On the 19th and 20th of March, Dan Ridley-Ellis, head of the Centre for Wood Science and Technology, will chair his first meeting as convenor of a key timber standards committee. This CEN task group TC124 WG2 TG1, plays an important role to ensure the safe grading of structural timber throughout Europe.
The role of secretary of the committee is now taken by Edinburgh Napier PhD graduate David Gil-Moreno, now at NUI Galway.
On the 19th and 20th of March, Dan Ridley-Ellis, head of the Centre for Wood Science and Technology, will chair his first meeting as convenor of a key timber standards committee. This CEN task group TC124 WG2 TG1, plays an important role to ensure the safe grading of structural timber throughout Europe.
This task group consists of a panel of experts with knowledge of the correct standard procedures and sufficient experience to be able to query potential problems. Since it is a vital matter for construction safety, new reports for machine and visual grading are thoroughly examined by TG1 before they are approved. This is done not to check that the standard procedures are followed correctly (although this is obviously a precondition), but to uncover issues that affect correct grading that were not anticipated when the standards were written.
Dan has been active on this committee for a number of years, and work at Edinburgh Napier University is used as the basis for grading the vast majority of structural timber grown in the UK and Ireland. This is a key part of the long running Strategic Integrated Research in Timber (SIRT) project, which provides research and standardisation support for the forest and timber industries.
The role of secretary of the TG1 committee is now taken by Edinburgh Napier PhD graduate David Gil-Moreno, now at NUI Galway.