Summary

  • The Indisputable Key project uses RFID to track wood from the forest to the factory.
  • It could help Europe’s timber industry save billions of pounds a year.
  • So far 29 partners from across Europe have taken part in a €12m pilot project.
  • A full working demonstration across the whole supply chain is expected by 2009.

Radio frequency identification (RFID) has become commonplace in logistics and materials handling and is even present on the supermarket shelf as a next-generation bar code. Now, the technology may be coming to the forestry wood production chain, thanks to an innovative project under way in Sweden to track and trace wood from forest to factory.

The Indisputable Key project is not purely the movement of RFID into yet another industrial sector. The wood supply chain is tailor-made to benefit from the technology, according to project co-ordinator Dr Richard Uusijärvi, who believes it could save the industry billions of euros.

The project, backed so far by Nordic development funds, the EU, industry groups, companies and technology providers, is developing smart information and communication technology (ICT), which supporters believe will enable a significant increase in raw material yield and better use of production resources, while reducing the environmental impact of forestry.

“There is a mis-use of wood,” said Dr Uusijärvi. “It is harvested and then we do all the adjustments at a later time in the chain. This sorting creates lots of waste. What this project will do is tell us everything we need to know about the logs and everything we need to know about the boards. Through this we can improve the final goods because the window manufacturer, say, will get the quality at the price he needs when he needs it.”

The scope for improvement is massive. Based on estimates of total production of sawn wood in Europe for 2002, 25 million m3 of material is going to waste every year, the equivalent of about e5bn. About 20% of final products do not match customer demand and Dr Uusijärvi believes RFID is the key to turning this around.

The technology was first adopted by the US military after the first Gulf war. Crates are tagged with a microchip programmed with information about the contents, which can be read at any time during its journey from warehouse to unloading.

Early efforts involved large tags attached to crates that were moved through entrance portals with built-in readers to decode and report back the information. This has been refined to a level of sophistication in which printable electronics are incorporated into single item labels that can be contacted at any time, like a mobile phone.

The forestry wood production chain faces greater challenges than most other industrial sectors. The Forest RFID system (WP4) will need equipment and components which can operate in the harsh environment of the forest, be integrated on all surfaces and optimised during the different stages of the wood-forestry chain from logs to boards and packaging. In the forest, where location, species, tree size and log information can be programmed, the tags are injected into the tree by the harvester. The tags have to be water resistant and capable of withstanding vibration, but also contain no plastic that would interfere with pulping processes.

Wood properties also put tough constraints on

passive RFID-transponders, powered by the radio signal it receives from the reader, in that the moisture in the wood decreases the operational distance. An active transponder, with built-in battery, would be too expensive. The cost is vital and has to be low enough to meet a target price of e10-20 cents each.

Dr Uusijärvi led a technical team on a visit to Japan last month where a tag made of a wood material is being developed. The team has also been working with electronics companies on a semi-passive transponder that uses electrochemical energy derived from the wood in which it is embedded.

A reader to receive the signal from the transponder and integrated to a harvester also has to have the same properties to survive, and overcome environmental disturbances, like reflection of signal by nearby objects, which are frequent in the forest.

Then, making all this information available to the people in the industry who need it is also more difficult than in other sectors as, according to Dr Uusijärvi, a substantial part of the forestry-wood chain is made up of small and medium-sized businesses, rather than retailers, who can fund extensive IT operations.

So far, 29 partners from Estonia, Finland, France, Norway and Sweden representing every aspect of supply, sale and technology have taken part in a e12m pilot Nordic project. The next step about to begin is a commercial project for which interested parties in Germany, Spain, Portugal and others have joined. Dr Uusijärvi said he expects to have a full working demonstration across the whole supply chain by 2009.

Probably the most encouraging aspect is the cost to the people in the chain. “Once this is in place it will cost no more and will probably be cheaper than existing methods. Some of the old systems it will replace are very complicated,” said Dr Uusijärvi. n

l For more information; www.indisputablekey.com.