Laurentian School of Architecture built with cross-laminated timber

At first glance, it looks like awooden castle is going up in downtown Sudbury.

Crews at the site of the new 54,000squarefootLaurentian University School of Architecture building have beenpouring concrete and installing rebarin the way you might expect at a construction site.

Buttwo-story high wallsmade from an engineered woodproduct not often seen in northern Ontariohave also suddenly popped up over the last couple of weeks.

"It goes together like an erector set," said Terrance Galvin, the founding director of the school.

"The panels came flat. People have been excited, I think, watching how quickly in under two weeks thesetwo storeysseems to get snapped together."

The panels Galvinis talking about are made from what is called cross-laminated timber (CLT) essentially glue sandwiched between layers of board from spruce or pine trees.

The result isa solid block or sheet of wood that can be trimmed to the shapes needed to create the structure and walls for a building.

The castle-like appearance at the architecture school sitewill disappear when beams are placed in the notches of the panels to provide support for the walls.

The product is considered environmentally sustainable because it uses small trees rather than old-growth forest, and those smaller treescanbe replaced more quickly through reforestation programs.

Potential northern industry

While it may benew to people in northern Ontario,CLT is not a new technology, Galvin said. It has long been used inEuropean countries,andsome Canadian provinces such as Quebec and B.C.

Regulation has stood in the way of wide-spread use of CLT in Ontario, Galvin said.

But the province recently changed regulations to allow CLT, which is designed to resist firein buildings up to six stories high.Previously, wood construction was limited to buildings with no more than two floors.

The Laurentian architecture school building is being used as a demonstration product toshow that not only can itbe used in buildings in Ontario, it could also be produced in the province, Galvin said.

We are hoping to use it as a catalyst.- Terrance Galvin, school director

"We are hoping to use it as a catalyst and a pilot project and a teaching tool," he said.

"But eventually ... we hope that people will be able to produce CLT in Ontario and I think that is on the horizon somewhere in thenot-so-distant future."

The CLT for the architecture school was brought in from Quebec because there was no supplier in Ontario.

But a provincial agency called the Centre for Research and Innovation in the Bio-Economy hopes that will change.

It provided Laurentian University with $350,000 to help fund the use of CLT in the new building.

Terrance Galvinexplained how CLT is being used to reporter Megan Thomas on CBC Radio's Morning North.