The "Greening" of England

Anyone who truly believes in making the world a greener place will welcome the latest brilliant development in timber technology.

Just imagine a miraculous discovery of the 21st Century:

A timber that :
· Is more durable than teak.
· is a plantation crop with a growth cycle of just 35 years
· can be recycled, burned, buried, or otherwise disposed of with no nasty consequences

better still...
· machines better than any hardwood
· takes a better finish than pine, as durable as pvc
· has no knots and comes in 6m lengths to minimise wastage.



A material such as this would be truly miraculous, and who could doubt its advantage in “green” terms over any plastic or metal: Just plant a seed and stand back for 35 years.
The small amount of energy required to fell, transport, convert, and machine it into useful products would pale into insignificance compared with the energy required to extract, smelt and refine aluminium, or to produce the chemicals from which pvc is manufactured.

Well, believe it or not, that material is here.
This wonder material of the 21st century actually exists.

And guess what: The ancient Romans understood the basic process, even if the technology to make it work in economic terms had to wait almost 2000 years.

The fundamentals are simple:
Soak any timber in vinegar to improve its rot resistance.

A more sophisticated process to impregnate softwood with commercial acetic acid was first proposed in 1928, and the race has been on since then to develop a commercially viable process. Only in recent years have the Dutch succeeded in bringing a commercially viable product to the market. They have branded it as a new species, and it certainly behaves like no timber I have ever previously encountered in a woodworking career spanning more than 35 years.

Because extensive trials with these acetylised timbers have been carried out over many decades, there is a massive database to back up the claims. The Building Research Establishment (BRE) for example, will back a 60 years lifetime, even in the most demanding wet and heavy applications. Treated timber used for canal lining has, after ten years in service, not shown the slightest deterioration.

Of almost as much interest to this joinery designer is the fact that it just does not absorb water at all. After extensive soaking of test-pieces, the swelling I have measured is less than 0.5% (yes, that’s less than half of one percent) compared to the usual expectation of between 5% and 8%.

That means the annual winter swelling/summer shrinkage of windows and doors can be consigned to the past.

Having beaten my head against the brick-wall of consumer resistance for more than two decades (we prefer zero maintenance upvc, dear), the answer is here:

SUPAWOOD WINDOWS DOORS AND CONSERVATORIES MADE FROM THIS WONDER MATERIAL OF THE 21ST CENTURY ARE EVERY BIT AS DURABLE AS PVC, AND INFINITELY LESS POISONOUS TO OUR PLANET

More next week.