Creosote: Proven Critical Infrastructure

Creosote-treated wood products have made a valuable contribution to the nation’s transportation, communications, energy, and maritime infrastructures for more than a century. Today’s railway ties, utility poles, and marine pilings continue to be protected with creosote from insect infestation and microbial decay.

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Welcome to the Creosote Council

Creosote wood preservative is integral to the nation’s transportation, communications, energy, and maritime infrastructures for more than a century. Today’s railway ties, utility poles, and marine pilings are protected with creosote from insect infestation and decay. In terms of performance and cost, creosote-treated wood products deliver benefits that cannot be matched by substitutes.

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Video: Creosote-Treated Wood Products

This video explains creosote’s contribution to the longevity of wood products, its many uses, its treatments processes, and more.

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Creosote's Role in Critical Infrastructure

Creosote-treated industrial wood products are long-lasting — railroad crossties, bridge timbers, utility poles, foundation piling, and more.

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A Cost-Benefit Analysis of Creosote-Treated Wood

Creosote-treated wood is regarded as a cost-effective material with economic advantages over non-treated wood materials.

Learn More About Creosote in Society

Creosote History

Origins protecting ships’ wood from decay

Creosote Regulation

Regulated as a pesticide by EPA under FIFRA

Creosote Research

Science, Environment, Health

Timeline: A History of Creosote Wood Preservation

Learn more about the history of wood preservation and creosote wood treatment, from the Napoleonic Wars and the Industrial Revolution to the expansion of infrastructure in the American economy.

Creosote Wood Treatment Timeline

Members of the Creosote Council

Wood Preservative Regulation: Scope and Application of the FIFRA Treated Articles Exemption

The paper discusses the U.S. Environmental Agency’s potential improper expansion of its authority under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), the federal pesticide statute, to regulate not only the registration, labeling, and use of wood preservatives, but also treated wood products.