8 July 2019 | Espoo, Finland

The WoodCircus Project Meeting gathered a total of 25 partners in the premises of the project coordinator VTT in Espoo, Finland on Monday 8th of July 2019. Alongside with project task updates and general assembly decisions, the main focus of the day was on an in-depth discussion on the results, gaps or needs identified during the fact finding process.

Fact finding and good practice mapping are one of the first tasks already well advanced and documented within the WoodCircus framework. In order to establish a complete review of the State of the Art, data mining activities, showcase identification and stakeholder interviews are still in progress. Different side stream value chain configurations have already been identified, the consortium partners had a vivid exchange of insights concerning the main findings of the value chain analysis.

Most of the identified issues are market-based: there are important variations in consumer acceptance of waste wood products or recycled materials which results in low demand of recycled wood and, eventually, in a lack of production. This is one of the reasons why sawdust, bark, or construction and demolition waste markets are generally unstable and not necessarily highly profitable. At the moment, waste wood decontamination processes can be costly. Natural phenomena such as insects or storms have recently caused an oversupply of virgin wood which cuts back the demand of waste wood even further. On the other hand, cutting through red tape would support positively the market development by permitting more rapid adaptation to changing situations. Overall, the sector would profit from establishing a set of forecasts for the future demand of virgin and recycled wood and different scenarios of market development for different countries. The WoodCircus consortium decided to aim to formulate a such set of configurations for either real or potential scenarios.