FUTURE REQUIREMENTS FOR TIMBER

A. C. CLINE.

When we estimate our future needs for timber, we have to be concerned with many products besides lumber fiberboards, plastics, modified woods, alcohol, fodder yeast, and others of the exciting array that modern chemistry has given us. We must plan on meeting requirements for all kinds of pulp and paper products, the liquid fuels, wood sugars, and plywood. Perhaps, also, atomic energy will make obsolete all our ideas about heating and power. Even though great changes like these lie ahead, we cannot discard the experience that people have accumulated these thousands of years. The wisest policy is to plan on a growing population and a rising standard of living and dependence on the forest.

In this article, the country's future requirements for timber are termed "potential timber requirements" the quantity of timber products that might be used by consumers who are afforded reasonable latitude in choice of readily available materials, including timber products, in a national economy functioning at a high level of employment and output. The definition differs from definitions of future consumption or of future demand based on whatever economic conditions happen to be at any given future time. Of course, the assumed condition of ready availability may not come to pass. It is plain that, unless the present trend toward forest depletion is reversed, the timber shortage will become more and more acute, prices will go still higher, and effective demand for timber will decline.

Emphasis is placed on requirements for trees of saw-timber size, because nearly 80 percent of all timber products are cut from such trees. Small trees from unmanaged forests might supply our future requirements for such products as pulpwood, fuel wood, fence posts, and small poles, which can be got from poorer and smaller trees,but not requirements for lumber, plywood, and other high-grade products.

In 1944 the commercial cutting of timber resulted in the removal of 49.7 billion board feet of saw timber; losses of 4.2 billion from fire, disease, insects, and so on brought the total saw-timber drain to 53.9 billion board feet. At the same time, annual saw-timber growth was 35.3 billion board feet. Thus, the excess of saw-timber drain over growth is slightly more than 50 percent.

The separate items making up the saw-timber drain in 1944 (in billion board feet) were:

Timber products whose end use is the primary form, that is, those that require no processing in a sawmill or other type of manufacturing plant, will be taken up first. They are also called the nonmanufactured products, because they are produced in the forest principally with the use of only hand tools. They include fuel wood, poles, piling, posts, mine timbers, and railroad ties. The major products in this group account for 19.8 percent of the all-timber drain, but only 8.8 percent of the saw-timber drain. The proportions are somewhat smaller than actual, because there are a few other products whose end use is in the primary form; for example, wood poles used in shade-grown tobacco, rough wood used for dunnage in storing ship cargo, and round and split material used in rustic construction.

THE REQUIREMENTS FOR FUEL WOOD are declining. In 1880, the country consumed about 146 million cords of fuel wood, but only 62 million in 1945. The drop, despite a large increase in population, is due to the increased use of more efficient and convenient fuels, including coal, oil, gas, and electricity. The fuel-wood drain on the forest is further lessened by the fact that only one-half or less of the total quantity consumed is cut from sound, living trees, the remainder coming from cull and dead trees or industrial waste from logging and milling operations. Moreover, the cutting of sound, living trees for fuel wood can be limited largely to trees of small size or inferior species that should be removed from the forest in the course of thinnings and other cuttings made to improve the final timber harvest.

Looking into the future, it appears likely that the per capita requirements for fuel wood will decline still further. The United States has abundant supplies of coal. The present wood waste from logging and milling operations that now goes to feed boilers may find a more profitable outlet in the field of chemical utilization of wood waste. Farms and other rural buildings eventually will be supplied with electricity; it is those outlets that now consume most of the fuel wood. Atomic power may lower the cost of producing electricity for all heating purposes, thus further reducing the use of other fuels. On the other hand, should the need arise, wood can be substituted for other fuels, even to the extent of powering motorcars and motortrucks. And automatic wood-burning stoves have been invented that are a great improvement over the ordinary stove, in both convenience and efficiency.

It is estimated that fuel-wood requirements in 1950-55 will be about 60 million cords, declining to about 50 million a half century from now.

REQUIREMENTS FOR POLES telephone, telegraph, electric light, and other utility-line poles made of wood--increased from about 3.7 million in 1909 to nearly 8 million in 1947. Nearly one-third of all the poles put in place now are for rural electrification. But there is a general trend in cities to put wires underground, and new developments in communications permit large numbers of messages to be sent without a corresponding increase in the number of lines. Ways and means will still be sought to eliminate pole lines, because they are repeatedly damaged by storms and other destructive forces, they are unsightly, and they take up space needed for other uses.

Changes are also taking place in the kind of poles used. Chestnut, northern white-cedar, and the western redcedar used to be preferred because of their durability; later, preservative treatment and a shortage of the preferred species gave first place to southern pine and Douglas-fir. In 1910 less than 20 percent of the poles produced received any preservative treatment whatever; now nearly 95 percent are treated.

The telephone and telegraph companies probably will not materially increase their use of wood poles; even now, some long-distance communications lines are going underground especially in localities subject to severe ice storms. And eventually the rural electrification program will be largely on a maintenance basis.

For the period 1950-55, potential annual requirements for poles are estimated at about 5.7 million. Looking 50 years ahead, annual requirements may not be more than 5 million.

In 1947 the production of poles that were preservatively treated was divided among the various species as follows:

A large part of future pole requirements can be got from thinnings made in dense stands to relieve congestion and give the selected saw-timber crop trees more room for growth. Thus the same stand that yields saw timber can also yield poles without materially reducing the output of the former.

WOOD PILING ranges from about 30 feet to more than 90 feet in length and from a top diameter of 5 inches to a butt diameter of about 2 feet. The best grades of piles are suitable for heavy railway bridges and trestles, piers, and other heavy construction; the poorest grades can be used for light building foundations, cofferdams, false work, and various temporary work.

Before the Second World War, consumption of treated piling averaged about 16.5 million linear feet annually. Assuming that 60 percent were treated (the correct percentage is not known) , total consumption was about 28 million. Potential annual requirements for 1950-55 have been estimated at 38 million linear feet, with a drop to about 23 million 50 years hence.

As in the case of poles, this need not be a heavy drain on the forest. Dense stands of second-growth timber will yield excellent piling through the removal of trees in thinnings made to improve the final saw-timber crop. Such trees are slender in form and have the dense wood desired in piling, because they are crowded and partially overtopped by the main crop trees.

The species used for piling that was preservatively treated in 1947 ranked as follows: