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Unlocking a New Era of Value-Added Timber Manufacturing in the Green Triangle

Recent research led by the Green Triangle Forest Industries Hub has confirmed the viability of manufacturing engineered wood products—such as Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL) and Glue Laminated Timber (GLT)—using locally grown hardwood and softwood pulp log resources.

With domestic demand for these products consistently outpacing supply, Australia remains heavily reliant on imports—a situation further compounded by the closure of Victoria’s native timber industry.
In response, the Hub is actively exploring strategic opportunities to add value to the region’s extensive plantation estate by assessing the potential for advanced timber processing operations.

Attract and Support.

Recognising the strong and growing market demand, industry stakeholders have initiated a comprehensive feasibility study to develop a collaborative business model designed to attract investment and support a scalable manufacturing operation in the Green Triangle, based in the Glenelg Shire.

This initiative focuses particularly on leveraging the region’s substantial hardwood (Eucalyptus globulus) resource, which has traditionally been exported in totality.

The Victorian Government has committed $500,000 to the study, with additional support from the Victorian Forest Products Association. Work is anticipated to be completed by late 2025.

In July 2021, the GTFIH released a wood flow study by leading industry consultant Tim Woods of IndustryEdge focused on optimising the use of softwood and hardwood resources and identifying higher value processing opportunities.

The study showed the sector was facing a declining resource base, largely due to restrictive government policy and agricultural and pressure, with existing processing absorbing nearly all available softwood.

Demand was outstripping supply by 0.6 million m3 with increasing pressure to maximise the use of existing resource and to explore how to extract new value from the eucalyptus globulus hardwood estate to meet growing demand for structural timber products.

 

In response, the Splinters to Structures: Value-adding to exported wood fibre research study was launched in 2022, under the Commonwealth’s Agricultural Trade and Market Access Cooperation Program auspiced by the GTFIH and Forest and Wood Products Australia (FWPA). Again managed by Tim Woods, the project aimed to explore how lower grade hardwood and softwood logs – traditionally exported due to no local processing capability – could be transformed into higher value engineered wood products, such as Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL) and Glue Laminated Timber (GLT), for domestic and structural markets.

This came at a time when Australia had been excluded from trade with China, it’s primary market traditionally accounting for 96 per cent of log exports, leaving pulp log stranded with no domestic processing option. This trade led to a 60 per cent drop in export volumes and prices.

IndustryEdge data

What was learnt from the Splinters to Structures project?

The Splinters to Structures: Value-adding to exported wood fibre research focused on specific demand and market opportunities for EWPs produced with both softwood pulp log and eucalyptus globulus log, with technical production trials to understand the capability of the resource.

Analysis from IndustryEdge showed a viable market for both the GLT and LVL products domestically and Asian export trade, particularly to Japan.

  • Australia’s demand for EWPs is dominated by LVL, supported by GLT as a complementary and specialist product, where in combination they compete with non-wood products and some sawnwood products. Demand is consistent and growing, peaking significantly above domestic production capacity, especially for LVL, during periods of peaking building demand.
  • In 2023-24, Australia’s LVL consumption was 280,000 m3, with GLT consumption as high as 79,000 m3.
  • Australia’s demand for LVL cannot be supplied entirely by local production, even when total demand is at cyclical lows. National production is about half the annual minimum demand.
  • Australia’s GLT market has sufficient production capacity to meet minimum demand levels. However, insufficient fibre, particularly of the right species, makes it challenging to meet, particularly for specific grades of higher strength GLT (GLT18+). Almost all of this higher strength product is manufactured from native hardwood no longer readily in supply.

Imports

  • LVL imports are largely originate from mainland China, Finland and the USA, primarily manufactured from softwood.
  • GLT imports are derived from Indonesia, doubling in 2023-24, following the cessation of access to Victoria’s native forests and the flow-on impact on the availability of sawn hardwood products suitable for manufacture into higher-strength GLT, among other products.

The opportunity

  • The lack of supply of higher strength GLT has not dampened demand for products, especially those graded GL18 and above, where the higher strength characteristics are primarily achieved by hardwood.
  • The additional market opportunity for GLT is about 10,000-12,000 m3 per annum – this is significant because the higher strength products can displace some GLT imports and other EWPs. Furthermore, it can complement other wood products and EWPs, including LVL, and can act as a substitute in the build environment for steel and concrete (enhanced by the growing appetite for clean, green construction).
  • The fast-start GLT commercialisation trial delivered a higher-strength GLT, made exclusively from hardwood, surpassing test requirements for both GL-18 and GL-21. The break in the test beam occurred in the glueline, not the timber, at 5997kg, just over 55Mpa. This was 23 percent higher than the GL18 equivalent goal, achieved at a pressure of 45Mpa or 4870kg.
  • Testing and grading of the new product is ongoing with certification to be delivered by 30 June 2025, illustrating it performs comparatively to other high performing hardwood GLT, and can be a substitute for both steel and concrete, fast tracking its commercial use.
  • Beams derived from the project are being showcased in commercial and residential builds, with project partners confirmed in both NSW and Victoria, with strong ongoing interest from builders.