Addressing Marketplace Durability Issues with Mountain Pine Beetle (MPB) Infected Wood (Summarizing Byrne & Uzonovic (2005))

Since I started working with wood pellets, I always feel that MPB wood has inferior quality than regular non-infected wood. The blue-stained wood of MPB wood made the wood appears "unnatural", which leads me to think that the wood is no good, i.e. lack of strength and durability.
But it is not true!

According to the work done by Byrne & Uzonovic (2005) and other wood scientists, the temperate bluestain fungi, unlike tropical bluestain fungi, does NOT damage the wood structure. Bluestain fungi are harmless and do NOT attack the wood itself but live on nutrients stored in a small proportion of wood cells.

Temperate Bluestain fungi on the wood surface (Byrne & Uzonovic, 2005)

Furthermore, According to tests done at Forintek Canada Corp, and other research laboratories, there is NO practical difference in strength between stained and non-stained pine. Bluestained wood is commonly used for construction in North America. The only concern is that bluestained wood has a higher water permeability which might cause the wood to retain more moisture ONLY if it is not well dried and stored. But wood is an perishable organic material at the right moisture content, whether it is bluestained or not.

Anyhow, well-treated bluestained wood CAN be used interchangably with non-stained wood. If the blue color is NOT desirable, the right combination of dark finshes can be used to hide any bluestain. The picture below is an example of dark finish that can be used to cover any bluestain.

I hope the general public is more receptive to the idea that bluestain wood is as good as non-stained wood, at least in the strength and durability point of view.