TimberSIL® is Everything an Ultimate Green Building Material Should Be

Sustainable – TimberSIL® is extremely long lasting. The amorphous glass in TimberSIL® imparts the extraordinary long life of glass to wood, as it surrounds and encases the fibers, inside and out; forming a protective glassy barrier that keeps organisms and air away from wood.

Longest life cycle building material : There is no known end to the useful life of TimberSIL®. The life is as long as glass, and subject to wear patterns, much like stone. .

Many reuses, many recycles replacing other materials : One purchase of TimberSIL® Products replaces many CO 2 emitting products throughout its long life. TimberSIL® can proceed through multiple materials, as it transitions through multiple cycles in increasingly smaller pieces:

• decking materials (est 40 years or more to tear down)
• structural framing (est 40 years or more, multiple cycles each 40 years or more)
• window components (est 40 year or more in window product)
• parquet flooring (recycled in smaller pieces)
• strand board (est 40 year or more, each cycle)
• chipboard (est 40 year or more, each cycle)
• medium density fiber board (est 40 year or more, each cycle)
• mulch

As a TimberSIL® product proceeds through these reuse cycles, TimberSIL® retains its Glass Wood properties as a Class A fire retardant, its strength, its stability, i.e., all its beneficial features. TimberSIL® Products, intact, are merely incorporated intact, directly into other materials, without any need to recreate their properties.

TimberSIL® Causes No future increase in CO 2 emissions . As TimberSIL® moves through its use cycles, it does NOT gradually breakdown and return carbon dioxide to the environment. The permanent sequestration continues.

TimberSIL® reduces future CO 2 emissions dramatically by replacing materials that cause future CO 2 emissions . The carbon in other wood, plastics and composite products breaks down within a few years at the end of its life cycle, and the ENTIRE material converts to carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. This is the reason that there is such an urgent need to reduce greenhouse emissions right now. It is not only the current emissions levels that causes concern, but also the unavoidable 10, 20, and 50 year increases that those numbers will grow to, causing catastrophic global effects, that is the greatest concern.

Breakdown products from vinyl decking and siding are particularly detrimental greenhouse gases. Vinyl (PVC) is 60% chlorine. PVC’s chlorine breakdown products such as Cl radicals, Cl ions, chlorine gas, OCl - (bleaches), chloroform, and hundreds of organochlorine compounds are some of the most predatory, most harmful, most aggressive greenhouse gases, and some are as much as 15,000 times more harmful than plain carbon dioxide.

The graph above shows the 50-year cumulative emissions for PVC, in CO 2 equivalents. The average useful life of vinyl is 10 years, and most of the degradation and environmental damage occurs in the next 20 years. Every 10 th year, a vinyl replacement deck is added and a new 30-year degradation and emissions release profile is superimposed over the emissions for the previous deck. The dashed red line represents the cumulative releases of vinyl over the first 50 years. The cumulative greenhouse gas emissions for PVC, adjusted to equivalents for CO 2, for just one average PVC deck, is 2.5 Million lbs.

TimberSIL® Products not only do not contain chlorine, but they prevent/replace vinyl-associated greenhouse gas emissions every time TimberSIL® Products replace vinyl products. The declining green line represents the cumulative decline in emissions that happens whenever TimberSIL® Products are used.

All products containing carbon that is not permanently sequestered will eventually release all of their carbon back to the environment, and make our global warming problems worse. Composite decking products are composed of petroleum and tiny wood fibers, all of which decompose ultimately to carbon dioxide. The image (left) shows that for just one average deck, over a 50 year period approximately 350,000 pounds of CO 2 will be released to the atmosphere (with deck and replacements of composite materials such as Trex®) or 350,000 pounds of releases will be PREVENTED with one long lasting TimberSIL® Products deck.

A Role for Everyone . TimberSIL® is one of the few products that can actually cause a major drop in greenhouse gas emissions, because the carbon in TimberSIL® stays there, and because TimberSIL® is a replacement for vinyl and other products that release large quantities of potent greenhouse gases over time.

Sometimes the global warming problem seems overwhelming and beyond the influence of any individual. Not so with TimberSIL® Products!!! Over a fifty year lifetime, the purchaser of an average-sized 460 sq ft TimberSIL® deck makes a huge difference in the fight against global warming. An average TimberSIL® deck, sequesters or eliminates 2.5 Million pounds of greenhouse gas emissions, as CO 2 equivalents of vinyl replacements.

The longer one keeps a TimberSIL® deck the greater the benefit to the global environment. TimberSIL® permanently sequesters the carbon in TimberSIL® Products, and forms a new carbon sink. There is no breakdown for at least hundreds of years.

Promoting growing trees to maximize atmospheric CO 2 removal .

Fast growing, young trees are an important way to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and reduce the threat of global warming. Trees that have reached maturity actually lose their ability to remove carbon dioxide from the air, because their carbon dioxide removal is balanced by their carbon dioxide production, and the net effect is zero. Mature trees are beautiful, but not helpful in the fight against global warming.

TimberSIL® helps promote carbon dioxide removal on a large scale by keeping agricultural forests young, where the carbon dioxide removal is highest. When the trees near maturity, they are harvested and the carbon in the trees is permanently fixed through the TimberSIL® process of Glass Wood fusion. This breaks the carbon cycle and shunts this formerly atmospheric carbon permanently into a new carbon sink – TimberSIL® building products. The new carbon sink is not back in the ground, but the TimberSIL® Products in the homes we live in.

TimberSIL® makes possible a recurring cycle of rapid CO 2 uptake, then harvesting for permanent carbon sequestration through the TimberSIL® glass barrier system, and replacing mature trees with young, rapid CO 2-removing tree crops. This provides large tracts of trees for maximized CO 2 removal, and large quantities of permanently sequestered carbon by the TimberSIL® process, stored indefinitely as TimberSIL® GreenBuilding materials.

Everyone needs to understand that we must be sequestering the carbon in trees with TimberSIL®, planting new trees immediately, and using the carbon sink that TimberSIL® represents in every way we possibly can.

Eliminating volatile organic compounds (VOCs) . Volatile organic compounds are virtually everywhere. Every composite material and plastic material contains unreacted raw materials, solvents, partial reaction products, catalysts, and additives such as phthalate esters; all of them VOCs. These components circulate freely in the polymer and continuously release to the air throughout the lifetime of the products. In enclosed environments, such as most homes, these components reach saturation levels, meaning levels that are the highest concentrations chemically possible to achieve. The cleaner the air, the faster these chemicals are released to the air. VOCs rapidly enter the body where they interfere with enzyme function, reduce ability to fight infection, and trigger immune system attacks on the body.

TimberSIL® is VOC-free by design. Our silicate-based starting formula is entirely mineral based, so there is no possibility that even one VOC molecule is produced.

This is extremely important since in today’s environment, most individuals have VOC-triggered immune responses to some degree, and underlying disease responses that can be triggered at extremely low levels of VOCs. The best protection for health, is the elimination of VOCs from indoor air entirely, and TimberSIL® can help move toward this goal.

TimberSIL® is proud of its mineral based, VOC-free process, at the VOC levels we know are needed, and that is complete elimination at the molecule level.

Superior properties . TimberSIL® Products match good for the environment with superior features to other products in the marketplace. Structures built with TimberSIL® last longer, and resist wind, water, earth tremors and fire better. TimberSIL® Products match maintenance with anyone; by the time homeowners touch up a TimberSIL® project, they’ll be replacing most competitors products completely.

Matching price . Our philosophy is that a product that is truly good for you (TimberSIL®) is a basic right of the consumer that should not cost a price premium. We are cheaper than composite alternatives, cheaper than most plastics, and cost comparable to cedar.

Better, safer, cheaper = TimberSIL®. As well as convenient and beautiful.