DryTECH

DryTech 2008 was a practical two-day technology programme. It provided an invaluable independent update on new timber drying technologies, research, and key developments from throughout Australasia, North America, South Africa and Europe. The issues covered assisted Australian and New Zealand wood products companies maximise savings in their timber drying and energy management operations.

Who attended?

Sawmill site and production managers, kiln drying supervisors, kiln operators, energy management specialists and quality control personnel. Most major equipment and product suppliers to the timber drying industry also participated in this series.

What did the programme cover?

Effective options for improving energy management for kiln drying operations
How mills can manage growing environmental compliance issues
Technologies for measuring and controlling emissions
Recent product advancements in kiln drying design
Impacts of scanning/segregation technologies on timber drying
Updates on key international timber drying developments and research

As part of the 2008 series it was exciting to see the "step change" that has been occurring with a number of new innovative drying technologies announced. The developments are markedly improving wood drying and energy efficiencies for wood processing companies.

The need to conserve water and reduce contaminant emissions from timber drying have led to significant changes in kiln design. With water conservation for example, approximately 600 litres of water is removed from just one cubic metre of timber during drying. In New Zealand we're producing currently around 3.5 million cubic metres of dried timber each year. This equates to over 2 billion litres of water removed. Take that world-wide, the estimate is around 180 billion litres of water is being extracted every year during timber drying.

Technologies such as condensing kilns where the water is being captured as condensate within the kiln rather than vented to the atmosphere, new drying kilns where heating, pre-heating and conditioning of the lumber is occurring as the lumber is fed through the kilns and pre-sorting lumber through scanning before drying - all having a major impact on kiln drying efficiencies.

For those unable to get to either Melbourne or Rotorua, a full set of proceedings can be ordered by going to the Post Event Details page on this site.

Australasian Timber Drying Group - Annual General Meeting

To capitalize on the kiln drying expertise that came into Melbourne for the event, the Australasian Timber Drying Group held it’s AGM on completion of the DryTech 2008 programme on Thursday 27 November 2008.