On The Rise: Mass Timber

Use of mass timber in construction has been increasing over the past ten years, boosted in part by use on data center builds at the center of so much current action. With buildings like Minneapolis’ T3 (Timber, Technology and Transit), and the University of Massachusetts’ Design Building in Amherst continuing to inspire new possibilities, some states, like Michigan, are evening offering incentives in the form of cash and consultation to builds that opt for mass timber as a lower carbon alternative to traditional materials. 

Techies for Timber?

It’s been almost ten years since T3, a seven-story, 220,000-square-foot office building in Minneapolis opened, becoming the first contemporary wood building in the U.S to feature a speedy, “grid-based framing system using a combination of spruce-pine-fir nail-laminated timber (NLT) panels, spruce glulam and concrete.” In those ten years, as Matthew Thibault reports for Construction Dive, the use of mass timber has steadily progressed:

The material has gained ground in construction over the past decade as a lower-carbon alternative to traditional building materials. Tech companies in particular have flocked to it — Meta, for example, is turning to the material amid the data center boom in an effort to create greener facilities, while Amazon made it a main component of its HQ2 complex in Virginia.The labor side of construction is also working to embrace mass timber — ironworkers, for example, are training to work with the material due to its similarities to structural steel, already a fixture for the trade.

Of late, use of mass timber in place of steel and concrete has indeed been given a particularly big boost by tech giants needing big, fast data center builds, and striving to lower embodied carbon footprints:

• The first administrative building Meta completed with mass timber was constructed at the company’s Aiken County, South Carolina campus this year….Meta received the wood building materials from SmartLam, and DPR led the construction.Meta will partner with Fortis Construction and Mercer Mass Timber to build additional mass timber buildings at its Cheyenne, Wyoming campus. Meanwhile, construction firm Hensel Phelps and mass timber company Binderholz will handle work at the tech giant’s Montgomery, Alabama site. Meta said it plans to experiment with using mass timber in more administrative buildings, warehouses and data halls going forward. 

• Meta is not the only tech giant turning to mass timber — including cross-laminated timber (CLT) — to build more sustainable data centers. Last year, Microsoft announced it would use CLT in a hybrid construction strategy to build a pair of lower emissions data centers, combining the durable wood with steel and concrete.

As the construction industry continues to explore materials that enable increased efficiency, potential cost savings, and contribute to sustainability, incentives to try out new approaches abound. For example, recently Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources announced the availability of money, guidance and technical assistance for the use of mass timber as an alternative building material:

The Michigan Mass Timber Catalyst Program provides financial and technical support to project teams in the early planning and design phases of new builds that use mass timber as a primary structural or architectural material … .Cash awards can range from $25,000 to $75,000. ….These projects can include commercial, industrial, public/institutional, multifamily residential and other building types that demonstrate innovative and optimized use of mass timber. 

“By advancing this technology, we’re not only reducing the carbon footprint of our buildings but also strengthening local economies and reimagining what’s possible for design and construction in our state,” said Cheri Holman, executive director of the Michigan Green Building Collaborative….Winning teams will participate in a cohort led by MassTimber@MSU and WoodWorks, a mass timber-focused nonprofit. The groups will work through design, procurement, cost estimation and code approval processes….Funding for the program comes from a one-time State General Fund appropriation….

Good To Know: Mass Timber? 

In a nutshell, here’s how communications gurus at Think Wood explain mass timber:

Mass timber is a new category of wood product that can revolutionize how America builds. It is comprised of multiple solid wood panels nailed or glued together, which provide exceptional strength and stability. It’s a strong, low-carbon alternative to concrete and steel. Mass timber building designs are pioneering better places for us to live and work, and new code changes were passed for the 2021 code cycle that allow mass timber buildings up to 18 stories tall.

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