Hybrid Poplar Wood Is THIS Properties of Hybrid Poplar As a Suitable for Their Products
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EM 8667 Reprinted October 1997 $1.00 Product and Market Opportunities for HYBRID DATE. Interest in hybrid poplar has • What products can be made from exploded in recent years. Within the hybrid poplar, and what products past 10 years, four pulp and paper OFshould be avoided? POPLAR companies have established hybrid • Who will buy the resource? poplar plantations in Oregon to help (Although poplar may be suitable supply their mills. for a company's products, there The Oregon State UniversityOUT is no guarantee the company will WOOD Extension Service and private buy poplar.) landowners are conducting First, a basic idea of the physical growth, yield,IS and clonal and mechanical properties of hybrid research in many parts in Oregon poplar is needed. Examples of of the state. Within 5. Leavengood and J. Reeb physical and mechanical properties 1-2 years, we'll be include machinability, shrink/swell better able to deter- characteristics, density, fastening mine which (ease, splitting, etc.), strength, and information:varieties per- finishing characteristics. The form best in any biggest hurdle to finding answers to given region. these questions is that little publicly The big question available research has been con- for private landown- ducted on hybrid poplar. ers wanting to To further complicate matters, establish poplar current the research that has been done plantations is, "Who PUBLICATION provides evidence that "not all will buy the raw mate- hybrid poplars are created equal." rial?" At the same time, The term "hybrid poplar" refers to buyers of the raw material (the numerous varieties, and therefore it wood products industry) are asking most is impossible to describe the whether hybrid poplar wood is THIS properties of hybrid poplar as a suitable for their products. From a whole. product and market standpoint, the Varieties are crosses between For pressing questions are: many different species in the genus http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog• What are the physical and Populus. This genus includes mechanical properties of hybrid 25 species, including black cotton- poplar? wood, eastern cottonwood, quaking OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY EXTENSION SERVICE Scott Leavengood, Extension agent, south-central Oregon; and Jim Reeb, Extension wood products manufactur- ing specialist; Oregon State University. aspen, balsam poplar, white poplar, such as hardboard and medium- density. To work successfully, the European black poplar, and Lom- density fiberboard. This publication original density of the wood must bardy poplar. Not only are the discusses each of these products, be sufficiently low that the wood properties of all these species including the processes used and does not resist compression and the different, but so are the properties potential obstacles to using hybrid final product is light enough to be of offspring produced by poplar. moved by the end user. Wood cross-fertilization. > species with a density of less than Poplars, such as cottonwood and Laminated strand 39 lb/ft3 work well. aspen, are used for a variety of lumber and oriented The density of most poplars, products, including boxes, crates, including hybrids, ranges from core stock for plywood, pallets, strand board " 25-30 lb/ftDATE.3 (Phelps). Therefore, food containers, upholstered In Canada and the midwestern hybrid poplars should work well for furniture frames, and pulp and United States, aspen is used widely LSL and OSB. In fact, laboratory paper products. The new hybrid for laminated strand lumber (LSL) OFtests have shown this to be the case poplar plantations in the Northwest and oriented strand board (OSB), '- (Heilman, et al.). were established to supply pulp and often called waferboard, flakeboafd, So why aren't we growing paper mills. chipboard, or a host Of other names. thousands of acres of hybrid poplar If you want to sell hybrid poplar LSL is a relatively new product in the Northwest for LSL and OSB chips to pulp and paper companies, used as a substitute for OUTsolid-sawn-' mills? The answer is that there are be sure to consider the haul dis- lumber and timbers. LSL can be no LSL or OSB mills in the North- tances to the nearest mills. produced in smallIS sizes such as west. Lockwood-Post's 7992 Directory of 2x4s, or larger sizes such as beams The problem is raw material Pulp and Paper Mills in the United and headers. OSB is a panel product supply. These mills require an States lists 7 mills in northern widely used as a substitute for ■>.■ enormous supply of raw material to California (north of Sacramento), plywood sheathing. •;. operate economically. Assuming a 13 mills in Oregon (all on the The processes used to produce yield of approximately 91 tons/acre westside), 1 mill in Idaho, and LSL and.QSB-information: are Ivery similar. -, for a hybrid poplar plantation 6 mills in southern Washington Most pl^Qts feied logs (not chips or (Heilman, et al.), a "typical" OSB (south of Yakima). While these "junk" as often is believed) into a, mill can use the equivalent of more numbers are a bit out of date, they disk-type flaker (a vertical rotating than 2,400 acres/year (Spelter). give a general idea of the number of disk). The flaker slices the logs into potential buyers. flakes.or wafers approximately : When chip prices are low, it may 11/2 inch,wide, 3 inches long, current1 be uneconomicalPUBLICATION to haul poplar and /32 inch or less thick. chips over long distances. For a The wafers are dried, crop that must be harvested within a sprayed with adhesive, set time, this limitation could be a and formed into a mat. problem. In othermost words, the The mat is loaded into a landownerTHIS may not be able to "hold press, where pressure out" until chip prices rebound. and heat are used to Some Oregon landowners densify the panel and interestedFor in establishing hybrid cure the adhesive. poplar plantations are seeking Wood density can markets other http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalogthan pulp and paper. have a pronounced Hybrid poplar wood has potential impact on LSL or OSB for use in laminated strand lumber, production. Compressing oriented strand board, veneer for the wood gives the final plywood, solid-sawn products product a higher density (e.g., boards), and fiber products than the wood's initial Until producers of OSB and LSL Unlike OSB and LSL mills, there how hybrid poplar performs as see hard evidence that this volume are over 85 veneer and plywood more solid-sawn product trials are of raw material will be available mills in northern California, conducted. over a long period of time in the Oregon, and Washington (Directory There may be opportunities for Northwest, there is little chance of the Wood Products Industry). hybrid poplar to be used as core they'll take the risk of building a Therefore, a market for plywood stock for door and window parts. new mill. should exist, providing logs are Manufacturers of these products We have the chicken and the egg grown to an "adequate size." overlay high-quality veneer over problem here. One possible answer With regards to the issue of lower-quality core material. is "if we grow it, they (the mills) adequate log size for plywood and In recent years, central Oregon will come." However, it's also veneer mills, Baldwin (1995) mills haveDATE. supplemented their raw possible that OSB and LSL produc- stated, "The definition of small material supply with radiata pine ers fear pulp mills will outbid them underwent an evolutionary change from as far away as Chile and New for the raw material. Therefore, during thisperiod [1980 to present]. OFZealand. It certainly seems, at least even "if we grow it," raw material Small meant a 12 to 14 inch diam- at first glance, that locally grown supply still may be a problem. eter in 1980. By 1990, six or more hybrid poplar could help alleviate producers were successfully peeling the industry's supply woes. Again, Plywood southern pine in diameters as small product tests need to be conducted as seven inches." • OUT to determine whether hybrid poplar There are a few mills in the Clearly, the trend for the ply- will be suitable for the millwork Northwest using Oregon's native wood industry is toIS be able to use industry. poplar, black cottonwood, as core smaller and smaller logs. How this Last, but not least, is the export material for plywood. Like the OSB translates into a rotation age for: . j; market. Heilman, et al. (1990) and LSL processes, plywood hybrid poplar plantations-still is', j • -. stated that "a potential market for manufacture involves compression unclear. • .r?;. ■■.■\>j? hybrid poplar is lumber for export. of the wood, although the amount i Limited sawmill tests show hybrid of compression is far less in ply- information:poplar wood equals or surpasses wood than in OSB and LSL. Solid-sawn material. - black cottonwood, which is cur- Again, low-density woods such Much discussion has de'titered on rently being exported for lumber." as poplars work well for plywood the use of hybrid poplar for lumber There are reports that many core. K Ply, of Port Angeles, pibduction. As mehtioned previ- Japanese buyers prefer light-colored Washington, tested TxD hybrids ously, other poplars are' used for wood lacking distinctive grain (hybrid poplars produced from solid-sawn products su61i as boxes patterns. Most poplars fit this crosses of Populus trichocarpa^-current and crates, upholstered ftimiture description. black cottonwood—andPUBLICATION Populus frames, and lumber. deltoides—eastern cottonwood) for However, poplar wood has a plywood manufacture. They found tendency to warp during drying. In Fiber products that TxD hybrids make excellent addition, there is a problem with Hybrid poplar also may be used plywood (Heilman,most et al.). There is grain fuzzing during machining due for fiber products such as medium- someTHIS concern, however, about to the presence of tension wood density fiberboard (MDF) and warpage of cottonwood veneer as it ("abnormal" wood formed in hardboard.