Company advances plan
for Big Island lumber mill

---

By Rod Thompson
Star-Bulletin

HILO >> Tradewinds LLC, a joint venture wood products company, is moving ahead with a $40 million investment in timber harvesting and plywood manufacturing in East Hawaii, says venture spokesman Don Bryan of Portland, Ore.

A contract for Tradewinds to harvest about 9,000 acres of nonnative timber south of Hilo has been negotiated with the state. Approval of the contract by the Board of Land and Natural Resources is set for discussion in Hilo on April 12 in the State Office Building.

Tradewinds would use wood from the Waiakea Forest south of Hilo, planted decades ago, and wood from 30,000 acres of eucalyptus planted by Prudential Timber on former sugar land during the 1990s.

The company plans to build a mill at one of three sites on the Hamakua Coast under consideration, Bryan said. The final site hasn't been selected, but it would be on an old cane road off the main highway to reduce truck traffic.

The price, once estimated at $25 million, has now grown to $40 million, Bryan said. That would buy a mill to produce veneer (thin sheets of wood), a lay-up plant to combine the sheets into plywood, a sawmill, a log chipping mill, and a 5-megawatt power plant.

About 400 jobs would be created, paying an average of $32,500 per year.

The facility would burn sawdust and waste wood to create steam, which would run a turbine to create enough power to run the operation. Heat from the steam would then be reused to dry lumber. Construction should be completed in 2003.

Although wood chips would be produced for pulp, they would be sold to mainland or Asian buyers. Critics have accused the company of planning a pulp mill.

Bryan responded, "A pulp mill is neither feasible nor appropriate in Hawaii. A pulp mill would require 20 times as much wood and water, and 25 times as much money as is available to Tradewinds."

Critics have also complained about potential truck traffic. Bryan said logs from the Waiakea Forest will result in only six truck trips per day through Hilo.