Sustainable timber specification

The UK building industry consumes millions of tonnes of timber a year. Whilst in the past the sources of this timber were entirely unregulated, today greater awareness of the significant environmental damage thoughtless timber specification can cause has led to the introduction of many different certification schemes – some good, some not so good.

The speaker will demonstrate that experience has shown that just specifying ‘sustainable timber’ does not always lead to ‘sustainable timber’ being used.

The speaker is Charlie Law from PEFC, who has over 30 year’s experience in the construction sector and extensive industry knowledge having worked for BAM, Kier and Lendlease.

He is also Sustainability Director at Timber Development UK (TDUK) and a member of Grown in Britain Executive.

The session explains what schemes are available, and where they can go wrong and explores ways of designing out the risk of unsustainable timber being used in the first place.

We will also look at the use of timber in cladding. With timber being an increasingly popular choice as a sustainable material cladding we’ll explore the specific pitfalls associated with use.