The 'Future Bio-pathways Project' examined a wide range of options for renewal of the Canadian forest products industry.
“If we follow this new model we will be able to produce power on the scale of nine nuclear reactors, enough to meet the energy needs of 2.5 million homes, or one out of every five homes across Canada” says Avrim Lazar, President and CEO of Forest Products Association of Canada.
On the employment front the research shows that an integrated mill – one that produces wood, pulp or paper as well as bio-energy and bio-materials - provides five times as many jobs as a stand-alone bio-operation. It also shows that the industry’s 270,000 jobs will be best sustained by following this integrated road to recovery.
“Years of intensive research and development have produced technologies that open up a world of possibility for the forest products industry in Canada. We can now rapidly convert wood fibre into a wide variety of high-value products such as bio-fuels to heat homes or power vehicles as well as bio-chemicals to make cosmetics, solvents, food additives and renewable plastics,” says Pierre Lapointe, President and CEO, FPInnovations.
By integrating the production of bio-products into existing forestry operations, they will be subject to the same high and increasingly stringent environmental standards that have made Canada a world leader in sustainable forest management.
