Coos Economic Action Plan
Wood Products Technical Review Committee Meeting
January 17, 2008
Following are the charts produced during small group discussions at the TRC meeting. Of the original five topics “forest development center” was combined with “market diversity”, and “existing business and labor” was deferred to a later date, which left the following three topics for discussion today:
FIBER SUSTAINABILITY
What do we need to know?
- timber availability study
- Total available biomass (tons/acre/yr)
- landbase/ownership analysis
- present harvest levels
Where can we get that information?
- FIA, GRANIT, TNC, Mahoosuc Initiative
- state data, prior studies, easements
Who can get the information?
- Matt! and whoever gets the contract!
MARKET DIVERSITY and FOREST PRODUCTS DEVELOPMENT CENTER
What do we need to know?
- new and emerging products (with feasibility)
- Why does it take 5 years for transition? How can we change?
- Likely investors
- Who/where are the entrepreneurs? (Mascoma Corp., etc.)
- Who/where are the academic/collegiate partners?
- new products not yet commercialized
- What’s the mechanism to “marry” R&D, investor and entrepreneur?
- What are the unique motivating factors that would attract investor?
Where can it be found? (correlated with the above list)
- University and R&D labs
- PUC, FERC, government
- DRED, Coös Economic Development, AVER, BEDCO
- DRED, banks and investment firms
- university and academic
- forest product labs
- DRED (Beno)
- market research
Who can get the information? (correlated with the above list)
- Thad
- politicians
- Pete Reviere, Bill Andreas, Jim Wagner, Beno
- banks (Jim Tibbitts), SBDC, Microcredit
- Thad, Sarah Smith
- Sarah Smith
- Beno
- Marketing firms
ENERGY
Biofuels/Biodiesel
What do we need to know?
- Fuel consumption
- Production Methodology
- Potential investors (coop?)
Who can get the information? Where can it be found?
- Department of Energy (State/Federal)
- USDA
- Universities
Cooperative Fuel Purchasing
What do we need to know?
- fuel consumption
- potential suppliers
- distribution process
- order of magnitude cost savings
- who will do it
Who can get the information? Where can it be found?
- equipment manufacturers
- loggers and truckers
Transportation Cooperative (operations and/or ownership)
- backhauls
- central dispatch
- can this increase individual truck efficiencies and ultimately reduce the number of trucks
What do we want to know?
- willingness to participate
- accountability
- who determines cost of service
- current size of fleet
- variability of demand (seasonal, leasing capacity)
- labor workforce
Who can get the information? Where can it be found?
- survey timber producers
- leasing companies
Regulatory Initiatives
- homogeneous load limits (NH, VT, NY, ME, Quebec)
- federal load limits (interstate)
- fuel tax – abatement or all to roads
- reduced speed limits and enforcement
Short term conservation issues
- backhauls
- no idling
- aerodynamic trucks
- reduced skidding distances
- cooperative use of logging equipment (shears, etc.)
- commuting in log trucks
- labor workforce