Standing up to technical scrutiny

When asked to gaze into this murky crystal ball, what became clear quickly is that there are positive drivers which the timber industry can capably influence; there are negative elements which we also have some power to turn around; and there are some which are in the lap of the gods. They are probably equally proportioned so the future is looking good. If we “do the right thing”, we have a 2-1 chance of a growing market for structural timber in construction.

If we are professional about our offering and our products, and we behave cohesively as an industry in terms of contesting the negative marketing noise and the fabricated perceptions about timber in construction, then the future looks bright. We also have to stop thinking that this is God’s building medium – it is not!

The pity is that, instead of individually taking care of our own businesses by ensuring tight quality management controls, understanding what hard mandatory and soft recommended regulations are coming down the track and ensuring that our offering is technically-compliant while beyond reproof, we turn to poorly-funded organisations to shout our cause and lean on the crutch of outdated marketing slogans. In the meantime, we delay or even scrap decisions and necessary investments that have to be made in our own businesses until it’s almost too late.

This trait epitomises the timber industry in the eyes of the construction industry and lays us open to justifiable attack and negative marketing spin. This won’t cut it going forward. In defence – of course, there are exceptions to the rule – there are companies committed to technical excellence and driven to be compliant in anticipation of the rulings. There are some embracing multi-medium hybrid building systems. An example is AIMC4, a technical collaboration between timber and block, where timber is the right product in the right place. They are, however, still in the minority.

The sustainable building regulations, under the guise of the Code for Sustainable Homes, never had the chance to kick in so we and other building medium providers to the housebuilding industry never truly felt the pain of the technical demands that this code imposed. We dodged a bullet because of the recession. Unfortunately, the bullet didn’t come from a rifle, it came from a machine gun and the inevitability of more sustainable bullets heading our way is as certain as death and taxes.

Building Regs 2010 in Part L has adopted the energy target from Code 3 and many system providers are still ignoring the technical implications of this. The mindset should not be to avoid them. There needs to be a paradigm shift towards the offering being the naturally-compliant choice for the client whether it is a Registered Provider (RP) of affordable housing, a national housebuilder or a self builder. We should be able to stand on our technical credentials, not outdated marketing spin.

Primary criteria

I mentioned earlier that this is not God’s medium of building; the incessant slogan continues “Wood – Naturally the only sustainable building medium”! Marketing won’t cut it when it comes to the hard reality of delivering cost-effective (low cost!) scale-able housebuilding systems that are fully optimised to meet whatever Sustainable Codes are applied in the future. The client, quite frankly, doesn’t care. He/she has two primary criteria – Code compliance and cost. If it is a RP, they have a third in ongoing maintenance. That’s it.

The old adage that a man’s home is his castle is gone. Five million people on a housing waiting list are not choosy. The demographic and the economy when this old adage was applied no longer exist. So let’s become the technically-compliant, cost-effective solution, drilling down into understanding the building physics of what we provide and ensure we can easily prove the technical credentials. We need to optimise the build structure and fabrication process so there are no cost leaks and ensure we (and I mean the system provider) can stand up to technical scrutiny by industries that have considerably more financial muscle and far greater collaborative strengths than we do. Where can we look for an exemplar of this in action?

The Canadians, who through the phenomenal technical efforts of the CMHC (http://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca), have driven system performance into the heart of the building system industry regardless of the medium; but naturally being a traditional timber built environment, it favours this medium. We can learn a great deal from them in this regard. We also have some excellent funded projects like AIMC4 under way which does away with the build medium argument completely.

We face some incredible challenges – fire, European compliance, sustainable compliance, skills, cost of build, speed of build, competition for fibre, to name a few. We can at the very least get our technical house in order and be ready. We can drill into our manufacturing and build processes to deliver lowest possible end-to-end cost. We can make sure that our accreditation is fully in order.

So to the point. Where do I (or we as C4Ci) see the timber industry in our sector five years? Our view is that we could stay static in percen-tage share or significantly lose out to other systems such as steel if these basics are not attended. We could, if we address the issues mentioned, very capably become the build medium of choice. After all, some marketers think we have God on our side!