wAys : a technological breakthrough for the wood market...and the planet

A unique, patented technology now at your service

The technology offered by wAys today is a disruptive force in the wood drying market. It’s a simple, pragmatic approach to drying wood that uses biogenic or recycled CO₂ instead of hot air.

We are revolutionizing the wood industry by proposing a drying process for wood materials that takes advantage of CO₂. Indeed, CO₂ has a more interesting viscosity than air (better circulation in wood), and CO₂ reflects heat back into the wood, so you can extract water from wood or any lignocellulosic material faster and with less energy.

Through its mastery of this new technology, wAys is making a major contribution to the industrial transformation of wood and the decarbonization of industry.

Unique technology

When wAys became interested in drying wood under CO₂ at atmospheric pressure, there were no references in the scientific literature.

Since then, in collaboration with other research teams, we have shown that drying under CO₂ not only maintains the wood’s ultrastructure during drying (i.e. little deformation), but also traps a significant proportion of the carbon from CO₂ gas in the dried wood (i.e. sequestered CO_2eq). One likely explanation for these phenomena is the deposition of carbonates in the interstices of the wood during drying under an atmosphere of CO_2.

Unsurpassed drying quality and speed

This technology makes it possible to industrially dry lumber with an initial moisture content of over 50%, and local species considered difficult to dry, while guaranteeing that the target final moisture content of the lumber is uniformly achieved.

CO2 drying reduces the tangential and radial shrinkage of lumber by over 50%. More generally, the wood deforms much less, resulting in significant industrial material savings.

Finally, whatever the species (hardwood, softwood, exotic), the drying cycle time is reduced to 3 or 4 days.

A powerful growth driver

A Carbondryer V35 dryer industrially dries green wood to the target moisture content in a homogeneous way (less stock), of any species (local and difficult to dry), much faster (2 to 6 times), with much less deformation (material gain) while consuming 20% less kWh/m3 of dried wood than a biomass boiler dryer.

wAys technology opens the way to new markets, boosts your performance and helps decarbonize your industrial activity.

A significant contribution to the environment

The quality of wAys drying enables us to save on materials and thus reduce the need for wood, and to exploit local species that are not used in the region.

Part of the carbon from the recycled CO₂ is sequestered in the wood and water during the drying cycle or through the production of biochar. wAys thus contributes to the decarbonization of industry (T of CO_{2 eq} sequestered) and to sustainable forest management.

wAys offers an immediate and simple disruptive recovery of biogenic CO₂ from an anaerobic digestion plant, a good example of the circular economy.

Easy to implement

Our technological know-how and process expertise guarantee easy implementation and operation.

All the components making up our technology are already on the market. The technology is disruptive in its performance, not in its components, which makes it all the easier to use and duplicate.