This morning on the front page of the Wallstreet Journal the is an article about how the cost of sawdust has soared due to a national shortage. If any of you has an excess of this commodity it may be beneficial to look into selling. Wallstreet Journal is a paid subscription, but I am guessing if you Google the article you may find more information. The name of the article in Wallstreet is : Sawdust Shock: A Shortage Looms as Economy Slows.
There is none to be had around here anymore. We're buying baled shavings from Canada@$600/month. I was looking into the shaving mills, but it doesn't look like the solution either. Hopefully by the end of the summer I will have a big planer setup and be planing my lumber, that should get us through next winter. There was a mill north of here that made so much sawdust over the years they just kept pushing it into the swamp. There is a shopping plaza on top of it now. :o
Dave
Here is a link to the article, however I think the Wall street journal only keeps content open to the public for one week
LINK TO ARTICLE (http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB120451039119406735-lMyQjAxMDI4MDA0MzUwMTMwWj.html)
Thanks Jeff.
I did not do the link as I thought it was a paid subscription.
I appreciate your help. ;)
That's an interesting article and not surprising with what I see here in Minnesota. The power plant in St. Paul is buying 50 semi loads of hardwood chips a day and other biomass users like the landscape mulch businesses scrambling for wood chips.
I suspect it will only get worse as the demand for fiber increases.
Were seeing it here to as we have a wood pellet plant only 35 miles from us that cannot get enough sawdust.
One of the north Missouri mills had a sawdust mountain from the circle saw to feed there kilns. They added a Brewco grade re-saw...the sawdust mountain disappeared and now they buy fuel for the steamer and kilns.
Were surrounded by poultry houses here in Arkansas...I wander what kind of predicament there in...I'll have to ask.
And I have a 40 trailer a day I pay to have taken away and used to fill a swamp.
There isnt a shortage around southeast missouri. There are mounds of sawdust every were. Some are 30 years old i bet. out in the middle of nowere you will find an old mill site. I dont know how some blowers are powerful enough to make them mountains. Heck thats a good way to fill in a hill side so you gots more flat land to work with around here.
This is why i am putting in a shaving mill.
Sawdust filling in a holler will never make stable ground I can tell you that.
Somebody should tell the people that run the landfill here.
People have to pay by weight to leave construction wood ( that has to be seperated from other stuff ) and the transfer station mixes the wood in with the trash and buries it !
They used to burn it in a pile but they lost thier permit to do that.
Leave them a copy of the article.
very interesting article,seems that we all could benifit maybe .all my sawdust goes to a local goat farmer.
The big mill down the road has been allocating sawdust for bedding for some time now. The price of animal bedding is becoming an issue "down on the farm"
And I can't find anyone interested in helping me build a saw dust grinding machine that I can take into the woods to make saw dust out of all the w/pine junk I can't make a log out of. Gee,you'll have to get a tub grinder then send it thru a hammer mill, like I've got 200k sitin around.
My grandfathers company used to make a thing called a "Sawduster" for dealing with sawmill waste. I have been trying to find out more about it. There is one about 15 miles from here, I have been meaning to check it out. I think finding a way to utilize low grade pine logs and tops would be great. There is a lot of waste in a pine tree top that is still fairly good diameter, just too gnarly to saw. I like the shavings mill idea, but it sounds like they don't like slab wood, and you have to dry it to bale it.
Dave
Dave I have been trying to find a market without haveing to dry the shavings. I can tell ya its slim. I talked to a guy earlier in alabama that said he sold to turkey barns without drying. I am going to head down northern arkansas around larry tomarrow and see what i can find out. So i might be around your area larry.
Semo
I have been burning pine slabs by the piles and have been trying to fill in the holler out front of Wandas shed. Could make lots if I had the means to do so. If they buy the de-barker and chipper I would give them the chips and dust. Why just last year we went through 500 tons of pine logs. That is a pile of slabs.
Check out this site. Where I can sell my sawdust and junk. I mean my new found gold.
http://www.recycle.net/cgi-bin/exview.cgi?w=01&sc=1125&st=LW
Don't you guys have any custom tub grinders down in Arkansas. You could grind all that up and make a fortune, or maybe a little or maybe breakeven maybe.
Stonebroke
Why we is so poor around here we's can not even pay attetion. There is a cedar mill about 50 miles from here an he grinds slabs for turkey barns. I have sold him some in the past but he is a cranky ole dude sometimes. Last year I sold him 4 TT loads of slabs then he forgot to pay for the last two. He was back hauling so there was no bill of laden just a mans word. He will not see another slab off of this mill. Looked at getting a chipper or renting one. Just one more thing on my list.
You got me Arkansasawyer! Seriously The custom tub grinding business really picked up in the northeast when they banned burning. And now that the wood pellet mills are sucking up all the sawdust you could finally make some money on biomass. The mulch business up here provides a good base and is seasonal. the bedding and pellet markets balance that out in the winter.
Stonebroke
Quote from: stonebroke on March 04, 2008, 06:47:43 PM
You got me Arkansasawyer! Seriously The custom tub grinding business really picked up in the northeast when they banned burning. And now that the wood pellet mills are sucking up all the sawdust you could finally make some money on biomass. The mulch business up here provides a good base and is seasonal. the bedding and pellet markets balance that out in the winter.
Stonebroke
no burning of brush or slab piles in northeast ?
Arkansawyer I was looking at that site the other day but you have to buy credits just to find out any contact info. But all in all it looks alright.
Jesse
The only people who can burn brush legally in NY are farmers. The slab wood sawyers generally get people to use it for firewood. You can hardly do anything in the North east without government permission. Big Brother at its finest.
Stonebroke
I sent a reply to a contact on that web site. He will be out next week to look at my cedar slabs. Looks like we got a deal cooking. I have 3 TT loads a sitting right now.
Stonebroke, fraid I'd have to move. But it's goin that way everwhere nowdays.
I sit here rather amused to see that a sawdust shortage made the front page of the Wall Street Journal...
We spent 18 months fighting with the Ontario Ministry of Environment when they said that sawdust was a waste and we had to pay a consultant to determine if it was having an adverse effect on the environment... 4 mills went nipples north because of the consulting fees and charges of failing to heed a provincial order.
There is a sawdust shortage because of the high Canadian dollar, the softwood lumber trade practices and the US housing turmoil. Our mills here are not working... vis a vis... no sawdust.
Okay... I've gone from amused to really PO'd back to amused again. I'm just glad that we accidentally had to change away from making lumber to making shingles...