Glasgow and Napier Universities are to receive £1.2M to investigate how best to maximise the use of Scottish timber in construction in the latest round of SRDG (Scottish Research Development Grant) funding.

Napier, which is home to the Centre for Timber Engineering, will provide engineering expertise, while Glasgow does research in wood science. The consortium also includes Forest Research, the research agency of the Forestry Commission, who are investigating the impact of forest management of timber quality.

Dr Mike Jarvis of the University of Glasgow's Chemistry Department explains: 'The aim of this joint project between Napier , Glasgow and Forest Research is to make better use of the large quantity of home-grown Sitka Spruce that will reach maturity in Scottish forests over the next 20 years. Some of this timber is strong enough to be used by the construction industry which imports almost all of its timber at present. The challenge of our research will be to identify the strongest timber as early as possible in the wood chain.'

Dr Jarvis added: 'This kind of research, aiming to find links from cellular structure to timber strength and engineering performance, is at present much more advanced on the Continent than here. The Forestry Commission will extend the link to the physiology of growing trees.'

Professor Robin Mackenzie, Head of School of the Built Environment at Napier, said: 'There are very strong economic and environmental reasons for expanding the sustainable use of Scottish-grown timber in building. The use of timber in housing construction has doubled in the past five years and although over 60% of houses in Scotland are timber-framed, in England this figure is only 6% - the focus is still on brick and concrete.'

Dr Jarvis concluded: 'Despite its old-fashioned image, wood is a sophisticated engineering material, which within a living tree shows outstanding strength and resilience ﾖ we have to find ways of selecting high-performance Scottish wood from such a variable resource so we can maximise its use.'

The grant will enable science and engineering research capacity to be pulled together, focusing initially on the fundamental questions of wood quality and performance and underpinning the search for technical solutions which can be applied to the Scottish wood industry

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Timber production and processing make up one of the largest industries in Scotland, contributing ?1.4 billion to the Scottish economy and supporting over 40,000 jobs, mainly in rural areas. The Scottish Forest Industries Cluster (SFIC) has calculated that UK market penetration can be increased from 9% to 15% over five years, creating over 1000 new jobs.

For further information, please contact Judith Hodgson Tel:0141 330 3535, email: j.hodgson@admin.gla.ac.uk or Professor Mike Jarvis, Tel:0141 330 4653, email:mikej@chem.gla.ac.uk

The Forestry Commission forecasts that the supply of Scottish timber will double by 2025, with around 80% of this increase being Sitka spruce from both state and private forests, planted in the past 30 years before the use of native species had such high priority.

First published: 8 August 2003