October 2023

Mass Timber Competition’s 2023 Winners to Showcase Innovation and Support Market Growth

The five winners of the 2023 Mass Timber Competition: Building to Net-Zero Carbon were announced in Chicago this month. The second-annual initiative, funded jointly by the Softwood Lumber Board and USDA Forest Service (USDA), demonstrates mass timber’s applications in architectural design and builds awareness of its significant role in cutting carbon emissions.

“The SLB was encouraged to see the architecture and construction community continue to expand implementation of mass timber systems in effective ways across a range of building types,” said SLB Chief Marketing Officer Ryan Flom. “This year’s winning projects will not only provide much-needed housing and gathering spaces for their communities, but they will also demonstrate viable paths for other teams to build for well-being, resilience, and a minimal carbon footprint.”

The following winning projects received funds totaling $2.2 million:

• CODA, a mixed-use residential project in Detroit—its team includes OOMBRA Architects, Brush Park Properties, IN Development Partners, JDH Engineering, Britt Peters and Associates, and AM Higley.
  
  
• Up@310 Lofts, a vertical addition to an existing building, from the Lignin Group, Tim Olson, Banwell Architects, 310 Marlboro St., and Entuitive.
  
  
• Via/NWA IC Program, an affordable housing project spearheaded by Blue Crane with a design team that includes A226, Modus Studio, Tatum-Smith-Welcher, Aspect Structural Engineers, and Arco Construction.
  
  
• The Village SF Wellness Center, a mixed-use social support complex for The Friendship House Association of American Indians; its project team includes PYATOK architecture + urban design, DCI Engineers, and Cahill Contractors.
  
  
• Woolsey Gardens (pictured above), a high-rise multifamily project, with a team that includes Solomon Cordwell Buenz, Northern California Land Trust, Tipping Structural Engineers, Swinerton Builders, and Timberlab.

The projects showcase larger-scale use of mass timber and a commitment to prioritizing the use of domestically sourced wood from sustainably managed forests. Teams will share case studies, research, whole building life cycle analyses, and lessons learned with the broader industry—helping to boost the construction of similar mass timber buildings across the country.

The 2023 competition follows last year’s program, which awarded $2 million in total funds to six recipients.

Q2 Highlights: SLB Programs Generated 454 MM BF of Incremental Demand 

The SLB and its funded programs delivered promising results in the second quarter, outperforming on a wide number of measures while defending existing market share and making strategic investments to boost revenue streams. Along with generating incremental demand of 454 MM BF, the programs accounted for 1.3 MM metric tons of sequestered and avoided CO₂.

A few key Q2 highlights:

• The American Wood Council, with funding from the SLB and U.S. Endowment for Forestry & Communities, launched a Wood Sourcing Tool and is expanding the industry’s life cycle inventory database to meet the growing demand for more-specific regional and mill-level environmental product declarations and fiber sourcing data.
  
  
• WoodWorks directly influenced 129 projects and indirectly influenced 329 projects in Q2. Combined, the projects represent 22.5 MM SF of impacted wood construction, 203 MM BF of incremental lumber, 45 MM BF of incremental engineered wood products, and 142 MM SF of incremental wood structural panels.
  
  
• Think Wood increased its overall content output by nearly 70% in Q2, translating to 636,327 marketing engagements—up 263% QoQ and +143% YoY.
  
  
• New accounts on the Wood Institute grew steadily and surged on an annualized basis by over 70%, while SLB Education completed three university faculty development workshops benefiting 52 educators from 42 schools of architecture and engineering.

To share your feedback or to request a printed report by mail, please email us at info@softwoodlumberboard.org.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced the appointment of four members to serve on the Softwood Lumber Board. The appointees will serve three-year terms, effective January 1, 2024, through December 31, 2026.

The newly appointed members are:

• Keith O’Rear, Prosper, TX (U.S. South, Large Seat)
• Fritz R. Mason, Atlanta, GA (U.S. South, Large Seat)
• Ashlee Cribb, Spokane, WA (U.S. West, Flex Seat)
• Craig Johnston, Portland, OR (Importer Any Region, Small Seat)

“The Softwood Lumber Board thanks Secretary Vilsack for appointing a strong slate of directors who reflect the diversity of the industry and will bring the unique perspectives from their regions,” said Cees de Jager, SLB President and CEO. “The SLB welcomes the newly appointed members and extends its thanks and appreciation to outgoing Director Eric Cremers and Caroline Dauzat for their leadership, service, and commitment to the industry.”

Army Corps Says: We Want You to Consider Mass Timber for the U.S. Army

Mass timber must be considered by all U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Project Delivery Teams when designing Army military construction and civil works vertical construction projects. That’s the directive shared in a recent bulletin that highlights the AWC, Think Wood, and WoodWorks as resources to consult.

The bulletin, which applies to all Army projects but is “highly recommended” for all military construction projects, also lists three mass timber projects that will be built by the Department of Defense over the next three fiscal years: a child development center at Virginia’s Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story, barracks at Washington State’s Joint Base Lewis-McChord, and a dormitory at Louisiana’s Barksdale Air Force Base.

The AWC has directly engaged with the Department of the Army to provide feedback on its construction contracting practices and to offer expertise as a resource as the department seeks to expand its use of mass timber systems. Army facility expansion and maintenance is expected to grow in the coming years. And the demand for low-carbon solutions is on the rise, opening new opportunities for wood products to fairly compete for funding that has, until now, been dominated by concrete and steel.

Think Wood Educates Homebuilders on Carbon Through EEBA

Think Wood is educating homebuilders on embodied carbon and the role wood can play in reducing their environmental footprint through an ongoing partnership with the Energy & Environmental Building Alliance (EEBA).

In September, EEBA adapted a Think Wood blog post to publish “Five Sustainable Eco Homes Built With Style,” sharing five examples of homes using softwood lumber to maximize both environmental impact and aesthetic appeal with its audience of homebuilders. Last year, EEBA established the Net Zero Carbon Building Professional Designation with funding from the SLB.

“The growing emphasis on embodied carbon reduction within the high-performance building industry reflects the unwavering dedication of builders towards sustainable construction,” Aaron Smith, CEO of EEBA, told Think Wood.

“These visionary professionals recognize that minimizing the carbon footprint of building materials is not only essential for environmental preservation but also for creating healthier and more resilient communities,” he said. “By prioritizing embodied carbon reduction, EEBA members are actively contributing to a collective effort to combat climate change and promote sustainable development, ensuring a brighter and more sustainable future for generations to come.”

SLB-Supported Mass Timber Installation Training Continues Growth

WoodWorks’ mass timber–installation training modules are resonating with construction professionals, with the curriculum’s 10 units being viewed by nearly 1,000 people and downloaded nearly 6,000 times since being launched in January.

Positive feedback continues to come in. After reconnecting with an international general contracting firm at the 2023 International Mass Timber Conference, WoodWorks offered a presentation on the curriculum at the firm’s Seattle office. Twenty-nine people attended in person, and 12 joined remotely from the company's Portland, Oregon, office—including project managers, superintendents, and trade crew leaders. 

“We have composite crews of ironworkers and carpenters with varying levels of experience,” said the firm’s Director of Mass Timber and Prefabrication. "[It is] beneficial to have everyone in the same place discussing common items/situations that come up on jobs. WoodWorks’ presentations and materials are great because they outline all of the common scenarios encountered.”

To expand the curriculum’s reach further, WoodWorks has also made the training modules available on The Wood Institute.

In addition to this curriculum, WoodWorks has partnered with 17 worker training centers and three universities to develop mass timber–installation training programs, with two additional training centers and a fourth university set to begin training in 2024. With funding support from the SLB and USDA Forest Service, WoodWorks has provided 18 mock-ups to facilitate hands-on installation and train mass timber–installation workers as well as future design and construction management professionals. Since inception through the end of September, the program has trained 833 people totaling 18,207 hours.

WoodWorks Helps Firm Get Affordable Housing Projects Back on Track

When Hickok Cole—a Washington, D.C.-based architecture and interiors firm with significant wood experience—ran into an issue that threatened the timeline of a light-frame wood affordable housing project, Senior Architect Starr Ashcraft turned to WoodWorks for assistance. WoodWorks helped resolve the issue relating to the potential use of fire retardant–treated wood for the 160,000-square-foot 5-over-1 project in Washington, D.C., which is projected to use 13.1 bf/sq. ft. 

With the first challenge addressed, the firm had other questions—specifically, how to transfer the load to make the exterior walls nonbearing, eliminating the need for a two-hour rating and to encapsulate supporting members. A WoodWorks Regional Director was able to offer several solutions by email and through a follow-up call with members of the project team. The solution also helped resolve a similar concern on a second project; the firm is now on track to complete both projects on schedule.

“The team at WoodWorks has been extremely helpful over the years with their feedback and recommendations,” Ashcraft said. “As designers, we are always looking to push the envelope on traditional wood-frame design, and WoodWorks has been a wealth of knowledge as we navigate these complex wood-framing details.”

Connecting Architecture Students With the Timber Industry

Time for Timber, a design studio at the University of Texas at Austin’s School of Architecture, is teaching students about innovative wood design and connecting them with the timber industry early in their careers. The SLB will provide funding to expand this course, taught by Tyler Swingle, after it received an honorable mention in the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) 2023 Timber Education Prize sponsored by the SLB. 

The honorable mention recognition comes with accolades but no monetary award. Nonetheless, seeing Time for Timber as a particularly strong submission worthy of support, the SLB will step in to provide incremental funding for Swingle to expand the next iteration of the design studio. Direct funding of faculty, outside of competitive grants, is a new initiative that SLB Education will continue in 2024 with select faculty and schools.

Students in the upcoming studio will again use their understanding of timber research in architecture to come up with rigorous and experimental design methodologies allowing them to evaluate new possibilities of wood construction. The studio will collaborate with the USDA Forest Service in East Texas to develop prototypes of emerging wood systems with students working between digital and physical models to simulate innovative wood systems and methods of construction. The studio will encourage students to carefully consider the environment and local economy, specifically relating to forestlands, and it will highlight the importance of understanding forests and how we use their resources in our buildings.

Mass Timber Is Proving Its Value

There’s growing evidence that mass timber buildings are providing a strong return on investment when it comes to higher building values and commanding above-market rental prices. Near the front of the pack is Hines, a global real estate investment, development, and property management firm that invested in a series of tall mass timber office buildings dubbed T3, with outposts completed and planned across the United States and around the world. And its investment is paying off: “If we just look at the performance of our timber office buildings when we pro forma them, we were thinking that the rents would be basically right in the middle of traditional class AA creative office buildings,” said Steve Luthman, CEO of the U.S. Midwest and Southeast regions and Canada for the developer Hines, in an interview for a CBRE podcast. 

Instead, “what we found in both Minneapolis and Atlanta is that our rents are at the very top of the market. We’re getting the same rents as the top of traditional class AA buildings in the city.” What’s more, Luthman said Hines sold T3 Minneapolis at a 3.75% cap rate in a market that rarely drops below 6%—meaning the project sold for a higher value than the market and project type would typically dictate.

And it’s not just Hines that is seeing gains as mass timber goes mainstream. In Atlanta, Sage Software is setting records with the $70-per-square-foot deal it signed at Ponce City Market’s under-construction 619 Ponce timber loft office (pictured above), according to the Atlanta Business Chronicle. That is far above the BeltLine Eastside Trail’s average office-space rents of roughly $49.98 per square foot—some of the highest in town, according to first-quarter data from Cushman & Wakefield—and sets a new peak for the city. The four-story, mass-timber office building offers 85,000 square feet of office space, with 25,000 square feet of retail. As designed by Handel Architects, 619 Ponce is expected to be completed in 2024.

The performance of these and other mass timber projects demonstrates that investors and tenants are increasingly recognizing the value of mass timber’s sustainability, low carbon footprint, and ability to create a warm and welcoming environment for the people occupying the building.

This monthly housing commentary report is a free service of Virginia Tech and is intended to help one gauge future business activity in the U.S. housing market.

August 2023 Reports (released in October 2023)

Part A: August Housing Commentary

Part B: August Economic Conditions