With the need to decarbonize cities by 2050 – which means more energy efficient buildings and a massive reduction in CO emissions2 at the time of construction – interest in the wood industry, which is still a niche in the land of Le Corbusier and the Perret brothers, continues to grow among the French concrete giants. Several recent signs indicate an evolution of the sector.
The most recent is the announcement, Thursday, June 3, of the arrival of the Eiffage group among the subscribers of the new wood and eco-materials fund launched by Bpifrance at the end of 2020. This fund, the third of its kind, now has nearly 80 million euros with the 8 million Eiffage, aims to support an industrial sector known as “with high potential”. But who would benefit from being more structured if the French forest, fourth in Europe, must help reduce the carbon footprint of the construction sector and create jobs that cannot be relocated.
The new environmental regulations for new constructions (the RE2020), which gives pride of place to biobased materials, and the growing market demand for wood – from communities, but also from customers ” who want real estate assets that do not depreciate easily ”, explains Valérie David, Eiffage’s sustainable development and cross-functional innovation director – help change the lines.
“If we want to increase sustainable construction, the supply must be fluid, with a homogeneous level of standardization”, continues Valérie David. But there is also the concern to provide with a raw material that has not been produced beyond the borders of the European Union, “And which will therefore have a positive societal and environmental impact”, she continues.
“The acceleration is clear”
In the same vein, at the beginning of May, Bouygues Bâtiment France-Europe signed a two-and-a-half-year supply contract with one of the largest French sawyers and panel producer, the Vendée Piveteaubois. For the community, which nevertheless represents 380,000 jobs, it’s a small revolution. Until now, sawyers hardly worked with visibility of more than one or two months.
There, if the order books are growing, it is the possibility for manufacturers to invest more easily in new sawing lines which, for the most modern, cost around 10 million euros. And for Bouygues Bâtiment, which has the objective of achieving a third of timber constructions by 2030, it is the certainty of being delivered in materials, and at controlled costs. In this period of crisis where some beams are taking more than four months and where wood prices are soaring, this makes all the more sense.
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