Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1917-10-09

There are moro than 5000 saw mills
In the United States, and their output OF
waste In che form Of saWdust, shavings,
slabs and other wood refuse ID estimated
- SO million cords Per year: This !:
equal to over 4 IL billion cubic feet OF
waste, which ID the capacity Of . bin
ono half mile high with . base covering
forty.acre lot. Or, considering each
cord to contain eighty cubic feet OF solid
wood With ell the cracks and air spaces
taken ont, these SO million cords would
make block of wood more than quar-
ter of . mile on each edge.
Perhaps one-half OF this so-called
waste product 10 not strictly speaking
wasted, but serves useful purpose as
fuel under the boilers. Much of the
remaining IS million cords not only
serves no useful purpose, but In most
cases 10 . source Of Inconvenience and
danger, and costs the mill time and
money.
Saw mill waste 10 disposed of In
various ways. Some goes to the local
fuel market, some to pulp mills or to
wood distillation plants. Shsvings and
hog cuttings, % we'll a. other mill waste,
are sometimes used to iii low places In
the yard. However, the most common
method of getting rid of waste Ii by
burning either In f1re.pit having an
open FIRE which sometimes has q protect
ing wall on the side towards the mill, or
In Q burner enclosed on all sides and hav-
ing spark-arresting screen at the top
and fire CRATE near the bottom. 10
both cases some kind of q conveyor is
necessary to bear the waste from the
mill to the fire. This is usually sort of
trough with metal bottom along which
slowly moving chain or cable, equipped
With cleats and buckets, carries the
waste to the fire.
A closed burner and conveyor costs
about $12, 900 for q mill of q hundred
Thousand feet daily capacity. Forty per
cent of the larger mills, cutting more
than IS, 900 board feet daily, are equipped
with closed burners. Forty-f1ve per cent
have tlre-pits. The remainder have
neither and dispose of their waste In
some other way.
1t Ia estimated that for q mill of one
hundred thousand feet capacity the cost
of conveying the waste from the machine
where 1t is made and destroying it In q
closed burner Is AZ cents per cord or
$10.05 per day. Burners seldom bring
in any revenue, although in few cases
ashes are sold for fertilizer, and In a
number of others the burner furnishes
hot feed water for the boilers.
Both burners and fire pits add to the
insurance rates on lumber, and IN the
case Of the pit on the mill itself. 10
order to reduce the fire hazard to zaro,
In the case of the burners, 1t is necessary
to keep all lumber piles at least one hun
dred and Fifty feet away from the burner
The matter Is much worse In the case of
pits, especially the open ones, which
must be kept three hundred feet away
from the mill and five hundred feet
away from any lumber piles. When
nearer than these distances from the
mill and yard respectively, the insur-
snce rates mount up rapidly with closer
proximity until they become practically
prohibitive when the 6re.pit is nearer
than one hundred feet.
No we'll managed mill would produce
waste If 1t could be avoided. This, how.
ever, is not possible. so the next best
thing Is to seek out some method Of
utiiz alton Of the waste 80 it will pay for
lite disposition. The Forest Service is
working on this problem, but has not
YET found satisfactory solution.