Uniquely beautiful, high performance bicycles are made more sustainably through an innovative use of natural, local coppice-woodland material.
Climate-change, loss of Wildlife diversity and wellbeing. We believe there are so many interactions and feedback loops between these three, that they are best addressed as a single problem, creating a range of synergies.
1. BEAMZ reduce climate-change by replacing unsustainable materials with carbon-negative materials. Each bike saves 48 kg of CO2, 42kg by not producing metal (aluminium) and 6kg absorbed by the wood as it grows. Climate-change causes biodiversity loss by changing environmental conditions faster than crucial elements of the food-web can respond contributing to species loss
2. BEAMZ support wildlife diversity by managing and catalysing the return of woodland to coppice management. Harvesting coppice wood does not kill the tree, and unleashes a woodland flowering, supporting invertebrates and pollinators, vital to food production and the wildlife food-chain. Biodiversity is at the heart of climate-change because the biosphere both created and sustains the high O2, low CO2 atmosphere on which we depend.
3. Poor wellbeing, ranging from a feeling of sadness to existential anxiety and depression is unsurprising against the backdrop of environmental collapse. The good news is that creating high-wellbeing jobs and volunteering opportunities including working in woods, with wood, with your hands and working to make a difference, are all evidenced to be excellent for supporting and rebuilding mental health. As the enterprise develops we expect to be able to identify targets for our wellbeing benefits who would gain the most value, including NEATs, people at risk of suicide or involved in the CJS.
Impacts are created by direct actions and by raising awareness. The latter is greatly enhanced by the attention-grabbing nature of the bikes when they are encountered on the streets.
Using natural materials to make a modern high performance bicycle has required a considerable amount of development work, on the product as well as special tooling and jigs to enable the material to be processed.
BEAMZ has developed the technology and relationships required to exploit the strength of natural wood poles in structural engineering application. The poles are young hardwood tree stems which have been debarked and dried and in some cased hollowed out into tubes. They exhibit strength-to-weigh ratios which are competitive with the best available engineering materials. Growth takes 3 to 10 years and is entirely sustainable. About half the weight of the material is carbon, sequestered from the atmosphere for the life of the structure. In all cases local indigenous species are used as these provide maximum support for wildlife while they are growing. Knobs formed around knots are left intact as these are formed by a natural process in the tree to compensate for the strength loss which would otherwise be caused by the knot. The fibre structure is always continuous from end to end.
The latest computer design technology is used to design the structures. Joining, preserving and finishing techniques have been developed and will be optimised further.
As a Community Interest Company BEAMZ is designed to sustain and develop its impacts through trading activity. Initially a range of pole-wood bicycles will be offered for sale. Bicycles are associated with sustainability and use of the material in this product will allow head-to-head comparison with the best materials available.
The enterprise will expand into other product lines and consultancy on pole-wood engineering solutions. Geographic expansion will be achieved by a nationwide branch structure, set up on a co-operative franchise basis. When appropriate, grant funding, impact investment or crowd funding may be sought to accelerate the expansion.
