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Re: GBlist: Good Wood





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> From: John Salmen <terrain@seaside.net>
> To: greenbuilding@crest.org
> Subject: Re: GBlist: Good Wood
> Date: Tuesday, May 13, 1997 8:52 AM
> 
> Good wood ... bad wood. Funny use of terms. Culturally wood has been
> 'bad' more often than 'good'. Wood in the sense of forested places,
> places to avoid. I would venture to say that we have probably never been
> comfortable with wood unless it is in some vanquished, processed,
	<snip>

Well, speak for yourself. There is a strong tradition of living in the
forests in american literature, including for example "Walden Pond" and
Cooper's work.

Personally I love forests and I'm moving into one. I certainly don't intend
to cut it down!



> The contradiction is that we cannot live without wood, living wood - the
> stuff that makes up a forest. The catch is that forests do not seem to
> survive in our company. Forests are dying and in the opinion of many are
> already dead. They are not and never can be what they were and the
> remaining question  is can they survive as they are. An american

They can indeed become what the once were, if only we would let them. If
all humans vanished tonite, the forest would have taken over again in 300
years or less.

And we certainly CAN live in the forest without destroying it. I can think
of many examples.

> 
> As to the use or disuse of wood or any other material the decisions are
> so complex and cultural that I can never think of any particular usage
> of a material as being positive or even rational. I like Terry's comment

I think this is a bit strong. Certainly the use of adobe in a SW arid
climate with no trees is quite a positive and rational decision, whereas
building a log cabin on the same spot (with logs shipped from Canada) is
not a very positive or rational thing to do.

> about the issue being the reduction of mass and energy flows through our
> economy and the economy being what we pay to live on earth. I think of

It is not what we pay to live. It is what we pay to live plus what we pay
to make living more enjoyable, plus what we pay to increase our status
whether we need it or not to live.

The living part is the smallest part.

> 
> I use a lot of wood in my projects and the contradiction is that its use
> at this time helps to maintain this area as a forested region of the
> world and that is my principal reason for using it. I think of my
> relationship to the process and material usage as one of stewardship or
> perhaps husbandry is a better term, where I am as responsible for
> maintaining the viability of the source of the material as I am for
> defining its end usage. Selective cutting of 2nd or 3rd generation
> forested land and adding economic value to that cutting by defining it
> as a sustainable building material has the ironic net effect of
> increasing cultural value in that land and hopefully extending its
> life as forest. Its not a good marriage because I know that each tree
> that I have removed from a local forest represents future soil and
> nutrient loss for the entire forest and that cumulatively such loss
> might kill a forest. But I also know that I have the potential of
> drawing more building material from these sources than if they were
> given over to gravel extraction or straw production - with less
> commitment of additional resources and maintaining our forested
> canopies has probably more benefit to the world than anything else we
> could possibly do.

I think that's a great idea and while I don't think I will use wood, I
applaud your sustainable harvesting. No doubt about it, it could be done
sustainably, but it's usually not.


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