Peter Blair, executive director, Structural Management Australia, Loggo’s structural engineer working on the Loggo engineered wood systems and Pat Thornton, founder and managing director, Loggo IP Pty Ltd at this year’s Timber Offsite Construction Conference in Melbourne.
Integrated timber giant Samling Timber Group has signed a Memorandum of Understanding in Sarawak with Loggo IP Pty Ltd, an Australian developer of competitive Engineered Wood Products using planted wood species such as Acacia and Eucalyptus for building systems aimed at housing, commercial and government buildings, three-storey walk-ups, shop top housing as well as mid-rise, and multi-residential apartments blocks. Source: Timberbiz
The MoU was signed on 18 October by Lawrence Chia, Samling Group’s Chief Executive Officer and Pat Thornton, founder and managing director of Loggo IP Pty Ltd.
“We will work together on a pilot project in Sarawak using Loggo IP’s patented engineered wood technology focused on a burgeoning forest recovery industry to develop small diameter true rounds or peeler cores.” Mr Chia said.
Mr Chia explained that every year millions of peeler cores are produced as ‘waste’ from plywood production. These were largely used in low-value recovery options such as packaging and as fuel for thermal energy processes.
“However, in a world ‘first’, Loggo has developed and patented three versatile engineered wood products as well as columns and each can be made from low value forest ‘thinning’ or peeler cores. Two of these beams can use Samling’s ply as a web,” he said.
Mr Thornton said that as the world shortage of timber hits home, he is convinced Samling can develop thee cost-competitive systems across southeast Asia and beyond.
“Apart from the financial benefits, Loggo’s low-tech, minimal processing and set-up costs and the economic advantage of these low-value plywood by-products is a green and sustainable way to increase returns,” Pat Thornton said.
Sarawak Timber Industry Development Corporation (STIDC) is a corporate body having been mandated by the State Government to regulate and facilitate the advancement and sustainability of the timber industry in Sarawak.
“STIDC is very happy that the industry players are taking initiatives to develop EWP using planted wood in Sarawak. This is aligned with our vision to utilize more planted logs for high-value wood- based products like engineered wood,” Datu Haji Hashim Haji Bojet, Advisor, in witnessing the MOU signing said.
“This is also in line with the State’s aspiration for the timber industry as one of the most important sectors to transform Sarawak into a developed State by 2030. We are confident that this MoU will allow Samling to progress from the initial stage of assessment to later manufacturing these high-quality structural components, first for local and then for global markets.
“This effort is fully complementary with STIDC’s overall EWP vision which includes laminated veneer lumber (LVL), glued laminated (Glulam) and cross laminated timber (CLT) products.”
The Asia-Pacific floor ‘coverings’ market alone is estimated to exceed US$250 billion by 2027. These ‘floor coverings’, tiles, boards, carpet, vinyl amongst others should be held up by ‘greener’ timber sub-floor frames as the world turns slowly against the highly GHG pollutant concrete and steel industry.
Samling, under its sustainable forests mandate, manages around 1.2 million hectares of forest land and 190,250 hectares of gross plantable forest plantations in Malaysia. Operating for more than 50 years, Samling is one of Malaysia’s largest timber companies, processing its own logs into sawn wood, plywood and veneers in an integrated, upstream and downstream operation.
The group has obtained forest management certificates for three of its Forest Management Units (FMUs), as well as four Licence for Planted Forests, all under the Malaysian Timber Certification Council’s Malaysian Timber Certification Scheme which is endorsed by the Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC).
In August 2023, Samling was awarded the prestigious “Most Diversified and Value-Adding Timber Manufacturer” award by the STIDC.
The Loggo concept slowly developed after better than expected, extensive testing results at the University of Technology of Sydney (UTS) in 2011. Loggo IP Pty Ltd was set up to hold and manage all to-be-developed Intellectual property rights (patents, trademarks, software, copyrights/plans, machinery, trade secrets etc) and Loggo Pty Ltd was set up as the trading company.
“We embarked on a business plan whereby we would research, develop, and register a plethora of worldwide patents in secret. In 2015 we began applying this principle to peeler cores, with Malaysia in mind, having already recognized its ability to be the manufacturing hub throughout Asia with its already established paths to market with timber exports to China, India, Indonesia etc,” Mr Thornton said.
Loggo Pty Ltd is now an ‘industry partner’ with a sizeable grant to the Australian Research Council’s Advance Future Timber Hub at the University of Queensland for further development into ‘the built environment’.
