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Transmission poles - Analysis of causes of premature failure in Slovenia
2025 - IRG/WP 25-20745
The study focuses on analysing the causes of the premature collapse of wooden transmission poles in Slovenia, where there have been several cases of rapid fungal decomposition of poles despite the planned lifespan of 30 to 50 years. The poles were made of Scots pine wood and impregnated with a copper-ethanolamine wood preservative. The research aimed to assess the condition of standing poles and e...
M Humar, B Lesar, N Kregar, S Drnovšek

Developments in the protection of wood and wood-based products
1980 - IRG/WP 340
Technology is playing an increasingly important role in the field of wood protection. This current review highlights how modern techniques have provided greater insight into the biological and physical processes affecting the durability of wood and wood-based products. Emphasis is also given to developments in preservative testing methodology and to the encouraging changes towards both the correct...
J M Baker

Addition of boron compounds and octanoic acid for improvement of biocidal properties and copper fixation at copper-ethanolamine based wood preservatives
2006 - IRG/WP 06-30408
Copper-ethanolamine based wood preservatives became important active substance (formulation) for wood protection, novelty. As copper itself can not ensure sufficient protection against wood destroying organisms and fixation in wood we combine it with other biocides like ethanolamine, boron and octanoic acid. This investigates were performance on spruce wood impregnated with different combination o...
F Pohleven, M Humar

Quantitative assessment of wood preservative emissions to waterways
2024 - IRG/WP 24-50393
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Emission Scenario Document (ESD) for Wood Preservatives provides methods to quantify the release of active substances from treated wood for various scenarios including sheet pilings in a flowing waterway (OECD 2013). The ESD is used for environmental risk assessment of wood preservatives according to the Biocidal Products Regulation...
K J Rader, R Carbonaro, C Mackie

European Biocides Directive (98/8/EC): Programme for systematic examination of all active substances of biocidal products on the market on May 13, 2000 Article 16(2)
2001 - IRG/WP 01-50166-03
PPT-Presentation...
K Rasmussen, A B Payá Pérez

A new wood preservative based on polymerized complexes of aminotriazole with copper acetate
1998 - IRG/WP 98-30169
This paper presents the results of preliminary fungitoxicity tests as carried out on new polymerized complexes of aminotriazole with copper acetate (PCC) against Coniophora puteana and Trichoderma viride. Laboratory tests on wood confirmed the findings arrived at in the screening test on agar medium. Deep penetration into pine wood of compounds studied was observed and particularly so at humidity...
K J Krajewski, A Lukasiewicz, J Wazny

Developing the technical guidance document on data requirements for biocidal products
1998 - IRG/WP 98-50101-02
Finland has been developing a discussion document for EC and the Member States concerning the specified data requirements for 23 biocidal product types, including wood preservatives, and their active substances. This data is required when applying for authorisation for a wood preservative according to the forthcoming Biocides Directive. The data requirements comprise of the core data set, which is...
P Karvinen, E Nikunen

Volatile borates in the treatment of wood and wood based panel products against subterranean termites
1995 - IRG/WP 95-30094
Blocks of pine solid wood, oriented strand board and plywood were treated with trimethyl borate by vapour treatment. It was meant to obtain either a full impregnation of the specimens or a shell treatment of the outer three millimetres. The efficacy of the treatments against subterranean termites (Reticulitermes lucifugus) was evaluated using an European Standard method....
L Nunes, D J Dickinson, R J Murphy

Draft Business Plan of CEN/TC 38 - Durability of wood and wood-based products - Introduction
2000 - IRG/WP 00-20207
CEN Technical Committees and Business Planning. The extension of formal business planning to CEN Technical Committees (CEN/TCs) is an important measure which forms part of a major review of business processes (known as 'Optimization'). The aim is to align the CEN work programme with expressed market needs and to ensure the adequate resourcing of projects through their development...
R Hüe

Evaluation of wood treated with copper-based preservatives for Cu loss during exposure to heat and copper-tolerant Bacillus licheniformis
1999 - IRG/WP 99-20155
Copper-based wood preservatives need to be effective against exposure to all types of microorganisms. Wood treated with six copper-based preservatives was exposed to 121°C and 20 psi pressure for 15 minutes under standard autoclave conditions and the copper-tolerant bacterium, Bacillus licheniformis CC01, for 10 d at 28°C and 150 rpm. Sixteen to 37 percent of the copper was released from the woo...
D M Crawford, C A Clausen

Work program of CEN/TC 38 (April 1993). Durability of wood and wood-based products
1993 - IRG/WP 93-20012
R Hüe

Copper based water-borne preservatives: The use of a thin section technique to compare the protection of wood by copper based preservatives against soft-rot and bacterial decay
1987 - IRG/WP 2286
This paper describes the techniques developed and gives examples of results obtained for the performance of copper based wood preservatives against both the bacterial and fungal hazards....
A M Wyles, D J Dickinson

Copper based water-borne preservatives: The biological performance of wood treated with various formulations
1987 - IRG/WP 3451
Wood samples treated with the various components of CCA preservative singly and in combination were tested against a soft rot organism, a copper tolerant brown rot organism and in soil burial both unleached and after leaching. The results suggest that, of the elements tested, fixed copper is essential for preventing soft rot attack and fixed arsenic is essential for preventing attack by a copper t...
S M Gray, D J Dickinson

The Biocidal Products Directive ( 98/8/EC ) - its consequences for the wood preservation industry
2001 - IRG/WP 01-50166-04
1. The Current Position This European Union Directive is one of the most technically complex pieces of legislation that has been developed by the European Commission (EC). Although the Directive was to have been implemented in the legislation of individual Member States of the EU by May 2000 progress has been slow. A number of Member States have yet to declare the Competent Authority who will handle their legislation. The body text of the Directive cannot stand-alone and is dependent on ancillary regulations and the development of technical guidance for both the Competent Authorities in the Member States and also industry to understand their roles in the whole process for the regulation of biocides and the biocidal products containing them. The process is far from complete in terms of a piece of workable legislation and this leaves not only industry but also the Competent Authorities with significant areas of uncertainty. This is potentially economically and socially damaging to the marketing and use of biocides and biocidal products. Because of this evolutionary process this paper can only be written in general terms as by the time the symposium takes place some significant changes to the position at the time of writing may have occurred. 2. Background The Biocidal Products Directive (98/8/EC), (BPD), is a directive which requires that biocides ( as active substances) are approved for use within the EU and the individual biocidal products containing these active substances are approved for use by the Competent Authority(s) of the Member State(s) in which it is intended to market the product. The product authorisation obtained in the first Member State should be mutually recognised by the other Member States in which application for authorisation to place the product on the market is sought. The Directive has to be seen in the context various other Directives, notably the Plant Protection Directive 91/414/EC). Biocidal products are grouped in the directive into twenty three "product types" and wood preservatives are Product Type 8. The intention of the directive is to harmonise the requirements for the placing of biocidal products and active ingredients on the market throughout the EU. EU wide use of so-called Common Principles are intended to be used to assess the dossiers in order to achieve a common approach and eliminate the current situation where individual Member States apply their own particular national approaches and criteria in the assessment and regulation of products . Annex IIA of the directive identifies the data requirements for the active substance and Annex II B for the biocidal product. There are additional data requirements identified in Annexes IIIA and IIIB for each product type reflecting potential for exposure to man and the environment. 3. Entry onto Annex I Any new active substance will require approval before it or any biocidal products including it can be placed on the market. The dossier to be submitted to the EC will have to include additional data and risk assessments for the product types (as defined in the BPD) in which it will be intended to be used. For those active substances that are accepted as being existing substances on the market before May 2000 (say in wood preservatives) these will be ranked and prioritised. This process is being defined in the so-called: Review Regulations. 4. An environmental directive There is no doubt that this Directive has a high environmental content in terms of the data and the associated risk assessments which are to be prepared. The protocols and the end points for some of these data requirements are still being developed. In general the EC considers that modelling exposure using human and environmental exposure scenarios covering the end use of the product is an acceptable approach . Data are required to enable these scenarios to be modelled and risk assessments made. It is necessary that regulators do not make decisions based on hazard assessment alone in the absence of fully worked out and agreed emission scenarios to define exposure levels which generate a realistic worst case risk assessment. Risk is a function of both hazard and exposure. A lot of work has been done in the development of Technical Notes for Guidance intended to help the regulator and the applicant in the submission and the interpretation of the data. Whilst it may be the case that the human toxicity data requirements still leave questions to be answered it is in the environmental aspects part of the regulatory process where there is still much work to be done. The Directive would seem to rely heavily on the development of Pass / Fail criteria in simulation tests. This is a big subject and of key importance to the risk assessment. 5. Wood preservatives ---- a test case Wood preservation has achieved a certain reputation. On the one hand it is said that a prime reason for the development of the Biocidal Products Directive arose from European problems in the regulation of the marketing and use of dangerous substances, notably wood preservatives. On the other hand because wood preservatives have been regulated by a number of Member States for many years it is believed they are well understood. The EC and the Member States also wanted to be seen to have achieved early success in the implementation of the Directive therefore the decision was taken to start, following failings with the speed of progress of the Plant Protection Products Directive, with a product type they knew all about i.e. wood preservatives. There is no doubt that there is a much greater understanding on the exposure scenarios, both human and environmental, for wood preservatives than many other product types. However, would it not have been better to have tackled some of the other product types where such an understanding is much less well developed? It is regrettable that the EC and Member States did not feel able to accept the results of an EC sponsored study (Haskoning report) on the assessment of risks for all the product types covered under the BPD. The results of this study clearly showed that wood preservatives did not constitute the most significant risk to man or the environment and in fact the risk was significantly greater for other product types. 6. Wood preservatives and the OECD Biocides Programme Another speaker will be covering this subject in more detail. Suffice it to say that because of the perception there was good knowledge about wood preservatives again they were selected as the pilot for an OECD project looking at environmental and human exposure assessment under the OECD Biocides Programme. The findings from two OECD Workshops actually demonstrated there was still much to be learnt about wood preservatives in order to refine the risk assessments to a state where they would be sufficient for the requirements of the BPD. This work is ongoing but it clearly demonstrates the problems that both the regulator and industry will have in the preparation and the assessment of the dossiers for both the active substances and the biocidal products. This is especially the case for other biocidal products that have not been subject to the same kind of regulation that wood preservatives have subjected to in the past. 7. Inorganic and organic biocides With current wood preservation technology there is still a dependence on inorganic chemicals such as copper (in conjunction with other biocides) or with chromium, as well as arsenic and boron for many end use applications. This is very much the case where a long term service life is a key factor in the use of treated wood for that end use. These substances are commodity chemicals and are also covered under the Existing Substances Regulations (EC) 1488/94. There is also work going on revising the Technical Notes for Guidance covering them . This includes a significant addition in the environmental risk assessment area. Efforts are being made to integrate and coordinate the requirements for both the BPD and the Existing Substances Regulations and OSPAR ( OSPAR Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic). OSPAR refers to the Oslo Paris Convention. Whilst the BPD seems primarily aimed at the regulation of biocides based on organic chemicals wood preservative products may contain both inorganic and organic components. Indeed there are probably few wood preservative formulations on the market that contain only one active substance. This must have a significant impact on the way the dossiers are prepared for the active substance and the biocidal products and how they are assessed both at the EC and the Member State level. 8. Consequences of the BPD for the wood preservation industry Whilst this paper addresses the consequences for the wood preservation industry per se, it must not be overlooked that there may be implications for the fabricaÈors of articles made from treated timber. Some current wood preservative formulations may over a period of time be withdrawn from the market because the risks and costs of generating the data and the preparation of the dossier make the product economically unviable. The presence of large working volumes of wood preservative solutions at treatment plants requires realistic withdrawal periods to avoid the unnecessary disposal and associated environmental risk of products that have been used satisfactorily for many years. 9. Availability of active substances The structure of the industry has changed dramatically in the past few months and there is no doubt that other changes both within and outside the wood preservation industry itself are yet to happen. The original differentiation between formulator of wood preservatives and active substance suppliers to the wood preservation industry has become blurred. Some of the active substances used in wood preservation are used in other either other biocidal product types or in products regulated under another directive, e.g. Plant Protection Products Directive 91/414/EC. 10. Data protection This continues to be a key issue for industry and some companies may find it strategically or financially necessary not to support an active substance in a particular product type thus leaving that sector without being able to use the active substance. The coming months will start to reveal which active substances are likely to be supported, at least through the notification process. Formulators are therefore in a close dialogue with their suppliers to try to determine their intentions on whether or not they intend to support their active substance. Today's wood preservative formulations are largely multi active substance based. Product costs, efficacy spectra, niche marketing and other considerations have made this process inevitable. New wood preservative formulations take time to research and develop and the continuity of availability of a choice of active substances is of key importance. A lack of adequate return on investment necessary to sustain the development of new products could have a negative impact on innovation and the rate of introduction of new products. It is extremely unlikely that any new active substance will be solely developed for use in wood preservation. This would be an effect contrary to expectations of the EC. The situation with wood preservatives is complicated by the fact that treated wood is a construction product and comes under the scope of the Construction Products Directive (89/106/EEC) (CPD). Products under the scope of the CPD are required to meet certain so-called essential requirements and one of these is durability. Demonstration of compliance involves the extensive suite of CEN wood preservative efficacy tests. Even relatively small changes in formulations may require extensive re-testing under the EN 599 regime in some Member States. 11. Task Forces Companies are encouraged by the EC to enter into Task Forces in order to reduce the burden of testing on animals and also to reduce the number of dossiers to be reviewed for each active substance. Ideally, and understandably, the EC would like one dossier per active substance. Parts of the wood preservation industry have been co-operating in Task Forces and much practical experience has been gained. Even closer co-operation will be required and this will enable companies to pool experience and expertise and manage their financial exposure to potentially high regulatory costs by sharing them amongst a larger number of parties. 12. Financial aspects Industry will have to make some best guesses with respect to its investment programmes for supporting its portfolio of products. Formulators and active substance suppliers are likely to group into Task Forces in order to reduce their costs in terms of data generation and the fees likely to be charged at the EU and the Member State level for the assessment of the dossiers. The compilation of the dossiers requires specialist expertise to assist the industrial applicant(s). This is likely to cost in the order of £100,000 per active substance, not including the costs of generating any data. The Rapporteur State's costs for reviewing the dossier is also expected to be of the same order. Clearly these kinds of costs will impact on innovation. An adequate payback must be available to the company to justify this level of investment. 13. Will mutual recognition work? Member States are required to recognise the authorisation of the biocidal product placed on the market in the first Member State when subsequent applications are made to place the product on the market. This is a fundamental principle of the BPD, although there is concern that Member States continue to have enough flexibility to prevent this happening if there are particular concerns in that Member State. Industry very much hopes this will not be the case and that mutual recognition, a fundamental principle of the BPD, will work in practice. 14. Environmental aspects Biocidal products such as wood preservatives are generally applied in controlled situations and not over large areas. Consequently any emissions can be considered to be from discreet sources, such as treated timber or potentially from timber treatment plants. This is in contrast to plant protection products and some other biocidal products that are usually dispersed over a relatively large area. Because of this a lot of work is required to be done to re evaluate how the environmental aspects of biocidal products such as wood preservatives can be assessed in an objective manner. The criteria that define an emission and how the PEC (Predicted Environmental Concentration) for each environmental compartment is determined are critical. The wood preservation industry, through the EWPM (European Wood Preservative Manufacturers Group), has been working with institutes and other interested parties in a co-operation known as the EFG (Environment Focus Group) to progress the development of appropriate methodology. Data will be required for both primary and secondary exposure to treated timber. The protocols for this work are yet to be agreed. This work is being further progressed in the OECD together with input from CEN TC 38 WG27. This co-operation between the OECD and CEN is extremely significant in that it is, I believe, the first time such a co-operation has taken place in the development of an OECD Guideline. If one considers all of the end uses where treated timber may be found carrying out a risk assessment with few guidelines on how it should be done is a very uncertain process for both industry and the regulator. Reliance on so-called expert opinion may be inadequate. 15. Comparative assessment (the substitution principle) This is a process whereby the health safety and environmental properties of acti_u101 ? substances used in the same product type could be compared and those with the most undesirable properties would not be placed on Annex I. Consequently biocidal products containing them would have to be removed from the market. This process is embodied in the BPD but it was initially considered that it would only be applied in the event of problems arising with active substances or products containing them rather than being used as a screening tool early on in the review process for active substances. This area is still an uncertain one with Member States having different interpretations of this principle. It is unfortunate that the wood preservation industry could be used to test out this concept at a European level. The consequences of this principle could be further losses of active substances available to the wood preservative formulators. 16. Substances of concern The BPD is not only concerned with the active substances that are formulated into the biocidal product but also with so-called "substances of concern". These are defined as any substance, other than the active substance, which has the inherent capacity to cause an adverse effect on humans, animals or the environment and is present or is produced in a biocidal product in sufficient concentration to create such an effect. There are significant implications for the formulator of the biocidal product . The formulator may have to submit an extensive dossier containing toxicological and metabolic as well as ecological data on each of the substances of concern when seeking approval for the biocidal product. There may be classes of compounds that become unavailable to the formulator either because of the risks posed by the co-formulant or because the cost of generating data will be uneconomic. 17. The wood preservation Industry's view on the BPD Industry has supported the development of the BPD since its conception in 1989. It is still supportive it but believes that the degree of complexity is disproportionate to the level of risk when it comes to wood preservatives. After all wood preservatives have been regulated for a long time and in reality there have been few significant health safety and environmental problems associated with them. Industry believes there is no need to determine an absolute understanding about a biocide and its application but rather there is a need to determine the level of understanding that will enable characterisation so that a risk assessment can be made. The wood preservation industry has sought either directly or through representative bodies a pro-active and collaborative approach with the regulators although at times this appears to have encouraged inappropriate demands. The regulators have invariably responded positively to this however they may not always understand the burden in both time and resource in having made wood preservatives the test case. Industry hopes that its efforts to be pro-active will be recognised and will be dealt with equitably when considered before the other product types defined in the Biocidal Products Directive.
D Aston

The effective control of moulds on freshly impregnated wood
2004 - IRG/WP 04-30352
Beside natural timber it is known, that moulds can also groth at the surface of impregnated wood. This material shows “defects” like resistant dark spots or color changes and causes complaints. During the last years, the problem by moulds seems to increase. Laboratory studies were carried out to show the effect of impregnations against moulds. Wood samples (Pinus sylvestris L.) were impregn...
G Cofta, K Lutomski, P Jüngel

Treatment of wood-based panel products with volatile borate
1990 - IRG/WP 3616
The paper presents recent developments in the use of volatile borate esters for the preservative treatment of wood based board materials. Several advances on previous reports are discussed. In laboratory studies, treatment times of approximately ten minutes at 20°C on boards at equilibrium moisture content provided full penetration and retentions of 1% wt/wt boric acid. Biological tests have been...
P Turner, R J Murphy, D J Dickinson

Performance of copper-based wood preservatives in above ground and ground contact tests
1994 - IRG/WP 94-30057
The relative performance of a range of copper-based wood preservatives was compared using above ground and ground contact procedures. The data, accumulated after several years' testing, show that on an equivalent active ingredient basis, differences in performance of the preservative systems tested can vary quite markedly. The contribution of co-biocides to the overall performance of thes...
A F Preston, K J Archer, L Jin, W Metzner, D Seepe

Assessment of the toxicity of some copper-, zinc- and boron-based wood preservatives to the cellar fungus Coniophora cerebella Schröet
1974 - IRG/WP 242
This article reports the use of a method based on the determination of the probability of the protection of timber against destruction by fungi. By converting the probability values to probit values and plotting them as a function of the amount of preservative retained in the timber, curves of the toxic effect are obtained, enabling any timber protection probability to be assessed....
V N Sozonova, D A Belenkov

Environmental risk assessment of treated timber in service: The Environment Focus Group approach
2000 - IRG/WP 00-50162
In the context of the Biocidal Products Directive (98/8/EC), and of the OECD work on wood preservatives, the Environment Focus Group (EFG), comprising 8 institutes and the European Wood Preservative Manufacturers Group, has been working on the environmental risk assessment of treated timber in service. A literature review of emissions from treated timber has revealed that very little existing data...
G Deroubaix, G Labat, I Le Bayon, S Legay, P Marchal, C Yrieix, E Melcher, R-D Peek, S De Geyter, J Van Acker, W J Homan, D J Dickinson, R J Murphy, E D Suttie, A J Nurmi, A-C Ritschkoff, D Rudolph, I Stephan, D Aston, E F Baines, J B Simonin

Experiences with penetration of copper-based wood preservatives
2001 - IRG/WP 01-20233
In the Nordic countries there is a long tradition of result type based specifications for preservative-treated wood. A common Nordic standard for treated pine (Pinus sylvestris) wood was published in 1976. After a revision in 1989 this standard, then named INSTA 140, defined four classes of treated wood: M, A, AB and B. Treaters producing according to this standard had to be affiliated to a qualit...
J Jermer, F G Evans, I Johansson

Copper leaching from Kemwood ACQ and Embalit CBC treated wood products
2000 - IRG/WP 00-50150
TNO has performed a study on the leaching of copper from Kemwood ACQ and Embalit CBC treated wood products, further referred to as ACQ and CBC. The sawn dry wood has been impregnated using an industrial vacuum-pressure process with ACQ (with or without Ultrawood 4) or with CBC, under supervision of Flexchemie B.V. After treatment samples have been transported and subjected to leaching tests at TNO...
P Esser, W L D Suitela, H Trompetter

Contradiction between uptake of preservative in practical situation and laboratory testing
1992 - IRG/WP 92-2392
By brush treatment water- and solvent-based products were applied on boards of Scots pine and Norway spruce to achieve an uptake of 100 and 200 g/ml. In addition the scope of work to achieve the required uptake of preservative was determined under practical conditions for both product groups. EN 113 (RAL-GZ 830) tests were carried out to test the biological efficacy of products. After 18 months ex...
R Gründlinger, O Janotta, M Melzer

Fungicidal activity of some new water borne copper octanoate based formulations
1999 - IRG/WP 99-30198
Four new water borne formulations for preservation of wood were prepared: the composition of Cu(II) octanoate, 2-aminoethanol (ethanolamine) and water; the composition of complex of Cu(II) octanoate with nicotinamide, 2-aminoethanol and water; the one of Cu(II) octanoate, organic boron complex, 2-aminoethanol, dimethyl sulfoxide and water and finally, the mixture of Cu(II) octanoate, diazene, 2-am...
M Petric, M Pavlic, F Pohleven, P Segedin, B Kozlevcar, S Polanc, B Stefane, R Lenarsic

Serpula lacrymans, The Dry Rot Fungus and its Tolerance towards Copper-based Wood Preservatives
2005 - IRG/WP 05-10555
Serpula lacrymans (Wulfen : Fries) Schröter, the dry rot fungus, is considered the most economically important wood decay fungus in temperate regions of the world i.e. northern Europe, Japan and Australia. Previously copper based wood preservatives were the most commonly used preservatives for pressure treatment of wood for building constructions. Because of a suspicion about tolerance toward cop...
A C Steenkjær Hastrup, F Green III, C A Clausen, B Jensen

Observations on the performance of copper-based wood preservatives in fungal cellar (soil-bed) tests
1994 - IRG/WP 94-20047
Fungal cellar (soil-bed) tests are considered to be an important tool for the evaluation of the performance of ground contact wood preservatives. Facilities of this type have been established world wide although caution has been exercised in their introduction into standard testing methods for the approval of wood preservatives. This is the result of concerns over the variability in the biological...
G R Williams, D Rudolph, M E Hedley, J A Drysdale, R F Fox

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