When Nak'azdli Development Corp. (NDC) unveils its inaugural Timber House next month - a unique prefabricated home in Canada that uses stud lumber from local saw mills and an innovative panel construction system by local forestry startup Deadwood Innovations - visitors will see firsthand what's possible when academia partners with business to solve pressing challenges.
Reflecting on Canada's housing crisis and challenges faced by the forestry industry, "there has been a lot of emphasis recently on fast-tracking mass timber construction for large-scale buildings in large urban centres, but very little focus on supporting regional housing, tailored to the specific needs of remote and rural communities," said Owen Miller, Deadwood Innovations CEO and Co-founder, explaining that these large projects primarily use high-cost dimension lumber.
"Our approach is all about tapping into local lumber, resources and expertise to build housing that aligns with community and cultural needs, is sustainable and delivers affordable homes built to last," Miller said. "The strategic objective is to establish an industrialized housing regional production cluster in one of Canada's largest forestry corridors."
The idea spawned from an earlier development project involving both NDC and Deadwood Innovations that aims to commercialize an upgraded lumber product made from low-value timber and forest residue. The partners developed an innovative thermochemical process that takes aspen and other low-quality timber unsuitable for sawmilling and transforms it into durable, high-quality lumber.
They quickly identified the need for a more affordable regional housing solution in northern B.C., as well as the opportunity to develop a local lumber supply chain that could support a local prefabricated housing model.
To advance both projects, the partners are tapping into leading-edge expertise at the University of Northern British Columbia's (UNBC's) Wood Innovation Research Lab in the School of Engineering through a program coordinated by Mitacs, a Canadian innovation organization that helps boost homegrown innovation.
"Housing demand across Canada is real and no matter where you live everyone is looking for solutions," said NDC CEO JP Wenger "This Mitacs-supported research is allowing us to check all boxes when it comes to providing affordable, sustainable housing."
"The Timber House project is an important example of how Canadian innovation fueled by research talent from our own universities can lead to critical new technology and approaches," explained Dr. Stephen Lucas, CEO of Mitacs. "We're proud to help accelerate made-in-Canada solutions that directly benefit Canadians and strengthen our economy."
The model Timber House, expected to be finished next month, is a first-of-its-kind prefabricated home designed and built by local residents for local residents within the Nak'azdli Whut'en community. What sets it apart from other prefabricated housing systems is that instead of using primarily high-quality dimension lumber, it relies on simple and economical nail-laminated timber made primarily from stud lumber produced by local sawmills.
The resulting mass timber floor, wall and roof panels - which are produced locally at the Deadwood Innovations Lumber Upgrader Pilot Plant in Fort St. James using a novel panel construction system - are both durable and warm, providing a comfortable aesthetic because the interior wood is exposed. Once completed, the housing kit is delivered on site and erected by crane in just a couple of days.
"The idea is to speed construction timelines and improve quality by pre-building the panels over the winter in a controlled facility away from harsh weather and then assembling the homes in summer," said Wenger. "Traditionally, a company like Nak'azdli Construction could only build a few houses per year because they start from scratch in the spring or summer. Our process will allow us to double or triple that timeline."
"We're taking a tree from the local territory, bringing it to a local mill, having it milled and taking that product to our facility to create panels, and then erecting a house in our territory," he said.
To come up with the initial design for Timber House, NDC partnered with Gehloff Consulting and Prakash Architecture, relying on input from community meetings and questionnaires. Though the show home has two floors, the idea is to support a range of custom designs from a cabin to a ranch-style bungalow to a large five-bedroom home.
Local students helping to advance research
Mitacs-supported researcher Yuming Bai, a former architect from China who is pursuing his Master of Applied Science in Engineering at UNBC, is currently working on an advanced computational design tool to speed the prefabrication design and construction process. By applying algorithms and parametrical tools, he is creating a software plug-in for 3D modeling systems that will automatically generate precise shop drawings from architectural floor plans and section plans, while meeting stringent building code regulations and other engineering specifications.
"My work is about optimizing the engineering design phase, which in turn will shorten the overall construction time," said Bai, who was drawn to Canada for its wood construction expertise and is extremely grateful for the Mitacs-supported project because it is allowing him to advance his research in mass timber structures and product types that are not typically used in homebuilding.
According to UNBC Associate Professor in Wood Engineering Jianhui Zhou, one of the biggest barriers facing smaller companies that want to get into the prefabricated housing market is a lack of designers who understand the complex interdisciplinary design process. The idea is to simplify the process through digital automation, resulting in shop drawings that can go straight to production.
"With this demonstration project, we're showing that our housing kits are feasible, doable and economical, that prefabrication is better for our harsh remote climate and gives us more control over quality, time and cost, and that the end-product is built to last," said Zhou. "We're also breathing new life into local sawmills that are currently facing the risk of closure. Our solution puts local people first."
