Wood Burning and Air quality

Hi Everyone!

This forum opportunity is so exciting! I'm so glad we have this BLOG format/medium of communicating and sharing as a community ;)

Below is some information The SMMHOA Board asked me to distribute to the Community regarding this topic of community interest. Please feel free to comment/post your thoughts and additional ideas or information regarding this topic. Thanks, Rev. Joe

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To : Sunrise Mountain Residents/Owners (SMMHOA members) and Tenants,

RE:

The particulate smoke emerging from house chimneys means the homes' residents are NOT burning their fires HOT enough; add fuel or air or both !!

Wildfires and temperature inversions make our normally pristine Cazadero air unhealthy. Many people here on Sunrise Mountain are suffering from breathing issues. Burning any items other than the wood necessary for heating, especially plastic, creates noxious and toxic fumes that our neighbors breathe. As residents and HOA members, as well as any tenants, we have a mutual caring concern about our Sunrise Mountain neighbors and community, and would never knowingly or intentionally want to harm others suffering with respiratory ailments by the burning of such items.

Q. Does smoke from fireplaces and wood stoves cause breathing problems?

A. YES, smoke particles can irritate airways and reduce lung function, leading to difficulty breathing and asthma attacks. Children, older people, and those with heart or lung disease are most vulnerable.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) warns that tiny particles in wood smoke can also increase the risk of stroke, heart at­tack, heart failure, and irreg­ular heart­beat.

To remedy this:

...Add fuel /dry wood or air or both!! ...

and burn only untreated, thoroughly dried wood...Don't burn wet wood. Wet wood dramatically reduces the efficiency of your woodstove and throws a lot of smoke.

Responsible wood heat means burning wood as completely as possible to increase heat, as well as reduce wildfire-starting embers and emissions of potentially harmful pollutants.

And for cleaner air, use a clean-burning gas or wood stove. Older uncertified wood stoves release 15 to 30 grams of smoke particulates per hour (g/h), but new EPA-certified stoves produce just 2 to 7 grams of particulates per hour. Look for the EPA white certification label on the back of the stove before buying. A lower g/h rating means a cleaner, more efficient wood stove.

Conventional fireplaces emit about 50 grams of particulate per hour. Find out what to look for when buying a pellet or wood stove and learn more about EPA's Wood Burning Fireplace Program.

10 Tips for Burning Firewood Responsibly

The Sonoma County Gazette By Jeff Serena

The renewed popularity of firewood as a fuel for home heating in the United States is raising some legitimate concerns about air pollution and health. The basic problem is that woodstoves don't completely burn all of the wood that we put into them. If they did, woodstoves would only produce heat, light, water vapor, and carbon dioxide—and only the amount of carbon dioxide that the wood would release anyway if left to rot on the ground. With incomplete burning, however, we also get noxious pollutants like carbon monoxide, various nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons, and, perhaps most importantly, microscopic particles of wood tar, soot, and ash—smoke.

Responsible wood heat means burning wood as completely as possible to increase heat and reduce embers and emissions of potentially harmful pollutants. Here are some ways to do that.

1. Burn wood in an EPA-certified wood stove or fireplace insert. Since 1992, woodstoves and inserts sold in the United States have incorporated technology that reduces emissions by burning much of the smoke before it gets into your chimney, either by means of a secondary combustion chamber or, less frequently, a catalytic combustor. This technology not only reduces emissions, but greatly improves the efficiency of the stove in converting firewood into heat, so you need less wood to heat your home. As an added bonus, the reduction in smoke output will keep your chimney cleaner, reducing the risk of a potentially dangerous chimney fire. If you're burning in an old wood stove, look into replacing it with a modern appliance. If you're shopping for a new stove, try to find one with an efficiency rating of 70 percent or higher and an emissions rate of 3.5 grams per hour or less (see footnote below).

2. Have your chimney inspected before having any new stove professionally installed. Bad wood stove installations and poor chimney linings are just plain dangerous.

3. Don't try to heat your home by burning in an open fireplace. Fireplace fires look nice, but they're hugely inefficient, typically losing 70 to 90 percent of the heat up the chimney. Besides, they throw sparks and trash the air outside the house—and often the air inside the house too.

4. Don't burn in a thirty-five-to-one firewood burner. These burners look like real wood stoves, but they dodge the EPA regs by having virtually unregulated airflow into the firebox, making them the equivalent of an open fireplace. That's bad. Lots of pollution and little heat.

5. Don't burn wet wood. Wet wood dramatically reduces the efficiency of your woodstove and throws a lot of smoke. Whether you buy your wood cut and split, have logs delivered, or fell your own trees, do it early (or even the year before) so the wood has time to dry. Stack the wood off the ground in a place that gets direct sunlight and good air circulation. In wet or humid climates, like CAZADERO!, cover the top of the stack to keep the rain off. Properly dried firewood should have no more than 25 percent moisture by weight, and 15 to 20 percent is better.

6. Don't burn anything in your stove except untreated wood and a little plain newspaper to help get the fire going. No pressure-treated lumber scraps, painted wood, plastic, old magazines, junk mail, notifications of property tax increases, or other trash.

7. Stage your firewood indoors. Find a sufficient space in your home to stack two or more days' supply of firewood within reasonable distance of your wood stove or insert. There are some nice racks made for the purpose, or you can build your own. Holding a small amount of wood inside warms and dries the wood a bit (making ignition faster and easier and cutting down on smoke), adds a little moisture to the dry winter air in your house, and keeps you from having to open the door and go outside repeatedly to bring wood inside five sticks at a time. People worry about bringing in termites or such, but if your wood was stacked and dried properly, there's no significant threat of imported pests.

8. Don't let the fire smolder. Either build a real fire or let it go out. If you see smoke coming out of your chimney, you're not burning hot enough, and you need to add fuel or air or both. One spring a few years ago, a neighbor looked at my depleted woodpile and unwittingly paid me the highest compliment you can give a firewood burner: "When do you burn all that wood? I never see smoke coming out of your chimney."

9. Watch for creosote build-up in your woodstove. Most modern wood stoves have a nice window so you can watch the fire. It's cozy and romantic, and it's also a coal-mine canary. If the window is collecting dark brown deposits from creosote (the tarry footprint of incompletely burned wood) it's a dead giveaway that your chimney and the air outside are getting the creosote treatment, too. The pollution is bad, and creosote build-up in the chimney is the main fuel for dangerous chimney fires. If you're seeing creosote on the window, increase the airflow into the stove.

10. Keep your wood stove clean and in good working order. Too much ash in the firebox can block the air intake and make for inefficient burning. Replace broken fire bricks and tattered gaskets. Have your chimney professionally cleaned.

Burning wood the right way warms your home, keeps your family safe, makes your neighbors happy, and helps keep the air clean for everyone.

Anyone whose sole source of heat is a wood-burning device must utilize an EPA-certified or pellet-fueled device that is registered with the Air District for an exemption from the burn ban. An open hearth fireplace will no longer qualify for an exemption in Sonoma County.

(click this link) EPA's Wood Burning Fireplace Program The online application was recently revised in preparation for the Winter 2018/2019 Wood Smoke Reduction Incentive Program. Please sign up if you would like to receive notifications about this winter’s and upcoming 2019/2020 Program.