A very smart person sent this to me today. I highly recommend taking a look – and not just because they quoted Neil deGrasse Tyson to kick off the report.
The Current State of Wood Reuse and Recycling in North America and Recommendations for Improvements.
According to Neal deGrasse Tyson, we are “the stuff of stars”. Specifically, “the atoms of our bodies are traceable to the stars that manufactured them…we are biologically connected to every living thing in the world.” Therefore, we are also the stuff of trees, and they of us. This connection both simplifies the truth and complicates the story of wood reuse and recycling. The truth is that all wood is 100 percent recycled material. That is the nature of renewable materials. It’s in the definition. If you put trees in a closed environment, over time they will grow, live, die and re-grow again within that closed system; recycling themselves ad infinitum. The presence of other species, especially animals, aids this process. This closed system is called earth.