Overview:
The Urban Hardwood Recovery Project

The Urban Wood Exchange is part of the Urban Hardwood Recovery Project grant awarded to Sustainable Resource Management, Inc (SRM) by the Northeastern Area State and Private Forestry, U.S. Forest Service. Through this program, SRMs Founder, Brian Knox trains urban foresters and tree professionals to recognize and capture the highest use and value contained within urban tree stems. This website then connects them to outlets for well-manufactured wood products and related services. This project builds on the success of the Hardwood Value Improvement Project, which trained foresters, saw mills and loggers to gain the most value of each log cut. We offer training throughout the mid-Atlantic region, including Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio and the District of Columbia. Goals of the project include reducing the level of waste of potently valuable wood, producing local sustainable lumber for municipal projects, reducing costs associated with removal and disposal of urban trees, and reducing the urban carbon footprint.

Background

The increasing age and maturity of our municipal and urban trees increase the risk and impact of environmental stress, invasive pests and weather disasters in urban environments. As a result, the removal of large trees from the aging urban canopy produces an estimated 200 million cubic yards of residue annually. The majority of this residue becomes chips and is either burned or composted, releasing carbon into the atmosphere. The logs that do get produced are often poorly manufactured and do not meet the needs of sawmills that receive them. Even with proper manufacturing, it is increasingly difficult to locate local mills and yards interested in the small amount of logs an urban environment produces. As a result of all these factors, most of the value contained within these mature trees is not realized when they are removed.

Municipalities and urban areas are under increasing economic and environmental pressure to manage their urban forest canopy to provide an array of environmental and social benefits, including the reduction of their carbon footprint and becoming carbon neutral. This program helps to meet these demands by capturing the potential lumber value contained in these aging trees and to utilize it within the communities they come from.

Project Benefits

Merchandising stems to their highest use enables municipalities to better control the costs associated with the management of their urban canopy by 1) significantly reducing waste disposal costs, 2) producing sustainable local lumber for municipal projects and for local craftsmen, 3) reinforcing the renewable and sustainable qualities of working forests, 4) sequestering carbon and 5) building network connections between producers and end-users that preserves the value of forests and forest products. It also provides sustainable local lumber that flows back into the community, providing a continuing legacy (offsetting concerns about tree removal) and an opportunity to enhance public understanding of sustainable working forest landscapes.

Urban foresters and tree professionals can benefit greatly from learning how to recognize and capture the highest use and value contained in these urban tree stems as well as from avenues to connect them with outlets for well manufactured wood products. Conversion of only 15% of current residue from chips to boards could theoretically produce 3.8 billion board feet of lumber for use in local building projects. It also sequesters carbon and enhances the benefits of the urban forest.

Project Goals

Expected accomplishments of this program include training at least 120 Urban Foresters and tree professionals to recognize and capture the value contained in large diameter urban stems; build the Urban Wood Exchange online network to connect them with local mills, yards and craftsmen; reduce the local tonnage of wood chips by 15%, producing local sustainable lumber for municipal projects; reduce costs associated with removal and disposal of urban trees; and address the reduction of the carbon footprint.

About Brian Knox

Brian Knox is a licensed professional forester and President of Sustainable Resource Management, Inc. As an industrial forester and procurement manager in the North Central and East Coast regions for nearly two decades, he worked directly with contract and independent logging crews to maintain high quality standards and procedures and often served as a bridge between industry leaders and concerned community members.

Through Sustainable Resource Management, Inc., a company specifically created to meet the growing needs of sustainability in our rapidly changing environment, Brian Knox has built a solid reputation in forestry education. His contacts throughout and beyond the Mid-Atlantic region have been developed through his work as a logger trainer throughout the Mid-Atlantic and Southern Regions; Regional Coordinator for the Hardwood Value Improvement Project; Southern Regional VP for the Maryland Forest Association; member of the SFI Steering Committee; lobbyist to the state government for the WV Forestry Association; Co-Chair of the WVFA logger of the Year Committee; representative of the Empire State Forest Products Association; State Representative to the NY State Forest Practice Board Advisory Council for the Department of Environmental Conservation; member of the steering committee for the NY Project Learning Tree; consultant to private landowners and landowner organizations; and as a sustainable forestry educator. His public speaking and education history includes college-level teaching.