Emissions standards to go nationwide?....

Garnification said:

Spoke with a gentleman the other day and he said that the epa is pushing for the wood fired emissions standard (phase one?) to be nationwide by this time next year. Can anyone confirm?

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No data, but it might start getting rid of some of the smokier OWB's if they did...

Of course, even if they are pushing for it, that doesn't necessarily mean that they will actually do so...

My understanding is that while some parts of the EPA or individuals working there might be urging it, it doesn't become more than just a rumor until they publish a proposed regulation in the Federal Register, and then there is a whole series of hearings, comment periods, and so forth that have to happen before it becomes an actual regulation. I'm not sure just how one finds out if there are such proposals being made, it's possible that Thomas.gov may cover it, I'm not sure... You might also be able to check with the EPA directly...

Gooserider

What is meant by "wood fired emissions standard"? Would that apply to indoor wood furnaces too then?

freeburn said:

What is meant by "wood fired emissions standard"? Would that apply to indoor wood furnaces too then?

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I believe that standard is pointed at OWB's only.

Regardless of how we feel about OWB's I think anyone that is an active wood burner should oppose the "more restrictions" mentality. Eventually it will affect all of us no matter how clean we think our indoor units burn. The hard core greenies won't stop until you can't even run an outdoor grill because it "smokes too much" when you're grilling up hamburgers.

You can't legistlate responsible use. More government control, in my humble opinion, is not the answer. Just look at gun legislation for a quick summary of how it will go...

I disagree. I have a Tarm 40. I am nice to my neighbors... less smoke for them to breath. I have at least 6 OWB within 1 mile radius of my house. Sometimes the nearest one 1/4 mile away sends me a huge smoke screen. I say it is governments job to regulate them. I would say instead of looking at teh way gov't deals with guns... look at how it dealt with cigarrette smoke. That issue is a more relevant one to OWB.

The standards should included all wood burning appliances and there should be smoke cops to arrest and heavily fine anyone burning a campfire without the prescribed smokeless wood

Birdman said:

I disagree. I have a Tarm 40. I am nice to my neighbors... less smoke for them to breath. I have at least 6 OWB within 1 mile radius of my house. Sometimes the nearest one 1/4 mile away sends me a huge smoke screen. I say it is governments job to regulate them. I would say instead of looking at teh way gov't deals with guns... look at how it dealt with cigarrette smoke. That issue is a more relevant one to OWB.

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I hope you're ready to give up your Tarm when Big Government get's done dealing with OWB's. You're next....certainly our gassers produce smoke, especially during start up. Eventually that much smoke will be "too much".

Note that I said increased gov't regs might start getting rid of some of the smokier OWB’s, not that I approved of the idea of the regs... As a hard core libertarian, I don't think the gov't has much business regulating such things for the most part...

One of the problems w/ gov't regs is that they effectively define "acceptable" as well as "not acceptable" - thus a problem person can avoid hassles by pointing at the regs and says "I meet the standard" while everyone downstream gags... The libertarian concept would be more inclined to go with litigation using the "trespass" idea - It is OK to dump garbage in your yard, but not if it crosses the fence into mine... If it does, you have to either stop, or pay me enough that I am willing to let you... If you do a trial w/ a jury of peers, (and a "loser pays" cost strategy) you rapidly end up with a pretty good idea of what will be acceptable, and a level of flexibility to allow different areas to have different standards.

So in our wood boiler case - "OK, jury members, today we are going to go sit on the downwind property line while Joe Smokesalot cycles his OWB - you will decide if his neighbor Sue Breathesalot has a legitimate complaint about his smoke being excessive, or if Sue needs to get a life...."

Joe has an incentive not to smoke out his neighbors, and insist on a clean burning boiler that he operates properly, and with "loser pays" his neighbors have reason not to make complaints unless they really do have a serious problem...

Gooserider

maybe the gov. should worry about all fires that are started either by strangers burning wildfiresdnr burning off grass lands!
there is many other things to worry about other than some ones smokn stove .yes i do not believe in DNR burning im a fireman and it just pisses me off!

I wonder how many pollutants air force one puts into the atmosphere compared to my Eko.........

thank you much,how about the 16 trains that go by or company per day

You people sound bad when you read down thru the posts... Don't get me wrong I don't agree with all the regulations either. That said now something does have
to be done with the owb smoke. If that was a car making that much smoke in your face the tickets would fall like snow. Sorry starting to rant , I have looked at
owb and from what i read the smoke offenders have to short of stacks to get the flu gases above peoples houses. That said the simple fix would be to go around
and fine the offenders acordingly ( the 6' pipe when it should be25' to get above the house 30' away). :cheese:

I tend to agree with Stee. It would be nice to be reasonable & say you can't smoke out your neighbors except it isn't going to stop there. The "Green" people need to also be reasonable & they aren't going to be. I think the gun control example is right on. Take Great Briton, everybody thought it was reasonable to register guns, then it was reasonable to require gun safes, then these needed to be government inspected, next step was turning over your guns or going to jail. My point is I think we need to do whats right with OWB smoke & fight from then on so we don't hear that our gassers need twin catalytic converters if not an outright ban, Randy

The definition of "a society" is that boundaries and limits are set to the benefit of the community.

Lots of stuff pollutes, that is a problem for all of us.

I wouldn't worry about the "big we" ending wood fired appliances, but pollution everywhere needs to be controlled. In the case of appliances that we talked about, pollution laws make the manufactures produce their products in a more level playing field. In my view it presently is not that way.

My next door neighbor demonstrates virtually no ability to run a smoke free wood burning stove fire. That is certainly an equally important issues. To this day they still can't find a way to burn cleanly, you would think that after the fire department came there for a chimney fire they would make an effort to learn how to burn wood. But as far as I can see they haven't learned yet.

I far as I can tell the "state of the art" is burning wood is using a gasification process. If I am correct then it will take something significantly better to removed those products.

Its happening in some states, and others are catching on. There are I believe a couple stated that are phase 2. Cities issuing burn bans and such. We don't have that around here, and probably never will in the middle of the country. But I bought my furnace which complies to EPA phase 1 standards. I did it incase such thing eventually would arise, and also I benefited with less wood consumption, more heat, and a cleaner chimney. Burning wood shouldn't be outlawed, but I do agree smoke dragons should be phased out over time.

Technically the Federal gov't should not step in unless the states delegate authority to it and unless the states delegate that authority the Fed should be forced to butt out. There are legitimate gripes with owb's putting out too much smoke at times. It is a step dangerously close to irrevocable to involve big government in something that can be handled locally. Colorado has restrictions on burning wood but policies there would not necessarily apply reasonably in a plains state or a less densely populated area. What better group of people to decide than the area where the owb/wood burning appliance is located? There is no real simple one choice does it all solution.

give them an inch they will take a mile eventually they will own your car your bank your house and eventually your wood burner .i think it should go on a case by case basis . a govenrment big enough to give yo ueverything you want is big enough to take it all away .the less big brother is involved... the better IMHO

laynes69 said:

Its happening in some states, and others are catching on. There are I believe a couple stated that are phase 2. Cities issuing burn bans and such. We don't have that around here, and probably never will in the middle of the country. But I bought my furnace which complies to EPA phase 1 standards. I did it incase such thing eventually would arise, and also I benefited with less wood consumption, more heat, and a cleaner chimney. Burning wood shouldn't be outlawed, but I do agree smoke dragons should be phased out over time.

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For anyone who knows the answer - What exactly is a smoke dragon? If you do not have an EPA cert stove/furnace and you are burning it at optimal burn, least amt of smoke possible, does this still qualify as a smoke dragon? Or is the smoke dragon the OWB infamous for smoldering all day?

freeburn said:

laynes69 said:

Its happening in some states, and others are catching on. There are I believe a couple stated that are phase 2. Cities issuing burn bans and such. We don't have that around here, and probably never will in the middle of the country. But I bought my furnace which complies to EPA phase 1 standards. I did it incase such thing eventually would arise, and also I benefited with less wood consumption, more heat, and a cleaner chimney. Burning wood shouldn't be outlawed, but I do agree smoke dragons should be phased out over time.

Click to expand...

For anyone who knows the answer - What exactly is a smoke dragon? If you do not have an EPA cert stove/furnace and you are burning it at optimal burn, least amt of smoke possible, does this still qualify as a smoke dragon? Or is the smoke dragon the OWB infamous for smoldering all day?

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It's somewhat of a "context dependent" term, but the way we generally tend to use it is to refer to any wood burning appliance that is either "Pre-EPA" or that burns like it was...

Simple fact is that even with optimal burning practices, it is still hard to make a Pre-EPA stove, or non-gasifier boiler burn with anything approaching the cleanliness of a modern stove that is working properly (Unlike my Encore ) so while it is always good to burn as clean as one can, you will always get more smoke from a smoke dragon...

Gooserider