel, ethanol, solar, wind, and any other “green” energy cannot replace fuels derived from oil. It’s simply not possible to get a passenger airline jet off the ground without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to power a large, ocean-going, tanker or cargo ship without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to maintain our national (or global) economy without fuel derived from oil… It’s simply not possible to replace fuels derived from oil…

As long as any sort of “green” or “alternative” energy (including biomass) requires government subsidies or incentives to keep it alive, those taxpayer dollars spent on it are wasted. Those dollars should be put where they do the most good, put where they will actually work to lower prices of near everything to the American consumer… pumping more oil from United States lands and waters.

Here’s a little publicized fact…
If you figure the average daily energy output of ALL the wind & solar power this country has in place today, it does not quite equal the average daily energy output of just one single average oil well. If you figure all forms of alternative energy, and subtract for the money spent daily on subsidies or incentives… the total becomes less than half the average daily energy output of just one single average oil well. “Green” or “alternative” energy is a poor business investment, guaranteed to lose the investors money… that’s why the only people stupid enough to invest is our government.

I flat refuse to use alternative fuels and energy sources… I flat refuse to be part of the problem. When you buy ethanol blended fuel, or biodiesel, you pay for it twice, once through your taxes and second at the pump… it ain’t no bargain, even at cheaper pump prices it ends up costing you more when you run all the numbers. Our government has dumped trillions of dollars into the wind and solar industries over the years, only to see near every company eventually file for bankruptcy… and then our stupid government just gives more money away, to another entity, so they can start-up the same cycle of idiocy all over again… stupid.

Did you crunch these numbers yourself or just get them off the internet?

Biomass is typically utilised as an alternative form of energy, either to supplement traditional energy sources (making your beloved oil supplies last that little bit longer) or to make the most of a resource that is otherwise underutilised, such as the slash left behind after logging that KiwiBro is talking about. Remind me again whats so ass-burning about that?

Back on topic; I think the biggest issues at the moment are the extraction and transport costs compared to the value of the final product, as Kiwibro has already pointed out, and the difficulty in securing reliable volumes close enough to a manufacturing facility. The central north island is probably the only place in NZ that may produce enough volume at the moment, and it seems like it's still a no go - the latest scheme is establishing short-rotation willow crops as a garuanteed supply

The only other option I can think of that hasn't been covered by others is.. nope, got nothing

 

[KiwiBro]

The only other option I can think of that hasn't been covered by others is.. nope, got nothing

We know you are holding out on us. Don't think I don't know about that mobile possum farming venture you have been working on for months now. Haul whole trees to the landing, prune 'em down to 3" stems and the slash/needles get fed to the possums. If only ground pine could replace palm kernal. We could make a killing selling to farmers, keep the activists quiet and save a zillion orangutans.

 

[imagineero]

I got sideways a few times, especially in new zealand in the winter after a few beers. I don't know if it was thinking that got me moving laterally, or the lack of it.

I've given some thought over the last few years about waste wood and its uses as well. I spent 6 months in the pine plantations in nz (south island, waimate) pruning and thinning mostly. The pine grown that was is grown agressively and grows too quick to have much use. Some of it is supposedly 'furniture grade' so long as you don't want your furniture lasting more than a few years ;-) It honestly isn't good for a lot. Leaving it where it lays actually does some good. A lot of the nutrients stolen by the trees in the overplanted rows ends up in the foliage which decomposes and goes back into the ground. Otherwise you'd be fertilising a lot more, just like most of the dairy farmers. Fertiliser runoff into rivers is a huge issue in NZ, at least in the south island. Access is also an issue. Most of the plantations I worked on were steep awful terrain. They're mostly planted out because there's nothing else you could do with the land.

Charcoal is a good thing, but charcoal is only ever as good as the wood that makes it. Dense dry hardwoods make excellent charcoal. Light wet softwoods don't make much at all, just like they don't burn that good by themselves. Processing charcoal is inefficient and illegal in most places, and cost prohibitive on a large scale.

In third world countries people do make char out of a lot of waste products, then grind it and reconstitute it with other things like sawdust, paper and a binder to press them into briquettes. There are commercial equivalents sold in developed nations which are ok, but not as good as good charcoa. Waste pine is fine for the purpose, but only if your labour is free and there is no other fuel available in your country. Give developed nations another 50 years and we'll probably all be in ther situation.

Chip is being used in some countries like the UK for example as a biomass. They have woodchip boilers with big hoppers that you can load up once a month or whatever, and they have rotating floor augers in the base of the hopper so the boiler can feed itself whatever it needs 24/7 with no tending. The boilers run heating, hot water and in some cases electricity. They're costly, and seem to have a lot of problems. The big (think hotel size) ones work pretty well. You need to live in a country cold enough to justify it. The problem with chip is that it is also only as good as the parent tree. Dry seasoned hardwood chip is excellent. Wet softwood chip is terrible. The way the market works is that the chip sellers want to get all their chip for free, so the guys giving it to them sneak all sorts of awful crap into it. Chip is very hard to dry without something like a heated aerated floor. There was a big market for export clean hardwood chip in aus a few years back but it collapsed. It was mostly being bought up by japan as a heating source, they used it as an alternative/supplement to coal. I dont think it worked out any good.

The best you could hope for with the pine is probably as an extender material combined together with a better quality material (coal, charcoal etc) in an expensive commercial setup, or to use it as low grade mulch, which I don't think there is much of a market for in NZ anyway. Pine mulch is pretty awful. Or you can just leave it on the ground so all the nutrients can get back into the soil so you don't have to start fertilising the plantations.

Shaun