Botanical name

Eucalyptus globulus Labill.

Trade names

• Spanish: Eucalipto blanco, Eucalipto azul, Eucalipto globulus.
• English: Southern blue gum, Eurabbie, Tasmanian blue gum.
• French: Eucalyptus bleu.
• Italiano: Eucalitto blu, Eucalitto globuloso.
• German: Blaue Eukalyptus, Blaugummibaum, Fieberbaum.

Applications

Flooring, laminated profiles, beams, struts, glue-laminated boards, particle and fibre boards, decorative veneers, sleepers, pallets, paper pulp, packaging, construction, batts, bed rails, furniture, handrails, balusters, windows, tool handles, firewood, oils, cineol, balsams…

Laminados Villapol has recently carried out two tests on the natural durability of the wood used in our installations, against attack by rot fungi and termites (according to standards EN 117 EN 113 and EN 350). The test was carried out jointly by CIFOR – INIA and CIS Madera and in Germany by the “Institut für Holztechnologie Dresden gGmbH”, obtaining identical results in both cases. The data for the rest of the species shown in the table were taken from the Revista Foresta Española of September 1999.

It is a tropical wood, originally from Australia, with guaranteed and proven sustainable management, as it comes from plantations mainly in the north of the Iberian Peninsula, where it is perfectly adapted, achieving excellent growth.

Thanks to its large supply of leaves, branches and bark, it attenuates surface transpiration and reduces wind erosion. This in turn provides large quantities of nutrients to the soil, these being effective after the decomposition of its remains after cutting, a situation which directly provides the nutrients to the roots. The type and quantity of nutrients can be seen in the graph.

As it has leaves all year round, it is an excellent purifier of the atmosphere, accumulating around 10 tonnes of CO2 per hectare per year while generating oxygen, thus mitigating the greenhouse effect. It is a sustainable species, which guarantees its continuity. Given this situation, the cyclical felling of this species is environmentally advisable, as the older the tree is, the less CO2 it accumulates. With this operation, the felled wood becomes part of a product, accumulating CO2, approximately 250 Kg/m3 (equivalent to the combustion of 107 litres of petrol for every m3 of wood).

At a time when we are aware of the consequences that climate change brings or may bring and where the awareness of mankind is the only way to stop this phenomenon, in this scenario is where wood can help us in many ways, making more plantations will mitigate CO2 emissions and if we use it for construction purposes we will save a lot of energy in the manufacture of materials and CO2 will remain accumulated in our lives.