| Abstract: | Intermingled land usage in the 3900 square mile Bay Area Air Pollution Control District presented special problems in curtailing open burning. Regulation 1, adopted in 1957, prohibited most types of open burning, with exceptions for public safety, instruction in fire fighting, flood control, agricultural burning and one- and two-family dwellings.Variances for open burning could be granted by the District’s Hearing Board.The need was established for utilizing the services of professional meteorologists for planning and carrying out open burns.Their proposals to limit adverse effects were : (1) Select a day of no inversion, with wind direction to carry pollutants away from local targets; and, (2) a day of low velocity at ground level, high velocity at high altitudes. Predicted meteorological conditions have been met for up to eight hours in a high percentage of cases. Experience has proven the need for proper stacking and drying of the wood waste to assure high temperature burning, and completion of the burn as scheduled. Even though the cost of hauling to landfills may be substantially more than the cost of burning under a variance, hauling is often selected because of the time required for stacking, drying, and waiting for designated meteorological conditions. Substantial progress has been made in curtailing agricultural burning. Burning of greenhouse waste has been stopped.on emissions from orchard heaters has resulted in replacement with new smokeless heaters.Orchard brush can be burned only on “burn days” designated in the winter when the inversion is predicted to be above 2500 ft. Stubble burning has continued due to the lack of a feasible alternative. Range brush burning also continues, mostly in remote areas of high elevation. Lumbering slash is burned at the insistence of forestry officials. The above burning could be limited to designated burn days, as is successfully being applied to orchard brush. Research on alternatives to agricultural burning is being spearheaded by the University of California, and its agricultural extension service. Each project usually requires several years to carry out and evaluate. Closer cooperation by all involved in agriculture and air pollution control is necessary to develop feasible alternatives to open burning. |
