BALTIMORE — A Baltimore based startup gives fallen trees a chance at a second life. Turning local wood waste into resources.
If a tree falls in your backyard, what do you do?
"Trees fall due to decay, disaster, disease and development. We take those trees we work with local arborists to funnel those trees into large scale building projects,” said Michael Sheets, Lumber Manager at Cambium.
The Baltimore company takes trees that would normally end up in the landfill and transforms them into lumber that can be used for construction, furniture, decking, fences and more.
"Once we get the trees and we get them into house, we use our proprietary software Traece to manage the inventory, track the inventory,” said Sheets. "We can see with all that data where the tree came from, the origin the chain of custody and the carbon impact.”
The goal is negative carbon footprint. They work toward this by keeping it local.
"Everything we do comes within 50 to 100 miles of this area so we're not really going too far away to pull material in," said Sheets. "What we're trying to do is embrace uniqueness in the material versus the sameness that you would get from the big box stores.”
When the wood arrives at Cambium, it's dried out and when they're ready to start building they call in the fabricator.
"The short snippet is it needs to be flat and straight and square," said Dan Toal, who is the fabricator that transforms the wood into something beautiful.
"I'll cut and sand and route and shape the wood into the required dimension and specification for whatever project it is I’m working with,” said Toal.
He's one of many who work on the material, figuring out the best way to use it. For him it's an opportunity to problem solve.
"I get to watch the material transform over the course of several hours and there's nothing but me and the goal for the day, and the challenges that I face and every day is a chance for growth and learning," said Toal.
The technique is Carbon Smart Wood.
"We'll never harvest a healthy tree for the purpose of creating the material,” said Sheets. "Carbon Smart Wood, our material, uses seven times less than wood plastic composites that are used for similar projects."
Currently, the company creates tables and countertops and supports fencing and decking.
Working with local companies that have the same goal, saving wood to save the planet.
In May, Cambium will have a slab sale ready for whatever wood projects you might imagine. For more information, click here.
