The American Wood Council (AWC) has released its second Industry Progress Report, detailing the wood products manufacturing industry’s performance across a number of environment, energy and safety measures.
“The report shows that there have been significant improvements over the last decade in the areas of environment, energy and safety, despite the economic downturn that caused a drop in wood products manufacturing in 2009,” said President and CEO Robert Glowinski. “AWC members are very proud of their record of mill safety, energy management and efficiency, and protection of the environment while producing products that are central to the lives and homes of all Americans.”
Key findings of the report include:
• The broad forest products industry is the largest producer and user of bioenergy of any industrial sector. AWC member companies have met over 75 percent of their energy needs, on average, from biomass over the last decade.
• The greenhouse gas reduction benefits of using biomass manufacturing residuals for energy by industry are equivalent to about 24 million tons of carbon dioxide – or the equivalent of removing approximately 4.6 million cars from the road each year.
• The 10-year trend has shown significant reductions in chemical releases, which includes formaldehyde and methanol.
• Energy intensity has improved significantly since the 2008-09 recession and has dropped slightly below pre-recession levels.
• Worker safety has improved between 2004 and 2014 for member companies, and the two reported safety metrics are consistently lower than all manufacturing during the same period.
The full Industry Progress Report is available on the AWC website at http://awc.org/news/2017/01/17/awc-industry-progress-report-shows-improvements.