King County Outdoor Burning

Good meeting with PSCAA

2008-05-06T10:31:00.000-07:00

Last night Jim Nolan of the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency came to the Greater Maple Valley Area Council that represents the interests of the unincorporated residents of the Tahoma School District. It was a good meeting overall.

Lots of people showed up to express their dislike for the proposed burn ban and to express their dislike for governmental regulations in general. Jim Nolan took quite a bit of time to listen to people express their opinions.

Jim had a number of good points that he wanted to make, and I thought they're worth sharing here:

- He recognizes the importance of outdoor burning in King County and now sees that there aren't alternatives for many property owners. He said he doesn't ever anticipate a time in the future that all properties in King County will have reasonable alternatives.

- He approves and appreciates people using wood to heat their homes. He recognizes firewood is a renewable resource that is in abundant supply here in King County.

- He is scaling back the recommendation to only ban burning on the most dense portions of the rural areas. He is asking rural residents to define what they consider to be rural. People volunteered that rural communities don't have street lights or sidewalks, they often have animals, and rural communities don't have lots that are under 10,000 square feet in size.

Jim Nolan will come back to the meeting in August and present the new recommendation to the PSCAA at that time and get any additional feedback prior to making the recommendation to King County.

Senator Pam Roach Supports Outdoor Burning

2008-05-01T09:40:00.000-07:00

Those of us who live in South King County are fortunate enough to have some great people representing our causes. I received an e-mail from Senator Pam Roach a couple days ago about the outdoor burning ban. She clearly supports allowing continued outdoor burning.

Senator Pam Roach wrote in her e-mail. "I support the ability of homeowners to burn under proper conditions."

Your senators and representatives are the right channel to go through if you wish to keep outdoor burning around. Please write to the state congress and insist they continue to allow our traditional practices.

Online petition for Continued Outdoor Burning.

2008-05-01T09:36:00.000-07:00

I will be attending the Greater Maple Valley Area Council meeting on Monday and encourage everyone else to as well to show support for continued outdoor burning.

I am starting an online petition for everyone to sign to show your support for the burn ban. Please add a comment to this posting showing you are in favor of continued outdoor burning. If enough people sign on, I'll start a real petition and start to get signatures and submit to the legislature.

See you Monday!

Focus group meetings

2008-04-28T08:40:00.000-07:00

The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency is holding focus group meetings with the various area councils in King County. They are trying to refine their outdoor burning ban policy and try to figure out how they can revise the scope of the burn ban in a way that will be more palatable for King County residents.

Two focus groups have been scheduled:

Maple Valley Greater Area Council: Monday, May 5th. Located at 22300 SE 231st, Maple Valley.
Four Creeks Unincorporated Area Council: Wednesday, May 21st. Located at 16431 SE Renton-Issaquah Rd.

Additional meetings will North Highline, Upper Bear Creek, West Hill, and the Vashon-Maury Island councils will be scheduled in the future.

PSCAA action

2008-03-01T19:22:00.000-08:00

Agency bans all land-clearing burning in King, Pierce, Snohomish counties effective July 1, will reconsider residential outdoor burn bans in the fall

A permanent ban on land-clearing burning in King, Pierce and Snohomish counties was adopted yesterday by the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency’s Board of Directors. The ban is effective July 1, 2008. The Board deferred a decision to prohibit residential yard waste burning in non-urban areas of these same counties until October of this year, pending further analysis of available alternatives.

Land clearing burning applies to fires to clear land for development, such as building a new structure or subdivision. Residential yard waste burning means outdoor burning by a property owner of leaves, clippings and yard debris from his or her own property.

Prior to this action, land clearing and residential yard waste fires were prohibited only in the urban areas of King, Kitsap, Pierce and Snohomish Counties. In December 2007, the Clean Air Agency proposed the three-county ban on both land clearing and residential yard waste burning. The proposed effective date for banning land clearing burning was July 1, 2008 and July 1, 2010 for yard waste burning. Kitsap County was not included in the proposal because reasonable alternatives are not yet available.

The Board’s decision was preceded by a public hearing, during which several people testified in favor of a total burn ban, but many owners of large properties pointed out that alternatives to burning such as curbside pick-up, chipping on-site or hauling yard debris to drop-off sites were not reasonably and economically viable. Agency staff heard this same message at a series of rural area workshops in January.

“We learned a lot from these large property owners,” the agency’s Compliance Director, Jim Nolan, told the Board. “They told us our alternatives to burning don’t address their needs. We have more work to do.”

Although the agency’s Board of Directors deferred action on residential yard waste burning, they clearly stated their unanimous intent that residential yard waste burning should ultimately be banned in denser sections of rural areas.

They directed staff to come back to the October Board meeting with revised recommendations regarding restrictions on land clearing burning in Kitsap County and residential yard debris burning in all four counties which could be implemented no later than July 1, 2010. They also directed agency staff to work with county solid waste and fire officials on expanded burn ban boundary lines, development of additional alternatives to burning and enforcement mechanisms for rural areas of the agency’s jurisdiction.

“This is about balancing property rights and public health,” said Board Chair Paul Roberts. “This is about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness – and life comes first. It’s time to move forward on this issue.”

By taking this action yesterday, the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency’s Board of Directors closed the public comment period on its current proposal. Public comment will be sought if another rule is proposed.

Public Hearing Today

2008-02-28T07:30:00.000-08:00

As a reminder, the public hearing for the proposed ban on outdoor burning will be today. I'll post the outcome of the meeting as soon as I learn of the board's actions.

The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency is recommending the Board of Directors to approve the ban on landclearing burning and temporarily hold the ban on residential burning based on the comments received. The agency staff feels that that the comments receive do not clearly indicate that reasonable alternatives exist for residential burning.

The Staff will request that the Board of Directors request they continue working with appropriate officials and conduct additional research to develop the case that reasonable alternatives exist for outdoor burning in King County.

I'll let you know the results of the public hearing today.

State Law requires clean forests

2008-02-27T06:45:00.000-08:00

The Revised Code of Washington requires landowners in Washington to reduce the fuel load in the forests to prevent the spread of wildfire. The law was enacted in 1986 and is generally used to create a special property tax that funds the DNR specifically for forest fire fighting.

In my opinion, reducing the fuel load of a forest is one of the many tools a landowner has to provide protection against the spread of fire.

RCW 76.04.600
Owners to protect forests.
Every owner of forest land in the state of Washington shall furnish or provide, during the season of the year when there is danger of forest fires, adequate protection against the spread of fire thereon or therefrom which shall meet with the approval of the department.

Contact your state legislative representative....

2008-02-25T20:46:00.000-08:00

I read over the recommendations given to the PSCAA Board of Directors by the staff employees regarding the burn ban. Thankfully, they are deferring the residential burn ban for now but are intending to revisit the issue in the October 2008 meeting.

In the memo, the staff members raised a very interesting point: They accurately say that the purpose of the agency is not to create policy but to enact and enforce the policy set by the legislature. In fact, the staff members cite Revised Code of Washington as the underlying policy they are required to follow:

"Burning shall be prohibited in an area when an alternate technology or method of disposing of the organic refuse is available, reasonably economical, and less harmful to the environment. It is the policy of this state to foster and encourage development of alternate methods or technology for disposing of or reducing the amount of organic refuse."

In other words, the staff is only permitted to evalute whether alternate technologies or methods of disposing are available. They placed the responsibility for burn ban on the state legislature when they enacted the ban in 1991.

I will be contacting my state congressmen and -women regarding the burn ban and would encourage you to do the same as well. Together we can let them know the value outdoor burning provides to the enviroment by continuing to keep fuel levels low in our forests (preventing uncontrolled wildfires in the future) and by allowing homeowners to care for the forests rather than subdivide them and turn our forests into new subdivisions!

EPA: Decomposing plants do not release carbon dioxide

2008-02-25T12:37:00.000-08:00

We all know that trees and plants use carbon dioxide and release oxygen while they are alive as we were taught in elementary school science class. It's a great arguments for planting and maintaining trees and forests here in King County. The trees and forests will release oxygen and help clean our air.

But what happens when the trees die off and the organic matter begins to decompose? Microbes and various fungi cause most of the wood decay around this neck of the woods. Well, both microbes and fungi use oxygen and give off carbon dioxide - the exact opposite of what plants do! Where does the carbon in carbon dioxide come from? The microorganisms are converting it from the tree or plant and returning it to our atmosphere.

A little portion of the plant or tree turns into soil. I don't have the data to cite a specific percentage but I believe that amount is relatively small as compared to the amount of plant matter that is converted back into carbon dixodie.

However, the EPA disagrees with the above explanation on political grounds. The EPA only recognizes carbon emissions due to direct human activity. A person lighting a burn pile is directly causing a release of carbon dioxide and this carbon release is considered when reviewing environmental impacts. However, a brush pile that is left sitting in the woods would decay naturally without human intervention. This carbon dioxide release is due to natural events and therefore is not considered when comparing carbon releases.

The State of Washington Ecology and Puget Sound Clean Air Authority both rely on EPA estimates when comparing alternatives. Under the PSCAA analysis of carbon releases, burning would release approximately 31,000 pounds of carbon dioxide (for 10 tons of brush burned) but would release no carbon dioxide if left to decay naturally without human intervention.

I'm not convinced this is an apples-to-apples comparison. It seems like carbon emissions should be considered carbon emissions whether caused by human activity or not. Does only human-caused carbon dioxide heat the planet or does all human-caused carbon dioxide heat the planet? I'd like to get your thoughts on this.

Is the Proposed Ban Fair to Senior Citizens?

2008-02-20T07:36:00.001-08:00

Many of the people commenting on the proposed ban on outdoor burning were self-described senior citizens. The senior citizens who chose to disclose their age ranged from mid-sixities to mid-eighties.

Several themes were common to all of the comments from our senior population:

- We have owned and cared for our land for years. We care dearly for the land and choose to keep it looking nice and tidy. We help reduce the fuel load of the forest and prevent forest fires by maintaining our land.

- We are choosing not to subdivide our property (at least for now). We are keeping larger lots in the country which city-folk love to view when they go on a Sunday drive into the country. We are continuing the traditional agricultural and silvicultural practices that King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties have endorsed as an important part of our area.

- Outdoor burning has been an efficient method of maintaining our property for the last 10 - 60 years. We no longer have the strength to load the material into chippers. Since we live on fixed incomes, we do not have thousands of dollars to hire people to clean the property for us. Curbside pickup is not available in our area (we have no curbs), and even if it was, our properties are large and the public right-of-way is hundreds to thousands of feet away.

- The proposed ban on outdoor burning would cause our properties to become littered with branches and brush. They would become overgrown and go fallow without our continued work on the property. We do not support the proposed ban on ourdoor burning.

I found these themes quite interesting because I did not look at it from the perspective of a senior citizen. Is it fair for the government to create such a drastic change in the life of person who has already paid their dues in our society? I certainly would feel bad for anyone who has spent a lifetime caring for property to be prohibited from maintaining it in the future since that'd be a crummy reward for a lifetime's efforts and energy.

Public Hearing February 28th

2008-02-19T10:41:00.000-08:00

Just a reminder that the public hearing for the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency will be on Thursday, February 28th at 9:15 AM.

Strong Support for Continued Outdoor Burning

2008-02-19T10:26:00.000-08:00

I just had an opportunity to review the comments (306 pages!) submitted by the public to the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency. After reviewing the comments, I can see there is strong support for continued outdoor burning. The comments against the burn ban proposal far outnumbered comments in favor of the proposal! While I didn't keep track of the ratio of comments, the ratio was at least a 5:1 against:for.

Some of the key points made by people against the burn ban proposal included:
- Many commentors felt that reasonable alternatives do not exist for people living on rural land (greater than 2 acres or so). They pointed out the large number of brush piles they have each year and the difficulty in hauling the debris to collection site.

- Many people who own larger parcels are senior citizens and would find the additional expense of hauling or chipping to be an unreasonable burden. Yet these landowners wish to continue maintaining the land as they have for up to 60 years rather than let it go to waste.

- Lots of people commented on how the additional trips to the compost facility as well as gas for the chippers would greatly increase air pollution. Several people (including Arie who commented on this blog as well) commented that the carbon dioxide released from the burn piles is no greater than the amount released due to natural decay.

Several people commenting in favor of the burn ban also had some valid points, and I should probably include them here to be fair to everyone.

- Several people commented that they were being smoked out by inconsiderate neighbors. Some people said the neighbors maintained a ongoing fire for up to four months! I feel bad for anyone that can't use the outside for any significant length of time and sure wish the had better neighbors. I agree there is a problem with these situations and additional controls may be necessary through the local fire department.

- Several people commented on disliking smoke of any kind and felt that indoor stoves/fireplaces should be banned as well. I would argue against banning indoor stoves because wood is America's renewable resource and is more plentiful on the local market than any other fuel source.

You can view the comments for yourself if interested at http://www.pscleanair.org/ and click on the outdoor burning link.

Open Letter to Puget Sound Clean Air Agency

2007-12-31T06:34:00.000-08:00

I recently submitted comments to the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency on the proposed outdoor burning ban. For good measure, I also submitted the same letter to King County Councilmember Pete von Reichbauer, Washington State Senator Pam Roach, State Represenative Chris Hunt, State Representative Dan Roach, and King County Executive Ron Sims (c/o Chief of Staff Jim Lopez).

--- Letter to Puget Sound Clean Air Agency---
I am writing in regards to the proposed ban on all outdoor burning in Pierce, King, and Snohomish counties by the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency.

I am part owner of a heavily forested thirty acre parcel of land outside Auburn, WA. The property is managed as a working forest with the management goals of increasing the value of the timberland and improving the overall forest health.

Jim Nolan of the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency and the Fire Warden at the Enumclaw office of the Washington Department of Natural Resources advised that outdoor burning would be prohibited on my property if the burn ban proposal is implemented as written.

I am concerned about my ability to continue managing our private forest without being able to burn the forest debris on the property. As a working forest, a large amount of branches, tree limbs, and other woody organic matter accumulate on the forest floor. The woody debris increases the forest fire danger and makes the woods more prone to forest fires. Maintaining a “healthy forest” by thinning selectively and reducing the fuel load is considered a best management practice to reduce the risk of wildfire. [1] Collecting the woody debris into piles and burning the matter is an effective way of reducing the fuels in the forest and minimizing the fire danger.

We all saw the immense devastation that the wildfires caused in California in 2007. I would sincerely hope the governments in the Puget sound region would create policies that encourage the removal of fuel building rather than encouraging landowners to allow it to accumulate.

Our forest contains a large amount of hardwood undergrowth, including vine maples and alder. The diameter and quantity of hardwood trees are not valuable for timber production and I will improve the timber quality of my forest by cutting, piling, and burning these small diameter hardwood trees. Douglas-fir, western hemlock, and western red cedar will be planted to replace the hardwood trees. Removal of the hardwood and replacing with conifer species is considered a best management practice by King County DNRP. [2] The thirty acre forest contains a lot of small diameter undergrowth and it would be cost prohibitive to haul and dump the small diameter hardwood at the composting centers.

The property also has a small five acre field that has been overgrown with blackberries, scotchbroom, and Canada thistle. As well known to the King County Weed Control, these species are very difficult to control and eradicate but the county recommends that all landowners control these weeds to promote a healthy ecosystem.[3] I intend to cut the blackberry canes, pile them into manageable piles in the meadow, and burn the piles of canes, as recommended by the Oregon State University Extension Service.[4] Other methods of removing the canes include curbside yard waste disposal, onsite mulching, and offsite hauling. Each of these methods would greatly increase the cost of removing the blackberries. There is no legal requirement to control the invasive species and I would be unlikely to control the invasive blackberries if burning was no longer an option.

I read in the News Tribune that the burn ban policy will primarily affect land developers and builders. I’d like to mention that I’m not a developer, corporation, or other profit-motivated organization. I’m simply a private landowner that is trying to improve the forest health and protect the environment by engaging in good forest stewardship. I’m only able to engage in low cost forest management techniques and am concerned the burning ban will greatly increase my expense in maintaining the forest.

For the reasons explained above, I believe that outdoor burning is a forest management practice that is essential to managing and maintaining my forest. As time goes on, more and more rules are being passed that make it more difficult for me to continue forestry in King County, and if too many additional rules are passed, it may be necessary to sell my forest to a developer and continue foresting in a more rural location. King County has expressed a desire to keep working forests alive in King County and I hope that the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency can ensure that outdoor burning can be used as a forest management practice in the future.

Sincerely,

Greg Magone

Note: The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency has said the outdoor burning ban will not apply to silviculture burning. I contacted Jim Nolan of the PSCAA and the fire warden for the Enumclaw district of the Department of Natural Resources. They explained that the DNR cannot issue a silvicultural permit for my parcel of land because it is within the boundaries of King County Fire District #44, which has assumed total responsibility for all fires (including forest fires) in the district and is the only authority that can issue burn permits. The fire district would only issue a landclearing or residential burning permit, both of which would be banned under the proposed PSCAA rule.

[1] “Be Firewise: Fire Safety Tips for Homeowners”
http://www.metrokc.gov/ddes/fire/pdfs/FirewiseBrochure.pdf
[2] “King County to harvest alder stand on Taylor Mountain Forest” http://dnr.metrokc.gov/dnrp/press/2004/0809taylor.htm
[3] “Himalayan Blackberry” http://dnr.metrokc.gov/wlr/lands/weeds/pdf/Blackberry_factsheet.pdf
[4] “Managing Himalayan Blackberry in Western Oregon Riparian Areas.” http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog/pdf/em/em8894.pdf

Carbon dioxide emissions will increase under burn ban policy

2007-12-29T11:36:00.000-08:00

One of the latest buzz words in environmental protection today is "carbon emissions." Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas contributor that many scientists have attributed to raising the temperature of the planet and potentially causing a lot of problems for Earth's ecosystems.

Woodburning has traditionally been considered a carbon neutral activity. Most scientists believe that the amount of carbon dioxide released by a wood fire is approximately the same as the carbon dioxide released by the wood decomposing naturally.

However, the burn ban policy would require people to chip or haul the woody debris for disposal. Either hauling or chipping uses gas-powered (and carbon dioxide emitting) engine. In addition, the plant matter will still decompose (as it would in the wild) and release the same amount of carbon dioxide as burning it in the first place!

The result would be a net increase in carbon dioxide emissions. Both the city of Seattle mayor and the King County Executive Ron Sims have made it a goal to decrease carbon dioxide emissions. This policy would directly go against that policy!

Silviculture burning?

2007-12-28T09:43:00.000-08:00

Under the proposed outdoor burning ban, exemptions would continue for silviculture burning and agriculture burning.

I contacted the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency and asked them if some property I own in South King County would qualify for the silviculture burning exemption. It's a forested lot that contains a lot of marketable timber and I manage this parcel to improve the value of the forest for timber production.

The short version of the story is the property would not qualify for silviculture burning because the fire district where the parcel is located has responsibility for all fires and the Department of Natural Resources does not issue burn permits in the fire district where my parcel is located.

So - under the proposed policy - there would be no options for me to maintain the forest health by performing routine outdoor burns. I will be filing comments with the PSCAA and hopefully they will revise the policy to better allow for silviculture burns.

Welcome to King County Outdoor Burning

2007-12-27T16:03:00.000-08:00

I read over the Christmas Holiday that the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency is considering implenting rules to prohibit outdoor burning in all parts of Pierce, King, and Snohomish County. How will the rules affect landowners in the three county region? I'm concerned that there are lots of landowners that use outdoor burning as an efficient method to removing dead tree branches, vine maple trunks, and other woody debris from their property and not how the debris will be disposed of instead of burning.

This blog is designed as a method for the other landowners in King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties to get together, share opinions, and hopefully present a strong argument to the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency to allow continued outdoor burning.

Please feel free to post comments on outdoor burning.