In Cold Northeast, Officials Consider Limiting Furnace Emissions

http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2009/08/10/10climatewire-in-cold-northeast-officials-consider-limitin-84422.html

People are going to freak out.

that could mean high unemployment for years, and they're talking about plans that will lead to an increase in the cost of home heating for this year.

We deserved to get creamed if this is the current plan.

The person who wrote this also seems to have difficulty understand that oil-burning furnaces will only burn high-carbon fuel and that all fuel that is high carbon is ultimately the same stuff whether it comes from Saudi Arabia or the Canadian tar sands.

What planet are these people from.

does your fuel oil contain an illegal amount of carbon?

I wouldn't be surprised if these Govs have a
solution to your over-emitting furnace.

buy their carbon offsets

Do you know how fast it will phase in?
Do you know what sort of provisions it makes for low income people?

Frankly I don't think we know anything really except that the same set of states that got together and established the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative are getting together and addressing another aspect of the same problem. That's certainly enough to piss off the fossil fuel industry and cause them to try and spin it, but I'd hope that a long time lib like you would recognize the difference between such "euthanasia" style hyperbole and real policy discussion.

This is the wrong time for this policy because people don't have the money to make any switch to cleaner heating fuels and government doesn't have the money to subsidize anyone's changeover. It is the same complaint that I have with the timing of the cap and trade bill, among other complaints.

Another odd thing about this piece is the emphasis on using wood as a heating fuel. Wood is not exactly a low carbon fuel, and if the northeast goes on a wood heating fuel binge, wood could go into a non-renewable state quite rapidly, reminiscent of the late 1800s.

In addition, wood can be quite polluting. Many people have older wood-burning fireplaces that do not burn cleanly and emit large amounts of particulate matter and other pollutants, and are particularly ill-suited to use in valleys--concrete and otherwise--because the pollutants stay put in the valley. Surely you recall the severe air pollution problems in places like Vermont during the '70s energy crisis. The same problems with money that make this initiative ill-timed with respect to heating oil make it ill-timed with respect to wood heat as well.

Edit: getting the right century.
Natural gas, which is probably the lowest carbon heating fuel as well as the least polluting, is barely mentioned in this article if at all.

It is a poor piece of writing about a policy that seems to be poorly thought out. Surely the New York Times can do better.

just pass a law,
problem solved

My understanding is that as far as resource size goes, the amount required for home heating doesn't challenge forestry resources at all. Other uses, such as burning it for electricity, require much greater quantities of wood. As for natural gas, (again I haven't had reason to check this in about 4 years) much of the northeast is already challenging the natural gas supply in the winter.

Wood (biomass) when used and managed properly, is a very good heating fuel re CO2 emissions. It is more or less carbon neutral except for the logging and transport, which since it is local probably isn't too high. I understand the particulate pollution. I used to live in Albuquerque where everyone burned mesquite. We frequently had the problem of a thermal inversion bottling the woodsmoke over the city, which lies in a shallow bowl; it can be awful.

I haven't read the plan, so I'll be reserving judgment until then.

you'll find that when everyone, and that was a smaller population, starts to burn wood on top of all other uses of wood supplies do dwindle. It is one of the reasons that people moved to coal for heating. I have seen the excellent graphic on current wood replacement in the northeast (I wish that I had bookmarked it), but I don't believe that it reflects the level of demand if a large segment of the oil heat users switched to wood.

As to wood as a fuel, you will notice that my post addresses other air pollution problems with wood give currently installed equipment. As to carbon neutrality, that calculation may depend on the efficiency of the burn and on close forest management. At a later date, I believe as you do, that burning wood could be managed to be carbon neutral. However, considering once again currently existing inefficient equipment and the necessity of limiting log removal, carbon neutrality is not a given.

Natural gas does have infrastructure issues at this time in the northeast. However, other cold areas of the country were as dependent on oil heat as the northeast, but managed to switch a huge percentage of users to natural gas, including both methane and propane.

Propane works well in rural and semi-rural areas because the compressed gas can be delivered to a terminal by pipeline, rail or truck and is distributed to end users by truck. Admittedly, the tanks are a truly ugly lawn ornament, but propane emits less carbon dioxide than oil for the same amount of heat, as I'm sure that you are aware.

New England may have to accept a CNG terminal or convince the folks in Canada to do it for them.

It sounds like it might cost people money or comfort.

Besides, it's not like there aren't other planets.

There is a time for everything, but I don't think that this is the time for the proposed program.

The article itself seems to be written by someone who doesn't understand space heating. Frankly, I haven't seen such a poorly researched and written article in the Times for a long time.

So clearly, the next 10 years years is out. When, exactly, would be a good time?
How about the next 20 years? 50? 200? 3,000,000?

Pick a number, no rush.

If our winter heat (which is natural gas) got shut off, we'd be unhappy for sure, but we wouldn't LITERALLY FREEZE.

I bet we could use a few space heaters, some strategic baking, sweaters, and a few blankets and be ok.

Back east there would be people frozen solid in their homes. :o

That's why no humans lived in Canada until the invention of the thermostat, and the native Wabanaki & Iroquois of the NE were actually cunningly disguised species of walrus.

Err, or something.

All the same, I'm not totally sure a 10% reduction counts as "cutting off" - unless they're actually planning to pull one in ten names out of a hat and then go around with the gas pliers. The article doesn't mention that bit, but maybe I'm missing something.

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

> That's why no humans lived in Canada until the invention of
> the thermostat, and the native Wabanaki & Iroquois of the NE
> were actually cunningly disguised species of walrus.

:spray:

My mouse-mat is now significantly damper than it was before I read
your reply ...

:spank:

would be greatly appreciated. I believe that one of RFK's sons is involved in just such a charity.

...is to give people money so they can burn more fossil fuels.

Tell you what, since we're clearly hell-bent on pissing away the future because we're too fucking lazy to change our living habits, I'll pop down to the kindergarten and have all the 2-year-olds rendered into biofuel, and ship that up. Maybe throw in a walrus or two: Should keep the ol' furnace ticking over for a while.

Alternatively, Find a New England insulation fund for the poor and elderly & I'll take a look.