Woodlot owners tour Fulghum Inc. Visitors observe log-to-chip process

BAILEYVILLE – The lumberyard Friday was filled with logging trucks ready to unload their cargo destined for the pulp mill.

It was business as usual at Fulghum Fibres Inc., the main supplier of wood chips to the nearby Domtar Industries Inc. pulp and paper mill. “We supply about 70 percent of the chips for Domtar. They buy 30 percent from other sawmills or wherever they can to make it up,” Fulghum’s plant manager, Mark Seavey, said.

A visit from members of the Small Woodland Owners Association of Maine to the busy wood yard was a first for some.

SWOAM is celebrating its 30th anniversary, and Friday several members saw the working wood yard, toured Wayne and Peggy Coleman’s woodlot on U.S. Route 1 in Baileyville, and took a short hike to the St. Croix River at Devil’s Head in Calais.

The plant produces 3,100 tons of hardwood pulp chips and uses 1,450 cords of wood per day.

The mill is situated next to the St. Croix River. “We are sitting on an area that used to be the flowage,” said SWOAM tour guide and Domtar forester Ernest Carle. “Years ago, it used to be a simple process to fill in a place and build it up. You can’t do that now.”

Seavey said the mill did not have enough room in its wood yard to supply all of Domtar’s needs. “The wood yard is pretty small, and we juggle trucks, and it’s hard,” he said.

The wood-chewing plant operates 24 hours a day. Fulghum has mills in the eastern and southern United States as well as South America.

The logs are purchased by Domtar and then taken to Fulghum Fibres, where they are unloaded into the wood yard. Huge cranes lift the logs onto conveyor belts. The logs are debarked and then turned into chips. After the chips are screened for size and dimension, they go onto another conveyor belt to the nearby Domtar mill, where they are turned into pulp and paper.

“The wood comes anywhere from within a 200-mile radius on the Maine side, and on Canada’s side we get some as far away as 300 miles from Prince Edward Island. It’s one trip a day, but we do get wood that far away,” Carle said.

The mill employs upwards of 45 people and has an annual payroll of around $2 million.

During the past year, the two companies have partnered to produce Forest Stewardship Certification chips and baled hardwood pulp, Carle said.

FSC means the logs are harvested and processed using approved environmental practices. A certifying committee reviews the process by reviewing the paper trail, which starts in the forest and continues on until the pulp reaches the customer. As one SWOAM member suggested, it’s something akin to organic farming.

“If you haven’t heard the term ‘chain of custody’ with FSC wood, you have to track it right through the stump all the way through to the product,” Carle said. He said they purchase FSC from several sites, including Seven Islands and the Bureau of Public Lands.

Seavey said the wood and chips are kept separate from the regular wood and chips. “So when we make our paper for our annual report, it’s kept its identity right from the start,” the Domtar forester said. “There is a premium currently, not a big premium, but those who are selling us FSC are getting a premium for it.”