Products

Treadlight™ Flooring

Treadlight™ Trim

Dimensional Lumber

NorthSlope Window by Clawson featuring Treadlight Larch

New! North Slope's Treadlight Color Suite

Treadlight™ Picture Frames

Greener Than Green

Treadlight Larch products contribute towards satisfying a variety of credits under LEED^®

ID Credit 1-1.4: Innovation in Design
1 Point Available
To provide design teams and projects the opportunity to be awarded points for exceptional performance above the requirements set by the LEED for New Construction Green Building Rating System and/or innovative performance in Green Building categories not specifically addressed by the LEED for New Construction Green Building Rating System.

Currently under development to be submitted for review through the CIR process:

How Using Wood from Restored Western Forests Exhibits Innovation in Design:
North Slope Sustainable Wood lumber, flooring, trim and windows are milled from stunted and overcrowded trees culled from forest restoration sites in the Western United States.

Traditionally, small forest fires sparked by lightning or Native Americans have thinned these Western forests and created what is known as “old growth.”  Starting about 100 years ago, the federal government adopted a policy of extinguishing all forest fires in order to save public timber resources and those on private lands.  Over the intervening decades, much of these public and private forest lands were clearcut – leveled by logging operations.  In open clearcuts, and elsewhere in the forest, trees grew back in dense thickets made up of trees all of the same age.  Without natural fire to “weed” these dense thickets, millions of acres of Western forests have become tremendously overcrowded with small, stunted trees – often 100 years old but only six inches in diameter.  These overcrowded forests are especially prone to huge destructive forest fires that kill all trees rather than simply thin out the forest as natural fire did in the past.
                 
By thinning out the small, stunted trees, the forest can be returned to conditions that favor the return of “old growth.”  This is what's known as “restoration forestry.”  The small, stunted trees culled during restoration forestry, when properly milled and used, can provide innovative, durable and beautiful building materials – such as flooring, trim and dimensional lumber.   Thus the use of these wood products goes beyond “sustainable” and beyond “conservation” by helping restore the forest to its original “old growth” conditions.

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