Juan D. Barrera – Daniel Páez.

EGI4

According to studies of evolution and characterization of wood consumption

in the housing sectors, projects and large infrastructure works, more than 1.6
billion cubic meters of wood are consumed annually. What about wood waste?
Do you think it is necessary to reuse it?

RECYCLING WOOD

Wood is the raw material for many constructions, more than 1.6 billion cubic meters
are harvested for use. Every year, more than 230 million tons of garbage are
produced in Latin America, a very high amount of waste. Over the years, industries
has transformed their production to make them cleaner and more environmentally
responsible. For this reason, recycling processes must be carried out for these
products that are used for various applications, and also, materials that their
obtaining implies the deforestation and a great environmental impact.
Through the recycling of wood, the extraction of raw material is reduced to reduce
deforestation worldwide. With recycling processes, the costs of raw material
production can be reduced, since obtaining a raw material has a higher
environmental and transport cost. Approximately 85% of wood waste is currently
recycled. To recycle the wood, it is separated from other elements such as screws
and nails, then it is crushed to obtain sawdust. With wood shavings it is possible to
make new boards or wooden elements, in addition, wood shavings are used to
isolate sound and temperature. In other industries, wood is reused as fuel in the
generation of electrical energy.
As we said earlier, that wood converted into sawdust has many uses, and decreases
the mass consumption of trees in America, There are three main destinations for this
material: manufacture of agglomerated board, (which are panels formed by chips or
particles glued with synthetic resins), Energy valorization with electricity production,
(such as incineration, pyrolysis and plasma gasification. Of these technologies,
incineration is the most developed and has low social acceptance.), manufacture of
compost and livestock uses. As we observe it is very necessary to reuse every wood
waste, however minimal it may be, because there we are saving the planet and
giving life some new creations or uses, people are becoming aware of it and apply
this to their daily, believe us that is the best decision if we want to continue to have
a great nature and biodiversity.