Citation:
Abstract:
The Moratuwa Woodworking Industry Cluster (MWIC) is a geographically concentrated cluster of over 1,600 small-to-medium scale wood-based manufacturing and retail facilities in Sri Lanka. Firms include furniture manufacturers, carpentry shops, sawmills, and integrated sawmills in Sri Lanka. The concept of industrial symbiosis was used to explore potential synergies and scale economies between cluster firms to share inputs such as energy and water, and currently common by-products, and waste to achieve higher efficiency in resource utilization. In this study, a survey of 180 primary and secondary wood product manufacturers was undertaken to quantify MWIC firm by-product production and consumption of wood residues to establish a baseline for possible end-use and waste synergies. The total population of enterprises generating wood waste is 730; retail facilities are not included. Sawmills produce approximately 66% of the 6,490 MT of MWIC’s monthly wood residue generation, with the balance produced by carpentry and integrated enterprises. Teak (Tectona grandis) and Mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla) are the dominant species used in the MWIC, accounting for most of the wood waste. The survey identified three main types of wood waste: sawdust (76.5%), boards with significant wane (16.5%) unusable for further products, and offcuts (6.9%). Sawdust accounted for 77% of wood waste generated within the study area. Only 55% of the wood waste generated in MWIC is currently utilized; the remaining 45% is taken to landfills or disposed in other ways such as simply disposed in waterways or non-approved locations. Improved wood waste sorting by type at the mill level and aggregated within the MWIC was determined to substantially increase the usability of wood waste as potential inputs in other wood manufacturing sectors in the MWIC.