MANILA, Philippines - “Wood, as long as it comes from tree plantations and not from natural forests, is the greenest among the construction materials in the market.”
Thus asserted Dr. Florentino Tesoro, former undersecretary of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), and Dr. Rico Cabangon of the Los Baños-based DOST-Forest Products Research and Development Institute (FPRDI).
About three decades ago, they recalled in a joint scientific report, wood, which is being linked to increasing worldwide forest destruction, began to be seen as a notorious construction material.
Today, with runaway global deforestation being blamed as a leading cause of climate change, the use of wood in industries gains even more notoriety.
“This need not be the case,” Drs. Tesoro and Cabangon averred in their joint report presented at a forum held at DOST-FPRDI. Their scientific paper aimed to help FPRDI identify ways to help reduce climate change.
The forest scientists rattled off the following advantages of wood: It is renewable and recyclable; it stores carbon; and producing lumber and other wood products emits carbon dioxide eight to 13 times less than producing cement or steel.
Tesoro, also a former FPRDI director, and Cabangon explained: “The excessive amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is the culprit behind climate change. Trees and wood products fight climate change because they trap carbon in their system. They make up what we may call a huge carbon sink.”
They pointed out that growing trees absorb one kilogram of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere for every cubic meter of growth. The resulting carbon is locked away for the tree’s life and the life of the wood and wood products coming from the tree.