What do recent pulp and paper investments in the PNW tell us about the region’s future?

Asia has increased its share of global wood pellet imports to a record 32%. Worldwide trade of wood pellets was practically unchanged year-over-year compared to 2022.

The global forest industry has experienced some serious changes across the past year. As we saw in our 2022 global forest industry predictions post, lots of volatility and global unrest yielded both expected and unexpected shifts.

A heightened sense of uncertainty continues to plague various aspects of our lives as global geopolitical trade flows and economic structures remain stressed.

Prices for pulplogs and wood chips increased QoQ in early 2022 in all 19 regions worldwide as tracked by the Wood Resource Quarterly (WRQ).

Demand for conifer wood chips and pulpwood softened in the Pacific Northwest (PNW) in response to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in early 2020.

A report from the US Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) BioPreferred Program estimates that new sustainable products and practice within seven biobased industry sectors reduced oil consumption by 9.4 million barrels in 2017.

The China Paper Association published its "14th Five-Year Plan" along with the medium- and long-term development outline of the paper industry at the end of 2021.

Global sawlog price changes were mixed in 1Q/22 with quarter-over-quarter (QoQ) increases in North America and Eastern Europe, while prices declined in Central and Northern Europe.

The frozen food segment saw skyrocketing demand months after the onset of the global Covid-19 pandemic as consumers had reduced access to restaurants during the various stages of lockdowns that began in March 2020.

To say that global geopolitical, trade flows and economic structures are stressed would be an understatement. Over the course of the last two years, a heightened sense of uncertainty has permeated our lives and the markets we depend on, though there are shimmers of light and reasons to be hopeful.

Over the past few weeks, I have had the opportunity to speak with a dozen or more loggers across the Northeast, and I am worried about what I hear. Almost universally, loggers express concerns about their economic health and wonder what their future will bring.

Over the course of the last two years, we have written extensively about the myriad ways in which the pandemic has impacted the pulp & paper industry — specifically the Tissue & Towel and Containerboard segments, which oftentimes were required to push aging equipment to near limits.

In December, Swedish pulp and paper manufacturer BillerudKorsnäs AB announced its acquisition of North American coated papers producer Verso Corporation.

As COP26 delegates dissected the detail on decarbonizing our world, chemical innovators ushered in sustainable solutions of their own. Late 2021 saw a raft of agreements and announcements key to sustainability and circularity.

The COVID-19 pandemic had immediate, cascading effects across the globe during its onset in 1Q2020.

Bulk and commodity trade and vessel movements are embroiled in further turmoil in early October, with day rates for vessel leases spiking so dramatically, a commodity trader told IndustryEdge, “Its stupid o’clock out there. You can get a vessel, but you’ll pay through the nose, and rates are increasing by the hour some days.”

The largest risks to the early-stage project development of modern bioenergy plants—including the ability to raise the necessary capital and demonstrate profitability over time—are associated with identifying reliable, sustainable, affordable and bankable supplies of wood raw material feedstocks.

The following was published by the US Industrial Pellet Association in response to CNN's incomplete and inaccurate portrayal of the biomass industry, America's privately-owned working forests, and the rural communities that support the global forest products industry.

In the first quarter of 2021, the container freight market shocked the global logistics industry with soaring prices that have yet to abate.

As I noted in the first post of this series, there is an ongoing disconnect that tends to resurface in the debate surrounding the use of woody biomass for renewable energy, including power generation and biofuels.