Weathertex Shows Forestry Hubs How Hardwood Pulp Becomes Weatherboards

Exclusive: One day after their Newcastle round table, managers from the Commonwealth's 11 regional forestry hubs ended the Hunter field trip on the Masonite Road factory floor, where the first manufactured building product to earn Global GreenTag Platinum certification starts life,

The Heatherbrae line where hardwood pulp becomes weatherboard, the final stop on the forestry hubs' Hunter field trip. (Photo Credit: Supplied to Wood Central / Central PR Group for exclusive use by the North East NSW Forestry Hub)

Weathertex, Australia’s flagship hardboard maker, threw open its Heatherbrae factory to the country’s 11 Regional Forestry Hubs on Wednesday, capping a Hunter field trip that ran from timber merchant racks to an active plantation harvesting operation. It comes as Nick Cameron, manager of the host North East NSW Forestry Hub, told ABC’s NSW Country Hour on Tuesday that the region holds 5.5 million hectares of forest and 100,000 hectares of plantation, and “enormous opportunities” to draw more value from both.

“We’ve got a magnificent resource here in the northeast,” Cameron said of a hub territory that runs from the Hunter to the Queensland border. Nowhere on Wednesday’s route was that case more visible than on the Masonite Road factory floor, where low-grade hardwood goes in, and export cladding comes out.

Managers from the 11-hub network at the Weathergroove display wall after the factory tour. (Photo Credit: Supplied to Wood Central / Central PR Group for exclusive use by the North East NSW Forestry Hub)

Weathertex’s Paul Michael and David Beach led managers past the steam-heated compression line that turns PEFC-certified hardwood pulp into engineered weatherboards, a process the company runs without glues, resins or formaldehyde. Steam, heat and pressure do the binding work, with the finished board made of 97 per cent natural timber and 3 per cent natural wax.

Inside the Heatherbrae plant, where steam, heat and pressure bind hardwood pulp without glues or resins. (Photo Credit: Supplied to Wood Central / Central PR Group for exclusive use by the North East NSW Forestry Hub)

Billed by the company as carrying a better-than-zero footprint, the Heatherbrae-made boards now ship to 16 international markets, including 1,500 homes across Saudi Arabia’s NEOM gigacity. That demand gave Wednesday’s visitors a working answer to the value-adding question their round table had discussed the previous day.

The tour opened at Marshall’s Timbers in Cardiff with Pam Weymer. (Photo Credit: Supplied to Wood Central / Central PR Group for exclusive use by the North East NSW Forestry Hub)

Hours before Heatherbrae, Pam Weymer guided managers through the racks of Australian hardwoods at family merchant Marshall’s Timbers in Cardiff, before the bus climbed into the Watagan State Forest plantation estate. Deep in the Watagans, Forestry Corporation of NSW’s Alex Flint led the group through an active plantation harvesting operation alongside the site’s contractor, briefing managers on aligning thinning markets with harvest contracting and silviculture.

Forestry Corporation of NSW’s Alex Flint briefs managers on thinning markets in the Watagans. (Photo Credit: Supplied to Wood Central / Central PR Group for exclusive use by the North East NSW Forestry Hub)

Finding structural markets for plantation hardwood thinnings has become a live question for the region, with Flint joined by Forest Innovation Services’ Mike Sutton and tree-breeding specialist David Mannes on species-site matching. Wood Central understands Cameron closed the in-forest session with a briefing on plantation hardwood and native regrowth investment models, before managers broke for a barbecue lunch at the Pines Picnic Area in Olney State Forest.

Managers from all 11 Regional Forestry Hubs at the Pines Picnic Area, Olney State Forest, midway through Wednesday’s Hunter field trip. (Photo Credit: Supplied to Wood Central / Central PR Group for exclusive use by the North East NSW Forestry Hub)

“Regional communities, from the interviewing I have done, are beginning to struggle – they’re concerned about their viability, and they’re concerned that these industries have been taken away from them,” Giselle Stollznow, whose consultancy StollzNow Research presented new social-licence research to Tuesday’s forum, told the ABC’s NSW Country Hour.

Source: https://woodcentral.com.au/weathertex-forestry-hubs-hunter-field-trip/