Slash generates electricity; heats Stoltze mill

A massive, but surprisingly quiet machine recently was working in the woods in the Crystal-Cedar area, grinding up a huge slash pile into wood chips.

The behemoth is the baby of Cameron Jump, whose family runs John Jump Trucking in Evergreen.

The Peterson wood recycler, as it’s formally called, has an 800-horsepower diesel engine and electronic controls that can grind up waste wood to the tune of about 90 to 100 tons a day.

It could probably grind more than that, but the trucks have to get back and forth to the F.H. Stoltze Land and Lumber Mill in Columbia Falls, where the chips will be burned in the company’s cogeneration plant.

The plant, in addition to providing heat for the mill, also provides about 2.5 megawatts of electricity back to the grid, Cameron Wohlschlegel, land and resource manager for Stoltze, said during a tour earlier this month.

Initially the plan was to burn the slash piles — waste wood — from the Crystal-Cedar Stewardship project, for which Stoltze has the contract. But nearby residents raised concerns earlier this year, and since it’s fairly close to the mill, it’s economical to grind up the wood and burn it in the co-gen plant, which is almost carbon-neutral.

The project was designed to thin the woods, which is just a few miles north of Columbia Falls off the North Fork Road, and improve browse for deer and elk. The stands were mostly lodgepole pine, according to Paul Donnellon, supervisory forester with the Glacier View/Hungry Horse Ranger District.

The area burned in the 1929 Half Moon Fire and came back thick with lodgepole and birch, he explained. Lodgepole are not fire resistant and can result in massive crown fires during fire season. This project thinned the lodgepole and kept most of the fire-resistant species like Douglas fir and larch.

Because it's a stewardship sale, Stoltze receives the timber in exchange for other work, such as thinning maple and hardwoods, so they regenerate back to a level where wildlife can browse on them.

They’ll also do some trail work and other road maintenance when all is said and done. The project is only about halfway completed. The thinning is a bit ugly at the moment, but should grow back in a few years. Already saplings are showing regeneration in previously thinned areas.

Wohlschlegel said Stoltze plans on grinding up the numerous piles under contract with Jump through the winter. It should provide about six months' worth of fuel for the co-gen plant.

People using the road — it’s popular with locals for hunting, hiking and other outdoor activities — should use caution as there will be heavy truck traffic from time to time.

Grinding up slash piles does have some limitations. The piles have to be about an hour or so from a mill, or it’s not economical to haul the chips, Jump noted.

But on this project, “we thought it would be a good fit,” Wohlschlegel said.