The Chauvin sawmill in Mignovillard in the Jura dreams of an Olympic future. The company will open next February on the historic sawmill site, in the center of the village, a CLT panel production plant, with in focus of housing construction markets for the Paris Olympics in 2024. The co-director of the company, Fabrice Chauvin, announced this Thursday morning on France Bleu Besançon during our special program dedicated to the forest of Franche-Comté.
CLT (cross laminated timber) is a wooden panel, made up of several layers of planks glued together in cross folds, which gives it great resistance. This future-proof technology allows the construction of high-rise wooden buildings. There are few examples at the moment in France, but in Strasbourg, an 11-storey wooden building was completed in early 2019. The world’s tallest wooden building was inaugurated in March 2019 in Norway, an 18-story tower that rises to 85 meters.
16.50 m long panels
The new CLT panel manufacturing plant will use the sawmill’s products to assemble, glue, and obtain large panels, up to 16.50 meters long and 3.40 meters wide, ready to install for the construction of buildings. “The basic idea is to use the different qualities of wood offered by the forest“explains Fabrice Chauvin.
In Mignovillard, the Chauvin sawmill processes around 1,000 cubic meters of wood per day from the Comt forests. It is also a shareholder in Frasne of the company Pro Lignum which manufactures laminated timber. The new factory will not use the same qualities of wood and will be complementary.
The Chauvin sawmill employs 50 people in Mignovillard, 16 in Frasne, The CLT panel production unit should total around twenty employees in the long term.
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