Getting the most out of your firewood

Summer is over and the chilly nights are upon us. You may be getting ready to fire up your wood stove or fireplace as you settle in for the winter. Before you do, however, take a moment to learn about temperature inversions, air quality burn bans, and how to get the most out of your fire while protecting your health.

Poor air quality can result in a burn ban

During the winter, a weather pattern called an inversion can trap stagnant air and unhealthy wood smoke close to the ground. 

If air quality reaches unhealthy levels, an air quality burn ban may be called by your local clean air agency, Ecology, or tribes. Check for an air quality burn ban in your area at ecology.wa.gov/burnbans or waburnbans.net. 


Air quality burn bans have two stages:

• Stage 1 burn ban
• No use of uncertified wood stoves or fireplaces is allowed.
• No outdoor burning, agricultural, or forest burning is allowed.
• Stage 2 burn ban
• No burning indoors or outdoors is allowed.

Air quality burn bans do not apply if wood is your only source of heat. 

Only burn dry, seasoned wood

Dry, seasoned wood provides up to 44 percent more heat than fresh cut or wet wood. Not only does that save you money, it creates less smoke and air pollution. Follow these tips to get the most out of your fire:

• Split your wood as soon as you get it.
• Stack your wood so it has airflow.
• Season your wood for at least 6 months.
• Cover your wood to keep it out of rain and snow.

A good burning fire should have minimal smoke coming out of the chimney and should be easy to see through. Filling your stove up with wood doesn’t make a fire hotter - by overfilling your stove, you rob the fire of oxygen, thereby producing less heat, wasting wood, and creating more unhealthy smoke.

Use the right wood stove for your home

Ecology regulates the types of wood burning devices that can be sold, resold, exchanged, or given away. These devices must meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Washington’s stricter certification standards. Use a stove that is certified in Washington, the right size for your home, and properly installed. Never install, sell, or even give away a non-certified wood stove.

If your stove isn’t certified, you should replace it, or consider switching to a natural gas or electric device. Check with your local clean air agency for grant programs to help offset the costs of replacing a wood stove with a certified model, or switching your heat source altogether. 

Health effects from wood smoke

Wood smoke is one of the main sources of air pollution in Washington and can cause health problems for everyone. Wood stoves, fireplaces, and other wood burning devices put out hundreds of times more air pollution than other sources of heat, such as natural gas or electricity. The smoke and soot from burning wood contains fine particles and harmful gases, including carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, and organic compounds. The particles are so small that they lodge deep in your lungs when inhaled and can cause serious health problems, including:

• Burning eyes
• Runny nose
• Coughing
• Respiratory infections
• Asthma attacks
• Bronchitis
• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer
• Irregular heart beat
• Heart attacks and cardiovascular disease
• Stroke
  

Kids, the elderly, pregnant women, and people with existing lung or heart diseases are the most sensitive to air pollution. Households that burn wood for heat are at greater risk for respiratory illnesses. Learn more about how wood smoke harms your health.

Now that you are prepared, go ahead and make some hot chocolate, break out your fuzzy slippers and have a movie marathon night in front of your nice, safe, warm fire.

By Kim Vaughn / Air Quality

Clean Air Month - part 2

Ways to protect the air

Today, we’re continuing our blog conversations that celebrate Clean Air – and sharing practical ways we all can do our part to protect and improve the air we breathe. Last time, we looked at just what is part of the Clean Air Act. In this blog, we'll consider how wood burning, household chemicals and buying products made locally impact air quality.

Buy local
The less time products spend on a ship, train, or semi-truck the less air pollution is created.

 

Consider ways to reduce, reuse, recycle, and reconsider where your items originate from. Buying local also supports small businesses and creates jobs. We all win when you buy local!

Use an adequate wood burning device
During winter we often have stagnant air that traps smoke near the ground. Heating your home with a wood burning device can increase your family’s health risk consisting of lung and breathing problems. Wood burning devices include:

• Wood and pellet stoves.
• Wood furnaces.
• Manufactured fireplaces.
• Masonry heaters.

Only certified wood burning devices are legal to purchase, sell, or give away in this state, whether new or used. They must meet Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Washington standards. If it doesn’t, check with your local air authority for grant programs to help replace your old stove, or better yet, switch to electric heat! Many electric companies offer grants to help convert your house to electric heat.

Burn wood the right way
You should only burn dry wood that has been split, stacked, and stored for at least a year. Dry wood emits less smoke and makes a hotter fire. You should be able to easily see through the smoke coming from your chimney. If you buy wood, ask if it has been properly seasoned. Properly dried and aged wood burns more efficient and saves you money! 

Only burn vegetation
Never burn anything other than vegetation. Check for burn bans before you start a fire and keep something nearby to extinguish it. For campfires, be sure to put them out completely and never leave them unattended. Everybody loves a good fire, but the smoke shouldn’t annoy your neighbor.

Burn barrels, construction debris, garbage, and scraps from another property are illegal to burn everywhere in Washington.

Reconsider burning altogether
There are many alternatives to burning yard waste. When mowing, leave grass clippings where they land. They provide nutrients for your lawn. Start making your own garden compost, or check with your community for free yard waste drop off days. The less you burn, the cleaner the air.

Dispose chemicals responsibly
Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) contribute to ground-level ozone formation because they evaporate into the air. Check with your local landfill or visit Ecology’s website to find a proper disposal facility. 

Some common VOCs to look out for are:

• Acetone (nail polish remover, furniture polish, wallpaper).
• Benzene (glue, paint, carpet, gasoline emissions).
• Butanal (barbeque emissions, burning candles, stoves, cigarettes).
• Carbon disulfide (chlorinated tap water).
• Dichlorobenzene (mothballs, deodorizers). 
• Ethanol (glass cleaners, dishwasher and laundry detergents).
• Formaldehyde (floor lacquers, some molded plastics).
• Terpene (fragrances such as soap and detergents).
• Toluene (paint).
• Xylene (traffic emissions, idling cars).

In our next blog we’ll address how all these activities influence climate change and how clean energy industries and our vehicle choices have an impact on clean air.

By Kim Vaughn | Air Quality

Baby, it’s cold outside

There’s nothing like a fire to warm you to the core, right? 
Wait — not so fast. Did you check to see if there’s a burn ban before lighting that fire?

Wood smoke is one of the main sources of air pollution in Washington. In the winter, it contributes to more than half of Washington’s fine particle air pollution.

What causes a burn ban?

In the winter, unhealthy levels of wood smoke in the air are caused by a weather pattern called an inversion that causes stagnant air to trap smoke close to the ground. The landscape and the number of homes using wood heat are also factors. When pollution reaches unhealthy levels determined by state and federal health-based standards, air quality agencies call an air quality burn ban to protect your health.

An air quality burn ban (aka home heating burn ban) has two stages:

Stage 1 burn ban

• No use of uncertified wood stoves or fireplaces is allowed. 
• No outdoor burning, agricultural, or forest burning is allowed. 

Stage 2 burn ban

• No burning indoors or outdoors is allowed, unless wood is your only source of heat. 

Air quality burn bans last only as long as it takes to get air quality back to a healthier level.

What you can do

If you use wood to heat your house:

• Use a Washington-certified wood burning device. 
• Burn only dry wood. 
• Obey wood burning rules. 
• Check for a burn ban in your area.

Health effects of wood smoke

Wood stoves and fireplaces give off hundreds of times more air pollution than other sources of heat like natural gas or electricity. The smoke and soot from burning wood contain fine particles and harmful gases, including carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, and organic compounds. These gases can cause cancer and other health problems. The fine particles are so small that they lodge deep in our lungs when we inhale them and can cause serious health problems, including:

• Asthma attacks. 
• Bronchitis. 
• Respiratory infections. 
• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). 
• Lung cancer. 
• Irregular heart beat. 
• Heart attacks. 
• Cardiovascular disease.
• Stroke.

Who is hurt by wood smoke?

Wood smoke can affect anyone, causing symptoms such as burning eyes, a runny nose, coughing, and bronchitis. Kids, the elderly, pregnant women, and people with existing lung disease (like asthma and COPD) or heart disease are the most sensitive to wood smoke. Research shows that obesity or diabetes may also increase a person’s risk of experiencing health effects.

Back in the day

Air quality agencies began limiting the use of wood stoves in 1987 to “control, reduce, and prevent air pollution caused by wood stove emissions.” In 1996, smoke from wood stoves made up 11 percent of our air pollution. That’s 231,000 tons of carbon monoxide, 75,000 tons of volatile organic compounds, and 31,000 tons of fine particles! By 1998, 10 counties — Benton, Clark, Franklin, King, Pierce, Snohomish, Spokane, Thurston, Walla Walla, and Yakima — had air quality that exceeded federal health-based standards. Not all of these areas exceeded standards only because of wood smoke, but other types of air pollution add to the problem.

When an area exceeds federal health-based standards, it is called a nonattainment area. As recently as 2009, part of Tacoma-Pierce County was a nonattainment area because it consistently had unhealthy levels of air pollution from wood smoke. As of the end of 2017, all counties in Washington are in attainment with air quality standards.

Do your part to keep our air healthy, and keep air quality burn bans shorter and less frequent. We’ll all breathe more easily during the winter.

 By Miriam Duerr | Air Quality