Smoke from an outdoor wood boiler, by Flickr user Michael Hoy.
A surprise announcement that the New York State Environmental Board will meet this Wednesday to vote on regulations about outdoor wood boilers (OWBs) has the DEC scrambling once again to appease fans of the cheap heat sources.
OWBs are a mainstay in rural areas but controversial because of their disease-causing particulate output. Over the past year, the DEC has been attempting to pass regulations that would force manufacturers to make cleaner models of OWBs. The agency's efforts have been fiercely resisted across the state, especially efforts to regulate existing wood boilers.
The controversy, which has smoldered all year, came to a head in October when the DEC attempted to send a set of new regulations on OWBs to the Environmental Board for a vote. After screams of protest from groups like the New York Farm Bureau, the Board declined to review the regs, and the DEC promised that there would be another round of public comment before any decisions were made.
And then came last week's brief announcement that the Board will meet to vote on OWB regulations this week. The Farm Bureau reacted with rage, denouncing the move as a "regulatory ploy" on its website:
“We were told by DEC officials in October that there would be a new round of public comment before enacting a set of revised wood boiler regulations,” said Dean Norton, president of New York Farm Bureau. “We took them at their word, which apparently was a mistake. If these regulations are approved under these circumstances, NYFB will be exploring possible legal remedies to the situation.” “This is a case of the more radical elements in DEC trying to shove these regulations through a week before a new Governor takes office,” said Norton. “Meanwhile, fuel oil prices are soaring and a cold winter lies ahead.”
The DEC is now hurriedly explaining that this has all been a misunderstanding. In an interview today, DEC spokesperson Lori Severino told the Watershed Post that the regs going before the Board this week only apply to new OWBs, not existing ones.
"Due to the massive amount of public comments we got, what's being proposed this week is just in regards to new outdoor wood boilers," Severino said. "The Farm Bureau may have been under the impression that we were going [to consider] the same proposal again, but that's not the case ... [T]hey decided. to do it in two separate pieces so that they could move forward with the one [regarding new OWBs] and still do that public outreach process for existing ones."
Severino said that before the Board votes on regulations covering existing OWBs, it will meet with OWB manufacturers and members of the public, probably early next year.
In an article in today's Daily Freeman, the fight between the DEC and the Farm Bureau continues with a spokesman for the Farm Bureau arguing that regulations that cover new OWBs will also affect old ones:
“We still don’t like it whether you have a new wood boiler or old wood boiler, the regulations that they’re proposing would affect both,” [Bureau spokesman Peter] Gregg said.
Stay tuned -- the OWB fight is only going to get hotter.
