Conduct an education/financial assistance campaign around one of the following wood burning/auto exhaust issues:
a.
Indoor and outdoor wood burning behavior, to ensure that wood burning is only done with seasoned wood and in a manner that doesn't negatively impact neighbors.
b.
Indoor wood burning technology, to result in community members upgrading from inefficient/more polluting fireplaces and wood stoves to pellet/natural gas/biogas stoves and fireplaces or the most efficient certified wood stoves.
c.
Smoker cars - older model/high polluting vehicles, to result in repairs spurred by repair vouchers.
An outreach campaign might partner or be run by chimney sweeps, who are in people's houses and can recommend cleaner burning techniques and technologies, potentially incentivized by the city.
MPCA resources on residential wood burning and U.S EPA Burn Wise resources provide specific information detailing cleaner burning practices and public awareness toolkits that can be customized for Minnesota.
Strategies for Reducing Residential Wood Smoke (U.S. EPA: 2013) includes information on education and outreach tools, regulatory options and examples, wood stove and fireplace change-outs, funding options, hydronic heaters (including outdoor wood boilers) and fireplace programs, and emissions and air quality improvements. Included are best practices such as burning seasoned wood that contains less than 20% moisture.
Current U.S. EPA-certified wood stoves and cleaner burning fireplaces are more polluting than those falling under Washington State standards, but these EPA standards will be upgraded in the next few years.
See the 2007 Valley Clean Air Now (CAN) Tune In & Tune Up program from Arvin, California.
Conduct an education campaign (including website information AND other media releases or outreach techniques) on the health risks of wood burning, including the steps needed to mitigate those risks (or similar campaign on "smoker" cars).
Conduct an education campaign (1 Star rating) and offer financial assistance for decommissioning older fireplaces or wood-burning equipment.
Achieve 2 Star rating AND create regulatory standards on wood burning (as in Action 2 of this best practice)
Implementation details: In 2010 the city held public meetings and established new requirements for outdoor wood boilers that establishes standards for burning wood with low water content.
Implementation details: Complete: In an effort to educate the public on the dangers of wood smoke and to set an example to the community, at the Nov.15, 2011 Edina City Council meeting, Council agreed to convert the two indoor wood burning fireplaces in the Centrum of the Hughes Pavilion, to gas. This generated much educational publicity in the Edina Sun Current, the Minneapolis Star Tribune and local Blogs. The conversion was complete in time for the winter 2011/12 season. The payback period for converting to gas was documented to be 7 years.
For more information contact: Ross Bintner (City staff) | rbintner@edinamn.gov | (952) 903-5713
no. 23 
Best Practice Action 1
