The Problem:
San Diego County generates hundreds of tons of woody biomass daily — and nearly all of it is chipped or landfilled, with no coordinated system to recover its value. The challenge runs deeper than disposal: the region’s species mix, dominated by eucalyptus, palm, and invasive vegetation cleared for wildfire mitigation, makes lumber-only strategies unworkable. Meanwhile, infrastructure is fragmented — a handful of small sawmills, no centralized log yards, limited drying capacity, and no network connecting arborists to processors. City forestry, county parks, fire agencies, tribal partners, and waste management each hold a piece of the puzzle, but operate in silos with no shared strategy.
Our Solution:
Unified Wood Economy conducted 40+ structured interviews across San Diego County to surface bottlenecks and build a coalition around a shared solution. That work revealed alignment around a hub-and-spoke model — a centralized processing campus with distributed aggregation satellites, including a promising public-private partnership with key private players for site access to a processing campus. Rather than pursuing lumber alone, UWE and key stakeholders in San Diego County have identified a diversified product strategy suited to San Diego’s material reality: biochar, compost, urban timber, and potentially thermally modified palm and eucalyptus mulch for fire-zone brush management. The project is now targeting a shovel-ready feasibility report and investor pitch deck by Q1 2027 — with recommendations backed by wildfire mitigation funding through RCD and CAL FIRE grant cycles for maximum impact and actionable next steps for funding.