Difficulty in shipping B.C. wood products

Friday 26 Apr 2013

 
B.C. forest companies say they can no longer get enough rail cars to move their products to market at a time when the U.S. housing market is going through a major recovery. U.S. housing rates topped one million in March on a seasonally adjusted rate, more than double the low point hit during the recession, prompting a run on rail cars that Canadian mills use to get their wood products to market. It’s not just lumber that’s being affected. Oriented strand board, plywood and even pulp inventories are building at the mills, forcing companies to turn to trucks – which are also in short supply.

“If you had a pickup truck, we would use it,” Bob Hayes, transportation vice-president at Canfor Corp. said. Earlier this year, Canfor came within four hours of shutting down a pulp mill because of a rail car shortage. Pulp production is also up and because it is perishable, it cannot be stored outside, Hayes said. Canfor has erected a big-top style tent at one of its Prince George pulp mills to store inventory but so far hasn’t had to use it.

However, the rail car crunch is adding to costs, from additional trucking to causing ships to be delayed in port, he said. “We were trucking this week from Prince George to Squamish terminal. We have never done that before. We had to find emergency trucks this weekend to go from Prince George to Squamish to keep the product flowing to the vessels and to keep the warehouses from overflowing,” Hayes said.

“I think transportation and the lack thereof, is going to be the biggest challenge for B.C. forest products companies to get their product to market in 2013 and beyond. Usually economics will drive solutions, but right now, that solution is to constrain the industry.” Source: Vancouver Sun
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