The council in January decided to punt after the Natural Resource Commission recommended an ordinance that would ban woodburning. Given the time of year and the fact that it was the end of the burning season, it made some sense to defer a decision in this case. The council will now hear the issue once again and perhaps make some sort of determination.
According to the staff report:
Additional monitoring data was successfully gathered at two locations in Davis for extended periods of time during the last burn season. Mobile monitoring of complaint areas and random locations around the community were unsuccessful due to technical problems with the equipment being used.
Dr. Cahill concludes fundamentally:
“that the air quality measured at City Hall during the winter test period, was well below the federal aerosol standards, PM2.5 is 35ug/m3 and that winter aerosol in central Davis are regional in nature, not locally generated.”
This analysis was presented a few weeks ago to the NRC, however the NRC continues to support wood burning restrictions. They have modified their original ordinance by altering the definition of allowable burn days for open hearth and non-certified appliances. This allows burning when wind is forecasted to be 12.5 miles an hour or more and PM2.5 is 25ug/m3 or less.
On the other hand, not mentioned in the staff report was the presentation by Alan Pryor who has been a strong advocate of woodburning bans and has been at odds with Dr. Cahill about the need for such restrictions.
One key point made by Pryor is that a year ago Dr. Cahill claimed that Davis’ air quality (in terms of particulate matter) was half as bad as Sacramento’s. So has Davis’ gotten worse, or has Sacramento’s improved? Either way wood burning may factor into that equation. Mr. Pryor argued that since regional air patterns have not substantially changed over the past 6-8 years this comparative change is probably due to the simple fact that Sacramento has implemented restrictive wood burning strategies over the past two years to reduce wood smoke pollution. Meanwhile Davis has continued, possibly even increased, unfettered burning. In other words, Pryor claimed the comparative deterioration of air quality in Davis compared to Sacramento is much more likely due to distinctly different approaches to wood smoke pollution control taken in Sacramento versus Davis and not otherwise due to general regional air quality conditions as Cahill suggested.
Yet it appears that staff and the NRC are making different recommendations here.
Staff is recommending that the city continue to work with Dr. Cahill to gather additional data.
The staff report notes:
“The Federal Government has included Davis in Sacramento’s nonattainment area. This generally results in the non-attainment area developing a plan outlining how it will improve air quality to get back into compliance. Often times the attainment plans include wood burning restrictions. The Yolo Solano Air Quality Management District will be undertaking data collection and developing an attainment plan that has to be submitted to EPA by 2012. This is another opportunity to partner and work with the YSAQMD to help develop the plan which can involve more data collection.”
They conclude that council ought to proceed with a voluntary program that would call for a no burn day when the SMAQMD calls for one.
However, the NRC recommendation directs staff to return with an ordinance to be introduced in September.
It has ten components to it.
1) Wood burning in approved appliances will be allowed on days designated as “Allowable Burn Days for Approved Appliances” for a maximum of 12 hours per day per residence.
2) Wood burning will be allowed in open hearth fireplaces and other non-compliant wood burning appliances a maximum of 6 hours per day per residence on “Allowable Burn Days for Non-Approved Appliances”.
3) Approved Appliances shall include an EPA Phase II wood stove or pellet stove which is rated at 7.5 grams per hour or less.
4) Allowable Burn Days for Approved Appliances shall be days when the forecasted average regional PM 2.5 concentration is 25 ug/m3 or lower and a forecasted average wind speed from 6 PM to midnight of 5 mph or greater.
5) Allowable Burn Days for Non-Approved Appliances shall be days when the forecasted average regional PM 2.5 concentration is 25 ug/m3 or lower and a forecasted average wind speed from 6 PM to midnight of 12.5 mph or greater.
6) Beginning March 1, 2010, a one-time permit shall be required to demonstrate compliance with this regulation and for law enforcement and educational purposes.
7) The above regulations do not apply to temporary breakdowns of central heating systems and power outages.
8) Only burning of seasoned dry hardwood is allowed.
9) The ordinance shall provide for annual review of this ordinance to assess the impacts of this ordinance, changes in regional air pollution conditions, and to review and approve new technologies.
10) This proposed ordinance does not pertain to any appliances fueled by natural gas or propane and/or designed and exclusively used for cooking purposes.
It would seem that many of these things could be adopted within the staff’s supported approach of a more voluntary system. In this way it would regulate but perhaps not ban wood burning.
Yet, staff has concerns about the implementing this current NRC recommendation. First is the absence of scientific data that quantifies the nearest neighbor concern by the NRC.
As they excerpt:
“In order to protect public health, the NRC proposes the following ordinance providing for the allowable use of wood-burning appliances and open hearth fireplaces for home heating purposes. The purpose of the ordinance is to improve air quality when regional pollution and local meteorlogical conditions create conditions where even small amounts of wood smoke can cause locally intense exposures to harmful and toxic emissions. These emissions can be particularly harmful to children, the elderly, and other sensitive populations. This ordinance provides a two-tiered system that allows for roughly equivalent total emissions for wood burning appliances, open hearth fireplaces and other non-compliant wood burning appliances. This ordinance allows for wood burning when it is least harmful.”
Other concerns include the following:
For the burn/ no burn criteria:
“The criteria the NRC recommends uses wind speed in addition to the forecasted PM 2.5. Since this is unusual, there currently is not an automated system to handles this. To implement, it will either be a manual process done daily, including weekends, to establish, publish and notify the next days forecast or require funding to hire a vendor to develop a system.”
The enforcement issue which proposes the Police Department but the task is also quite complex.
1. Because of the inherent difficulties of monitoring actual burning time, the 6 hour maximum burn time is not readily enforceable.
2. Enforcement is complicated when various appliances are treated differently. Police officers would be required to distinguish between open hearth, non-EPA certified wood burning stoves and inserts and EPA Phase II certified stoves and inserts. Some of this concern is relieved if permits are issued.
3. Police officers would be required to distinguish between seasoned dry wood and unseasoned or wet wood.
4. And lastly, this type of call could be triaged and be a very low priority.
And permitting:
“The NRC recommendation includes a one time permit as an additional vehicle to educate the public and to help the enforcement element. Along with the educational component, the intent was to simplify enforcement. By way of example, a police officer would verify the resident had a valid permit and that it is a permissible burn day. The permit may offer some assistance on the enforcement side but the requirement that all users of wood burning appliances is seen by many as
onerous and overly bureaucratic. From an educational aspect, there are other methods that can be utilized that would be more widespread than through a permitting process.”
Brief Commentary
Throw in the problems with enforcement at a pratical level and it appears at this time a ban on woodburning is premature. Restrictions however are a more reasonable goal along with continued outreach.
Public education is probably a necessary condition for achieving the worthwhile results that the NRC is attempting to achieve. Some of their recommendations could be included with staff’s recommendation. It seems that the wise strategy would be to incrementally move toward safer woodburning, while paving the way for tougher restrictions down the road.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Agreed. That’s why it’s a good idea to look at actual measured data, rather than theoretical data.
Since Sacramento County already has a burn ordinance, and Davis is in the Sacramento media market, it is probably simplest for Davis to adopt the same ordinance:
[url]http://www.sparetheair.com/burncheck.cfm[/url]
That way, no-burn days are already being publicized for Davisites and little further notification would be needed.
Don Shor’s approach makes sense to me.
“I agree w the poster who agrees w Don Shor” Don is nearly always thoughtful and correct too.
As one of the “evil” burners, (EPA approved stove, seasoned wood, “green” days only) I would like to chime in. I am delighted that the NRC FINALLY realized that burning a Duraflame log is not the same as a roaring fire in an open hearth fireplace. Their prior position was that both could be punished by six months in jail if done 3 times on unapproved days in a year. Their current position is much more sensible, but still has problems: First, it requires Davis to have a standard that conflicts with the Yolo Solano Air Quality Management District (YSAQMD). Every day the district sends out an email listing the air quality of the day. Many of us who burn wood do so only on “green” days when air pollution is very low. However, the proposed rules for Davis would not be in sync with the YSAQMD; a person could conscientiously follow the county guidelines but still be cited for not following the Davis rules. In fact, there would be two sets of rules: one for EPA approved appliances, another for fireplaces. Second, as mentioned earlier, the enforcement of the NRC plan is problematic. This plan puts limits on the amount of time burning could take place: 12 hours for EPA approved devices. If one neighbor complains that another neighbor has been burning for more than 12 hours, but the stove owner says he has only been burning since he got home from work 9 hours earlier, does the policemen write the citation or not? For fireplace owners, the rules are different here too.
I realize that burning wood in any form is a contentious issue in Davis, and I am well aware that I am in the minority of the readers of this blog. But as in most issues, there ARE two sides of the issue, and the environmental issues are also complex: for instance, in terms of pouring carbon dioxide into the air, there is the issue of burning sequestered fuels like natural gas vs. renewable fuels like seasoned firewood or pellets. Also, as Dr. Cahill and others report, the health effects of wood smoke are minimal compared to diesel or gasoline, yet no one complains about the large number of diesel trucks that deliver bottled water to every grocery store in town. I appreciate the Vanguard offering a forum for this issue which I hope will remain more civil than the horse ranch development debate has become. And I hope the city council will spare us the need to create our own EPA.
The Sacramento ordinance is as follows:
Ok to burn25 micrograms (particulate matter) or less
Burning discouraged26 – 35 micrograms
Stage One, no burn36 – 40 micrograms, burning allowed in EPA certified devices
Stage Two, all burning prohibited> 40 micrograms
Individuals can apply for waiver due to economic hardship or ‘sole source of heat’.
These stages are widely publicized on local television and radio news outlets, and in the Sacramento Bee. The Davis Enterprise and the Vanguard could add them daily.
The Yolo-Solano Air Quality District has a voluntary “Don’t Light Tonight” program set at 35 micrograms.
The Davis NRC proposal would establish Allowable Burn Days for a certain number of hours, depending on the appliance, all based on a level of 25 micrograms or less, varying by wind speed:
Non-approved appliances – 6 hours, 12.5 mph wind speed.
Approved appliances – 12 hours, 5 mph wind speed.
It is difficult to reconcile the conflicting data presented by Alan Pryor and Tom Cahill. I think that using individual monitoring sites may be part of the problem. But we have data available from independent sources about weather conditions and regional air quality that make it possible to assess how Yolo/Solano air compares to Sacramento air on a daily basis.
The problem arises during temperature inversions, when there is very little air movement and the polluted air is trapped. Often these are our periods of valley fog. At the weather site at ipm.ucdavis.edu you can look for days that have relatively low high temperature, a low temperature spread, low wind speed, and low solar radiance. When those conditions prevail, they tend not to be localized: the whole valley is pretty much the same.
At sparetheair.com, you can look up the Air Quality Index by county region (Yolo-Solano, Sacramento, Placer, and El Dorado) for any day of the year. You can compare ozone and particulate matter (PM) for each area.
When I compare days with the weather criteria above for the AQI for particulate matter, I only found one in which Yolo-Solano scored higher than Sacramento. On all the rest, Sacramento was higher than Yolo-Solano for particulate matter, usually significantly higher.
There may be neighborhoods where smoke is trapped and readings would be higher. But the ‘no burn’ conditions would usually be triggered when the air is that still. If you look at days with low wind speed in Davis, Sacramento AQI PM readings would nearly always trigger a burn restriction.
Sacramento’s burn ordinance allows burning up to a somewhat higher level of PM than that proposed by the Davis NRC. But remember, the burn day notifications by Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District are based on Sacramento readings: they issue a burn day notice when their readings are high. Based on the days I looked at, they are more likely to issue a burn day restriction than Yolo-Solano.
The major advantage is that Sacramento’s ordinance is already in place, regularly publicized, and follows a model that seems to have proven efficacy.
I too agree with the assessment and pragmatic solution offered by Mr. Shor. Can we expect our elected reps to think outside the (staff) box? I won’t be holding my breath (unless there’s an inversion).
07/07/2009 City Council Agenda item #5 – Consideration of Wood Burning Restriction and UC Davis Delta Group Aerosol Monitoring in Davis Neighborhods – will be pulled from discussion tonight and City Council will not take any action. This item will be rescheduled to a date still to be determined.
Don:
Sacramento is updating its burn ordinance this year. Starting this winter, instead of the tiered structure, burning will be prohibited when particulate matter is at 30 ugs or more. This makes it even simpler.
To Don Shor – Re: “The major advantage is that Sacramento’s ordinance is already in place, regularly publicized, and follows a model that seems to have proven efficacy”.
It is true that Sacramento has an ordinance in place and to biggy back on it would be the most simple solution. But it is not proven effective enough because Sacramento did not reduce their PM sufficient enough to meet federal standards. Thus, they have proposed a number of options all of which include lowering the thresholds further – either as a two-tiered approach or a single tier at either 30 ug/m3 or 25 ug/m3. They are also proposing an automatic further step down to 20 ug/m3 if they still do not come into PM2.5 compliance by 2012. The San Joaquin Valley APCD has already implemented a 30 ug/m3 single threshhold standard with an automatic kickdown to 20 ug/m3 if federal attainment is not met. This is expected to be decided at the Sept Sac AQMD Board meeting.
By the way, the Sac AQMD staff reports a 21-23% reduction in PM when they have complete no burn days even with only a 50% compliance rate so their mandatory restrictions do work to some extent. This evidence speaks against Dr. Cahill’s theory that all of Sacramento and Davis wood smoke is from the Sierra Nevada foothills. If Dr. Cahill’s hypothesis were otherwise true, restricting wood burning in Sacramento should show no effect on regional PM which is clearly NOT the case – see http://www.airquality.org/bod/2009/MayRule421BoardLetter.pdf
But let’s look at the bigger picture here also:
Assuming we burn wood and produce PM2.5 in Davis at only 75% of the per capita rate in Sacramento (.009 lbs/person/day vs. .012 lb/person/day in Sacramento – a very conservative estimate given our wealthy demographics), this means the city produces an average of 32 TONS of PM2.5 pollution over the course of a 120 day wood burning season. That is the equivalent of burning 765 MILLION cigarettes!(at 0.04 g/cigarette)
60,000 people x .009 lbs/person/day x 120 days per burn season = 64,800 lbs/season x 454 g/lb / .04g/cigarette = 765 Million cigarettes
Worse yet, wood smoke has been shown in peer-reviewed studies by EPA scientists to have 11 times the mutagenicity of cigarette smoke on a per gram basis so we essentially put the functional mutagenic equivalent of over 8 billion cigarettes smoked into this city’s air every winter. Can’t you just see our kids skipping happily through their playgrounds breathing this toxic soup.
Doesn’t it seem crazy that we can fine a person $100 for smoking a single cigarette in a city park yet we let wood burners put out thousands of times as much proven toxic wood smoke any time and in any amounts they wish. Where are the wood-burning libertarians on this issue? Talk about a double-standard!
Re: Enforceability of a Wood Burning Ordinance -This is the number one complaint raised by staff against any wood burning ordinance. But it is a complete red herring designed to scare the public that we are going to have overzealous police kicking down doors to inspect their fireplaces. Firstly, enforcement of the ordinance is complaint-driven. If wood burners really burn as cleanly as they say so there is no smoke or smell, then there is no complaint and no enforcement. Clean burners will never even hear from the police.
But if there is a complaint, the police dispatcher simply looks to see if the wood-burner is permitted and if it is an allowable burn-day. If both are true, then the dispatcher simply informs the complainant that the fire is legal. If either are not true (i.e. the wood-burner is not permitted or it is not an allowable burn day then the policeman can simply drive by the wood-burning house and observe the smoke from the chimney or use an IR viewer to see the heated chimney if at night. A warning or notice can be subsequently sent by mail and the police office can probably handle everything without even leaving their car. The simplicity of the NRC proposed ordinance is that 90% of complaints will probably be handled by a police dispatcher and not even involve a patrol officer.
And even though there is a requirement that seasoned wood be used (as there is in the Sac AQMD) and the Air Pollution Control Officer has simple moisture meters to check wood content, as a practical matter they never do this because of time constraints.
But even if this were not the case, to say we should not have an ordinance because it would be difficult to enforce is ludicrous. Davis has a lot of public health ordinances on the books that are far more unenforceable than the proposed wood burning ordinance. For instance, Davis prohibits putting hazardous materials down the storm sewers or sewage lines. In most case when this happens – and we know it does from our storm water outflow and sewage plant inflow, the City is days to weeks behind in determining a violation and it is by then impossible to go back and trace miniscule amounts of chemicals in the sewage or storm drains. In other words, this ordinance is completely unenforceable. Davis also has all sorts of provisions against hazardous or prohibited materials in garbage, recycling, and green waste and the city pulls all sorts of junk from the waste stream. Yet to enforce those ordinances, the city would have to have an inspector checking into every garbage or recycling bin or shuffling through the piles of green waste every week before pickup to enforce these ordinance. Clearly this can’t be done so these ordinances are functionally unenforceable. Does that mean we should do away with them? Of course not! At some point, the City simply relies on the good intentions of its citizens to obey its rules and regulations and the proposed wood-burning ordinance is no different.
Hi Alan,
“Thus, they have proposed a number of options all of which include lowering the thresholds further…”
That’s fine. If Sacramento toughens the ordinance, Davis can follow suit. I think there are advantages of adopting a streamlined regional ordinance. Advocates of cleaner air for Davis should encourage the use of Sac air quality numbers, as they are more likely to trigger a no-burn day than Yolo-Solano numbers. The question for the council is whether it would be voluntary or mandatory.
“This evidence speaks against Dr. Cahill’s theory that all of Sacramento and Davis wood smoke is from the Sierra Nevada foothills.”
I don’t know if he said “all” of the smoke was from the foothills, but I agree that it is probably a minimal source. Just looking at the prevailing wind directions in local weather data at ipm.ucdavis.edu suggests that smoke is not moving east to west most of the time. Actually, during inversion conditions the air is mostly just rising and sinking around the whole region. It is a regional issue, pretty much from Vacaville to Placerville.
Your statistics are interesting, but (1) much of the time the smoke just blows away, and (2) people don’t heat their homes with cigarettes! I think most people could come to a common ground that minimizing exposure to wood smoke is desirable, while still allowing the use of this renewable energy source under the right atmospheric conditions.
Don
To differentview – Re: “Agreed. That’s why it’s a good idea to look at actual measured data, rather than theoretical data.”
Again, this is another red herring espoused by Tom Cahill to support continued burning (including his own). Both the YSAQMD and Sac AQMD routinely use dispersion modeling tools to estimate emissions and pollution potential for everything from industrial emissions to exposure to freeway pollution. The number one tool they use now is something called HARP (for Hotspots Area Reporting Program). Tens of thousands of simulations are run by AQMDs and CARB every year up and down the state. And guess what? HARP uses the EXACT same algorithms that were used to predict local wood smoke emissions. They are called the ISC3 algorithms (for Industrial Source Complex). These are proven and refined by decades of experience by the EPA. If you do not believe in dispersion modeling, would you have an industrial complex put in right next to a Davis school or senior home without an inkling of what exposures it would cause to Davis residents? Of course not! You do the modeling first.
Indeed, when Dr. Cahill recently gave his stamp of approval to the New Harmony low-income housing project, he relied on these exact same dispersion modeling tools to predict that there would not be any adverse exposure to excessive freeway pollution. It was suggested that Dr. Cahill actually move his equipment over to the New Harmony site and actually measure the PM concentrations there but this idea was not pursued by the Council. It seems incongruous that we say it is OK to use dispersion modeling when we are situating industry or allowing low income development right on a freeway but we do not believe it is really good to use it and we need actual measurements when defining wood-smoke emissions from well-to-do homeowners in Davis. Again, this is simply the case of the wood-burning community wanting another standard applied to them than to industry and low-income folks.
By the way, the long-anticipated study by Dr. Cahill was specifically going to look at the nearest neighbor issue when the wood smoke study was done. This part of the study was mostly a complete bust, however, because the equipment he used never worked right except for one occasion when he reported local PM2.5 concentrations of 1,500 ug/m3. This is about four times as high as the maximums predicted by the computer modeling on which the wood smoke ordinance was based and is 42 times as high as the federal 24-hour PM2.5 standard. So, if anything, the modeling was not conservative enough and actual local ground-level concentrations may be much higher than originally thought!
I will burn mine , whenever I want , you guys have to many rules
The preceding comments aptly frame the ongoing debate between concerned, yet reasonable, citizens (e.g., Don Shor) and fanatical, all-or-nothing zealots (e.g., Alan Pryor).
I believe a large majority of Davis residents are “environmentalists,” and would readily accept a measured, phased-in ordinance to reduce air-borne particulates from wood-burning.
Unfortunately, such a reasoned approach falls on deaf ears with zealots such as Pryor. By incessant crunching and debating of numbers, he is diverting attention from the key point: community acceptance.
That type of bull-headed insistence has damaged the cause of environmentalists nationwide, and might create a strong back-lash from responsible, but freedom-loving Davis citizens.
By the way, Mr. Pryor, I have an open-hearth fireplace in my home, but have not burned a fire in it for over 20 years. BUT, if you continue your fascist attacks on individual freedoms and voluntary compliance, I might just light a roaring fire this Fall & Winter as a tribute to you for trying to strip away my personal freedom & choices.
I strongly suggest that you re-think your heavy-handed tactics or face defeat at the hands of more reasonable, freedom-loving Davis citizens.
Rarely agree with Mr. Entrikin, but he has this “nailed”, IMHO… “zealotry” is the bane that will divide this community (on almost any issue), and will prevent this community from finding ‘common ground’ on those issues… we need to discuss, listen, then, as appropriate, act… oh, yeah…
i have no credibility because I feel I can’t use my real name…
[quote]I will burn mine , whenever I want , you guys have to many rules[/quote]
Who cares, you live in Vacaville.
I am starting a fire right now. , and I live in Davis
To Rick Entrikin:
You seem to believe that your freedom to burn and pollute the air takes precedence over every other consideration. Alan Pryor spent years accummulating the studies and data he presents demonstrating the damaging effects of wood smoke, yet you toss all of that aside if favor of your God given right to pollute.
I have COPD; that is asthma and emphasyma. I also have a need to go to various areas of Davis to meetings etc. frequently. Last winter, everywhere I went in Davis, I experienced acrid smoke filled air. Not only does that trigger allergy responses, I have to realize that I am sucking particulates into my already compromised lungs. Your God given right to pollute is killing me and hundreds of other people with compromised respiratory and cardiac systems and it is permanently damaging the lungs of our children. Why else do you think the American Lung Association and Breath California among many others agree with Alan Pryor in his assessment of the affects of wood burning on our health?
Davis has played with the issue of wood burning for several years. It is time to do something about it. There is no God given or Constitutional right to burn wood and pollute the air. There is, however, much evidence that wood burning pollutes and threatens the health of our elderly, our children and ourselves.
The ordinance proposed by the NRC, after much study by that commission, is a reasonable solution. It is not as “draconian”, as many viewed it,as what was originally proposed, which included a ban on open hearth fire places. It proposes restrictions on burning based on PM levels and wind speeds. It is actually less restrictive than Sacramento’s ordinance which has absolute bans based on PM levels. It is time Davis tried to live up to its environmental reputation.
Oh boy, another ordinance that gives yet another opportunity for neighbors to call the police on each other. Didn’t we learn anything after the snoring incident?
I do not support this ordinance.
I think some of the detractors who frame this as a case of civil liberties vs, “fanatical zeolots” should get out of town more often and look around the world to see what is going on elsewhere. 90 % of the people between Bakersfield and Chico are now covered by mandatory wood-burning restrictions including everyone in the Bay Area. We are actually in a very small minority of people who are not covered by mandatory restrictions. Even Chico now is covered. Here is a quote from Chico City Councilmemeber Andt Holcombe when asked why he supported mandatory restrictions,
“”We were asked to get in touch with reality,” Holcombe said. “The reality is people are dying and smoke is contributing to their deaths…. We were asked to consider liberty. I don’t know if there would be anything more deterrent of someone’s liberty than if they were dying.”
Here’s another from former Chair of the Sac AQMD and current Roseville Councilmember Jeff Starsky, ““This type of particulate matter can be very, very dangerous. For someone with asthma, it can be life-threatening…Anyone who goes for a walk on a cold evening and all the people in the neighborhood are firing up their fireplaces, they can taste it, they can feel it, it chokes their breathing, it is that noticeable…And that is why we, as responsible public officials, have to do something about it” – Insights, Capital Public Radio, 11-21-2006.
Plus the proposed Davis City Ordinance is specifcally supported by the American Lung Association and Breathe California’s Health Effects Advisory Task Force (of which Tom Cahill is a member).
The I guess there are a few other “fanatical zealots” out there like me also.
I will continue to burn my aged (2+yr) wood whenever I choose.
Some of those who have posted here on this issue seem to feel they have some kind of God-given right to burn and to pollute the air we all have to breath, and that that right supercedes all other considerations. I disagree.
Allan Pryor has spent years studying this issue. He has collected volumes of studies and data that show conclusively that wood smoke is dangerous to our health and that we have a problem here in Davis. Why do you think that the American Lung Association and Breathe California agree with Mr. Pryor and support the efforts he has made to address the issue here? Yet, many of you dismiss this information, insisting that your right to burn and pollute take precedence.
I have asthma and emphysema. I often have to travel to different parts of Davis for meetings, events, etc. Last winter, in every neighborhood I visited, I was greeted with acrid wood smoke. Not only does this trigger allergic reactions for me, and many like me, but I have to recognize that when I inhale this polluted air, I am sucking poisonous particulate matter deep into my already impaired lungs. Your “God-given right to burn” is killing me and many like me with weakened respiratory and cardiac systems and it is permanently damaging the lungs of our children.
Mr. Pryor has worked with the city’s Natural Resources Commission for two years to develop an ordinance on wood burning that is based on the irrefutable scientific evidence that the particulate matter in wood smoke is life-threatening, and that under certain conditions in winter when you are all exercising your “right to unfettered burning”, Davis air is unsafe to breath. The NRC’s recommendations present a reasonable approach to protecting our vulnerable population from the dangers of wood smoke. Please go on the city’s website and read the ordinance.
Our city has been dancing around the issue of wood smoke for about 5 years now. There is no question that wood smoke is harmful and life-threatening. There is no question that we have a problem here in Davis. Most other communities in California have already adopted restrictions or bans on wood burning. It is time for Davis to join them.
I haven’t heard that we have a problem in Davis that is created in Davis.
This ordinance doesn’t ban burning wood in fireplaces, just restricts it to 6 hours at a time. It also gives the Davis police yet another ordinance to I just don’t see how this ordinance will solve “no burns” health problems. It just may be that “no burn” who has asthma and emphysema and allergies really shouldn’t be living in the Sacramento Valley.
Edits in italics.
I haven’t heard that we have a problem in Davis that is created in Davis.
This ordinance doesn’t ban burning wood in fireplaces, just restricts it to 6 hours at a time. It also gives the Davis police yet another ordinance to enforce. I just don’t see how this ordinance will solve “no burns” health problems. It just may be that “no burn” who has asthma and emphysema and allergies really shouldn’t be living in the Sacramento Valley.
Disagreeing on the fine points of an ordinance, and whether there should be one, is one thing — we all need to be able to hear one another and voice our opinions (which, hopefully, will lead to some common ground and agreement). However, I am quite saddened to read comments by those who feel anyone with less than perfect health should move elsewhere, or by those who have blatant disregard for the well-being of one’s neighbor. How could anyone agree with someone who just doesn’t give a damn about anyone else? The endeavor through this process should be to provide clean and breathable air for all.
To No Burn: I can understand your concerns, but it would seem to me the better approach, from an enforcement point of view, is to follow Sacramento’s ordinance. It doesn’t sound like it would ultimately be any less restrictive than the NRC’s recommendation, in the ultimate end. Don Shor has pointed out that when the NRC’s prohibition would kick in, the Sacramento’s prohibition would have already kicked in. So do we really need another layer of bureaucracy? I don’t think so.
Data collected shows that we have a problem in Davis that is created in Davis.
The current ordinance does ban burning in open hearth fireplaces when PMs are 25ug or higher and wind speeds are under 12 mph and in EPA certified appliances when PMs are 25ug/cubic meter or higher and wind speeds are under 5 mph. With PMs lower than 25 ug and windspeeds 12 mph or higher, burning is permitted in open hearth fireplaces for 6 hours. Whe PMs are 25 ug or lower and wind speeds are 5mph or higher, burning is prohibited in open hearth, but permitted in EPA certified for 12 hours. Conditions would be broadcast on local media. Enforcement would be complaint based. Burning under these conditions, would generally ensure that no smoke collects at the neighborhood level, so the air would be free of smoke.
It is a complicated ordinance. I would not object to adopting something like Sacramento’s proposed new rules, which would simply prohibit all burning if PMs are 30 ug or above. There may be some tiers to this one too. Not sure yet. Sacramento’s rules do not apply to Davis, so no new layer of bureaucracy.
“It is a complicated ordinance. I would not object to adopting something like Sacramento’s proposed new rules, which would simply prohibit all burning if PMs are 30 ug or above. There may be some tiers to this one too. Not sure yet. Sacramento’s rules do not apply to Davis, so no new layer of bureaucracy.”
No, no, no. What I am saying is that if we adopted Sacramento’s ordinance, we would not need to create a whole other layer of bureaucracy with our own special separate ordinance. Why reinvent the wheel, when Sacramento’s ordinance would do us just fine!