Agenda 2020 Forest Products Vision

Tom Foust, Department of Energy, Office of Industrial Technologies, Washington, DC

Like Lynn said, my name is Tom Foust. I’ll go over, very quickly, the Agenda 2020 program. It is a joint research program with the Department of Energy (DOE) and the forest products industry represented by the American Forest and Paper Association (AF&PA). I work in the Office of Industrial Technologies (OIT) at the DOE. OIT has three simple goals:

1. Reduce raw material and depletable energy use per unit output
2. Reduce generation of wastes and pollutants
3. Provide advanced science and technology options that dramatically increase the productivity of US industry.

First I’ll give you some basic statistics about the forest products industry including pulp and paper products and wood products and statistics about the industrial sector in general. Then I will discuss the Agenda 2020 program.

The forest products industry employs 1.3 million people directly and produces products valued at $230 billion per year, including $130 billion in pulp and paper and $700 million in lumber. The employees earn on average $12/hour. The forest products industry spends about $9 billion per year on capital expenditures, $3.4 billion of which supports pollution abatement. This industry also uses about 3 quads of energy per year.

The OIT focuses on the 7 most energy and waste intensive industries in the manufacturing sector. These industries use 80% of the energy and generate 90% of the waste in the manufacturing sector. The industrial sector uses about one third of the energy consumed in the US. The forest products industry consumes about 15% of the energy in the industrial sector.

Pollution abatement costs in the industrial sector average less than 1% of sales. The forest products industry spends about twice that on pollution abatement. Energy expenditures in the industrial sector average 2% of sales. The forest products industry spends 3.5% of sales on energy, almost twice that of the industrial average. As a result, while research and development spending averages 3% of sales in the industrial sector, the forest products industry spends only 1%. Compounded with that, there has been a shift from 1988 to 1993 away from basic and applied research toward product and process specific, commercialization type research. This leaves very little spending on fundamental research to support the forest products industry. The OIT assists in supporting this area.

Now that I have given you some background information, I’ll give you an overview of the Agenda 2020 program, and some examples of the research included in our first year portfolio. The model is actually very simple. First the industry writes a vision of where they would like to be some time in the future to remain globally competitive. Next the industry develops technology roadmaps which guide the industry from the present to their vision of 2020. These roadmaps then become the basis of requests for proposals.

The DOE, as mentioned by a previous speaker, encourages collaborative research. Eleven pulp and paper universities have formed an alliance to work collaboratively on research. The DOE national laboratories have signed a memorandum of understanding to work cooperatively to support the forest products industry in performing research. Fifteen national laboratories have signed the agreement.

The vision, "Agenda 2020", was written by the forest products industry in November 1994. It calls out 6 essential areas for performing strategic research: sustainable forestry, environmental performance, energy performance, improved capital effectiveness, recycling and sensors and control. The research pathways were completed in 1996 and were used to issue the call for proposals in 1996. As an example, I will show you the research pathways for the capital effectiveness area since that is the shortest. It starts with the Agenda 2020 focus area, then describes the results of continuing research, next it describes the future direction for research, then the knowledge and goals that will be delivered from that research, and finally lists the results realized in 2020.

The research pathways were developed by task groups for each of the six technology areas. These groups also evaluate, select and prioritize research and development and make recommendations to the DOE. Typically, these task groups are made up of representatives from industry, national laboratories, universities, federal government agencies, and industry groups such as the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement in the Pulp and Paper Industry (NCASI) and the Technical Association for the Pulp and Paper Industry (TAPPI). Finally the AF&PA is facilitating the process.

This is the second year the DOE has received recommendations from the task groups on research and development efforts. The task groups evaluate the proposals using six criteria: relevance to the topic identified in the request for proposals, clarity of objectives, general technical and scientific quality, probability of achieving the objectives, benefits to industry and innovation. The probability of achieving the objective and benefits to industry are scored higher than the other four criteria.

Again to review the process, each task group reviews the research pathways and develops and issues a request for preproposals or two page idea fact sheets. Preproposals are reviewed according to the six criteria. A selection of the top preproposals is made. Those selected are invited to attend a poster session to assist in the development of final five page proposals and to develop collaborations between investigators and industrial partners. Final proposals are submitted to the task groups and evaluated, again according to the six criteria and another selection is made. Based on this selection, recommendations are forwarded to the DOE where another internal programmatic and technical evaluation is performed to determine final selection and project awards based on available funding. In the environmental area for example, 177 preproposals were submitted. 35 were selected to submit 5 page proposals. 10 were recommended to the DOE for funding, and 10 received DOE funding. Approximately one third of the five page proposals are funded.

This is the second year using this process. 1996 was the first year. So far, the process has worked well. In the first year, 1996, we developed a $7 million research and development program. About $5 million was DOE funds and $2 million industry funds. The projects were recommended to DOE in March and awards were made by September. I will give you examples of the types of projects funded in 1996 in the environmental and the sustainable forestry areas. In the environmental area, 10 projects were funded. The first three projects aim to reduce the volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from kraft mills and lumber drying. A big problem for the industry is the water discharge associated with the pulping and papermaking processes. The next couple of projects are for removing non process elements from process water to support mill closure and increased water recycling. The last few projects support the basic understanding of the fundamental chemistry of lignin and cellulose to develop more efficient pulping and pollution prevention technologies ultimately reducing the industry’s environmental burden. In the sustainable forestry area, 5 projects were funded. These mostly support short rotation woody crop development and soil limitations of loblolly pine and hybrid poplars.

One of the benefits of this program is that linkages are being made between universities and the national laboratories. Consortia are being formed, like I said, the DOE national laboratories, the forest service, and the forest products laboratory all participate in this process. Other industrial groups such as NCASI and TAPPI are also involved. To give you an example of the level of interest in this program, so far in 1997, 664 preproposals have been received. DOE expects to fund about 30 of those this year.

File posted on March 17, 1998; Date Modified: February 21, 1999