CO2 absorption, resistance, price… Is paulownia the tree of the future?

“It’s true that the growth is still extraordinary”rejoices Jérôme Guéguen, in the TF1 report above. For two years, this dairy farmer from Finistère decided to dedicate one of his fields to planting paulownias. The trees already reach a height of seven to eight meters: “After ten years, we will have the first plantation to sell”believes Jérôme. He and his colleague Stéphane invested 5,000 euros in this field, and ultimately hope to collect 80,000.

A variety from Asia, paulownia is mainly used as a building material. But this tree also has exceptional ecological virtues: it absorbs ten times more CO2 than the others and releases four times more oxygen. Although it is sometimes criticized for its invasive nature, the shoots that Stéphane and Jérôme obtained were created in the laboratory: it is therefore a hybrid and sterile species.

The two men bought their shoots from Sandrine, an entrepreneur from the Netherlands, who started selling paulownias in France four years ago. “We started with around ten hectares,” she tells TF1. “This year we planted a little over 400 hectares in total. And it’s still going, it’s just the beginning.”

Low price, lightness, resistance…

Paulownia already has its French fans among woodworking professionals. In Gironde, the Ikiwood company did not wait for the tree to be planted in France to exploit it, initially importing it from Asia. Its founder, Vivian Ferry, praises its “very good value for money“, but also its “better weight-to-strength ratio”. Not to mention its aesthetic: “When we see that there are no knots, that it doesn’t produce resin, that it remains super stable over time… It’s a soft wood, it’s a light wood, we see the veining has character compared to certain other species”he believes.

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“We can make glued laminated panels, we can make acoustic panels, we can make cladding, we can make paneling”lists Julien Sottet, co-founder of Ikiwood. At their home, a panel of paulownia paneling is sold for 30 euros per square meter, compared to 100 euros for an oak panel.

An alternative to deforestation?

These professionals now hope to create a real paulownia market in France. The law could well help them: by 2030, it will no longer be possible to import wood from deforestation. Therefore, the local planting of paulownias could appear as a good alternative to the deforestation of French forests. The only real reservation expressed by specialists against the paulownia: its rapid and spectacular growth is sometimes to the detriment of the endemic species of an ecosystem, by depriving them of resources and light.