Local Freres’s Mass Ply Panels shape the near-complete PDX Airport roof
Freres’s Mass Ply Panels shape the near-complete PDX Airport roof
PDX’s new terminal mass timber roof is installed
LYONS, Ore. 14 February, 2023— Four hundred thousand square feet of Freres Engineered Wood’s Mass Ply Panels was used on the 9-acre mass timber roof in the Port of Portland’s PDX Terminal Project. The Port of Portland recently announced that they have reached the halfway mark in a five-year-long airport expansion project. The use of Freres’ MPP has made it possible for designers to mold and shape the PDX Airport roof into its lattice design.
There were 1,347 Mass Ply Panels used in this first phase installation. The PDX Terminal Project’s 18-million-pound mass timber curved roof supports 49 skylights installed across the roof. An impressive 2,425 MPP parapet panels surround the perimeter of the roof that gives it its unique curved design.
Associate principal at ZGF Architects, Christian Schoewe, celebrated Freres’ latest improved appearance-grade MPP at the Industry Summit on Timber: Timber in the Digital Environment. Schoewe says, “One of the unique things about using Mass Ply Panels is that it gave us an opportunity to improve the design because of the areas where it gets expressed, it just looks very clean. The improved appearance-grade MPP is absolutely stunning.”
Due to the size of the new terminal roof, the installation was divided into 18 “cassettes,” which are portions of the roof that are approximately 800,000 pounds. Fourteen panels were installed in January and four remaining panels will be installed in 2024.
Freres also notes significant carbon benefits from this mass timber roof. “We supplied 73,527 cubic feet of MPP (2,082 cubic meters) for the terminal roof. Using WoodWorks Carbon Calculator, we determined that there are 2,208 metric tons of carbon dioxide stored in that wood,” says Tyler Freres, VP of Sales at Freres Engineered Wood. “Considering this helps us avoid 854 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions in carbon dioxide, the total potential carbon benefit that MPP contributes to this new airport roof is 3,063 metric tons of carbon dioxide.”