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Description
Standwood is an Estonian company producing wooden sauna materials (both from non-thermal and thermal wood). Wood is a popular building material due to its good characteristics, relatively favorable price (e.g. compared to stone facades) and natural appearance. However, wood has a number of disadvantages while used outdoors and in hot, humid conditions: the wood swells, tends to rot in wet conditions, warps, molds etc. Therefore, there are various methods to improve the properties of wood. Thermal treatment uses only water vapor and heat – no chemicals are used. Heat inside the thermal modification chamber is slowly raised up to 215°C. The process takes around 36– 48 hours. Water is needed for two reasons: because the temperature rises so high, the water prevents the wood from burning during the thermo-treatment cycle. Water is also used to ensure the quality of the final product: the moisture is added to the product to prevent cracking and ensuring long life.
The main objective of this project is to expand and automate Standwood’s production with the result of bringing two new product groups to the market: finger-jointed sauna material and thermal-treated façade cladding, and terrace flooring made of coniferous wood. The expansion of production will be achieved by acquiring a new thermal treatment chamber. Standwood’s objective is to organize the production in a way that the new thermal chamber helps to reduce CO2 emissions and the amount of energy needed for the thermal treatment process. The new and existent thermal chamber will be connected to the same boiler in a way that by keeping the chambers in different work cycles it is possible to use residual heat generated in one chamber’s cooling phase to heat the second chamber and also the water vapor required for moistening.