'The way of the future': Taking cross-laminated wood to new heights

It's called mass timber, cross-laminated wood used in modular construction.

Launched in 2019, St. Thomas-based Element5 is Ontario's first manufacturer of cross-laminated timber.

"It's an engineered wood product,” Element5 President/CEO Patrick Poulin told CTV News. “It's structural components that would be analogous to steel and concrete to produce a mid-rise building. But you're making it all from wood. So beams out of wood and plates out of layered wood."

The provincial government has recently approved the construction of wood, midrise buildings of up to 18 storeys tall. On Tuesday morning, the province committed almost $3.5 million to the expansion of Element5's operations at 70 Dennis Rd.

"Not only is it going to create 32 new jobs in this region, in St. Thomas area, but it's also going to help the forestry sector across Ontario,” said Nolan Quinn.

Quinn is the associate minister of Forestry in the provincial government.

Mass timber products at the Element5 facility in St. Thomas, seen on July 30, 2024. (Gerry Dewan/CTV News London)

He continued, “You know, innovative technologies that they're using here in the advanced wood construction is the way of the future."

Poulin also points to the environmental benefits that come from building with laminate wood, "If you think about the elegance of what trees do, extracting CO2 from the atmosphere. That CO2 gets parked in the fiber of a tree. Then that tree gets harvested and you build a beautiful building out of that. So that CO2 is permanently out of the atmosphere and parked in a building."

St. Thomas Mayor Joe Preston said the Element5 products benefit the Ontario economy from north to south, "Somebody up north is making money taking down those trees and turning them into the source for what Element5 does. Somebody further down that stream is now building houses and building buildings."

Quinn notes that the province also sees mass timber construction as a way to tackle the dire need for more affordable housing, "With Bill 185 going up to 18 storeys, this is going to allow us to be able to build faster and more efficiently. You know, as an estimate, it's about 50 per cent faster to be able to build the project [with Element5 modular material] because it gets on site and it's already prepared and ready, and there's about 20 per cent less waste as well. So it's very sustainable."

Poulin said mass timber construction is already common in Europe and the practice is rapidly gaining traction in North America. That has prompted Austria-based Hasslacher Group to join the Element5 ownership group. Hasslacher is a world leader in timber-based products.