Like any natural resource we need to get to the point where recycled material is cheaper or more profitable than virgin material. For now it is still seen as cheaper to harvest standing lumber than collecting and processing wood waste to create engineered wood products.
There are a host of problems to be solved to get to the point where it will just make economic sense for a business to change over. There are efforts underway to realize this ambition. However, it will necessitate modifying the way in which a wide range of industries function. There will need to be analyses of business practices and attitudinal change beginning at the top all the way down to the lowest level workers.
Take construction material waste. Currently, as homes are built the waste, such as cut offs, are cast aside to be collected by a laborer and thrown into a dumpster. This is commingled with all other wastes and hauled to a construction waste landfill site. There are efforts afoot to change this i.e., LEEDS, but it is a huge paradigm shift.
By changing the way we look at reuseable waste materials we can affect the way in which raw or virgin materials like forests are perceived. Then people trained in the care of trees, like arborists will have a stake in the preservation of forests.
