KIRBY – As the region’s wood industry evolves, a Northeast Kingdom logger is using a $130,000 state Working Lands Program grant to develop new outlets for low-grade wood products. Heath Bunnell started a business this summer that takes in wood waste and creates products such as mulch, compost and kiln-dried firewood.

Bunnell bought a farm in Kirby last year and spent the early part of the summer overseeing the deconstruction of a large barn on the property, which once held a brick factory and later a scrap car business. Bunnell wants to provide a market for the low-grade wood that has flooded the market since Northeast mill capacity diminished sharply in 2015 and 2016.