HPBA gets delay in lawsuit to give Trump Administration time to review

President Trump shaking hands with
his EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, a
prominent climate change skeptic.

The Hearth Patio & Barbecue Association (HPBA) moved to delay its lawsuit to allow the Trump administration time to review the settlement proposals that HPBA submitted in 2015 and 2016 and re-evaluate whether some issues can be settled out of court, according to its court filing.  The EPA and the environmental groups who intervened did not oppose the delay. They filed their motion with the US Court of Appeals weeks before they would have had to meet the first filing deadline.

The original suit was consolidated to include challenges from HPBA, the Pellet Fuel Institute (FPI), Tulikivi and Richard Burns and Company. In November 2016, the EPA informed HPBA that it would not continue in settlement talks, but they did reach an amicable settlement with Tulikivi, a masonry heater company that wanted masonry heaters to be a regulated technology under the NSPS. The EPA is seeking additional information with regard to PFI’s lawsuit.

On March 16, 2017, the United States Court of Appeals approved the 90-day delay sought by HPBA and set a new briefing schedule for the parties that plays out through the end of 2017. HPBA must file its brief with the Court on June 26, laying out a final list of issues it intends to litigate. After that, the EPA will respond with its positions on September 26, revealing how it will defend those portions of the regulations.

Less than a month later, the interveners must file their briefs. Interveners include the American Lung Association, Clean Air Council, and the Environment and Human Health, Inc. They are represented by Timothy Ballo of Earthjustice.

HPBA is simultaneously moving a bill in Congress to delay the 2020 provisions of the NSPS by 3 years, which in turn will give the legal proceedings time to play out. Another bill would erase the wood heater NSPS altogether. HPBA does not support this, but some individual boiler and pellet producers support it.

“The Trump Administration is a wild card for all parties in the lawsuit and the Alliance for Green Heat urges all parties to support the core provisions of the NSPS,” said John Ackerly of the Alliance for Green Heat. “For the future of wood heating in the US, we need to protect the transition to cord wood testing and adopt affordable test methods that reflect how consumers use stoves,” Ackerly added.

A blog “Hearth industry lists grounds for lawsuit against EPA” by the Alliance for Green Heat in 2015 laid out more details of the substance and process of the lawsuit. One often overlooked point is that HPBA does not appear to be challenging the 2020 emission standards for wood or pellet stoves, but only for outdoor wood boilers and warm air furnaces.

Petitioners' Brief(s)                               June 26, 2017

Respondent's Brief                                September 26, 2017

Intervenor for Respondent's Brief   October 18, 2017

Petitioners' Reply Brief(s)                  November 8, 2017

Deferred Appendix                               November 15, 2017

Final Briefs                                             November 22, 2017

U.S. Government Winter Fuels Outlook Includes Pellets and Wood for First Time

EIA Administrator Sieminski says wood pellets represent a “significant opportunity” for consumers to save money

October 10, 2012 - The U.S. government released its annual assessment of prices and availability of heating fuels today and for the first time it included information on pellets and firewood. After gas and electricity, wood is the third most common heating fuel in America, but the annual Winter Fuels Outlook had never discussed it prior to the 2012-13 heating season.

The Winter Fuels Outlook is put out by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), an independent statistical and analytical agency within the Department of Energy. Reports published by the agency are the premier source of energy information in the country and are used to guide economic policy and educate the public.

During today’s press conference, EIA Administrator Adam Sieminski mentioned the “significant opportunity” for consumers to supplement their oil heat with wood pellets, as well as with electricity.

The inclusion of wood and pellets in the Winter Fuels Outlook came after over a year of discussions and meetings between the EIA and a coalition of wood and pellet groups. Senator Shaheen (D-NH) also raised the importance of pellets as an alternative to oil in New England with Administrator Sieminski.

According to the EIA, wood and pellets now produce more residential heat in the US than propane and nearly as much as oil. Wood produces 0.5 quadrillion Btu (quads) per year, propane 0.49 quads and oil 0.6.

EIA projects that average household expenditures for heating oil and natural gas will increase by 19 percent and 15 percent respectively over last heating season. The agency expects the country will experience colder temperatures compared to last year's mild winter, with oil and gas prices remaining virtually the same.

In terms of wood and pellets, the report said:

Wood consumption in homes has risen over the past 10 years, reversing a trend seen in the last two decades of the 20th century. In 2009, U.S. households consumed about 0.5 quadrillion Btu (quads) of wood. Household fuel oil consumption, by comparison, was only slightly higher at 0.6 quads. In homes across the United States, wood is most commonly used as a secondary source of heat and is second only to electricity as a supplemental heating fuel. Twenty percent of New England homes (1.1 million) used wood for space heating, water heating, or cooking in 2009 (EIA, Residential Energy Consumption Survey, 2009). This is nearly twice the national rate. Almost half of all rural households used wood in this area of the country. In contrast, only 12 percent of urban New England households used the fuel.

According to data previously published by the EIA, the average American household heating with wood consumes two cords of wood per year. This number includes homes that use wood or pellets as a primary, secondary or occasional heat source. The EIA also documents that consumption in rural areas is more than twice that of urban areas. The EIA estimates that 91% of homes that heat with wood use firewood, 8% use wood scrap and 6% use pellets.



Wood use also trends strongly with income level, according to EIA survey data, with households making $20,000 or less using more than twice the amount of wood as households making $120,000 or more. 

“The EIA’s focus on wood and pellets is an important and timely step in the right direction,” said John Ackerly, President of the Alliance for Green Heat, a non-profit consumer organization based in the DC area. “If EIA can report on pellet prices along with oil and propane, consumers will be better equipped to make the best choices for them, which may be to use a local, renewable fuel,” Ackerly added.

For a full copy of the Winter Fuels Outlook: http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/steo/index.cfm 

Wood Heat Fact Sheets by the Alliance for Green Heat & UMD Extension Now Available

The University of Maryland Extension in collaboration with the Alliance for Green Heat developed several fact sheets on the topic of residential wood heating in the state of Maryland. The fact sheets in this five-part Wood Energy series are available for download.

The Wood Energy Audit Checklist is mainly designed as a tool for energy auditors performing appliance inspections but also contains useful safety tips for homeowners with wood burning stoves. The checklist covers a number of practical topics, including stove and chimney maintenance and how to inspect for clearances.

Buying and Storing Firewood & Pellets takes an in-depth look at how to buy firewood wood and pellets. The fact sheet covers properly seasoning and storing wood.  Nearly everyone who has bought firewood multiple times has been shortchanged. Even an experienced wood burner is likely to find something new and helpful in this guide.

Buying a Secondhand Woodstove explores a widespread - but scarcely written about - practice of buying a used wood or pellet stove. It cautions against buying a secondhand wood stove that is not EPA-certified and offers other advice to consumers, including how to inspect a used wood stove for damage and what questions to ask the seller.

How to Buy a New Wood Stove delves into the typical questions consumers have when beginning to shop for a wood-fired heater.  It covers what qualities to look for when purchasing a wood stove, such as sizing and EPA certification, as well as the differences between the various types of wood stoves (cat, non-cat, pellet and masonry), how to buy a wood or pellet boiler, and more.

Considerations for Your Wood or Pellet Stove Installation  explains the importance of having your stove installed professionally and pulling the required permits from both a safety and insurance perspective. It also discusses the appropriate clearances needed for combustibles, chimney, hearth pad and stove pipe options, and differences in pellet stove installation.

Lifecycle Assessment of Pellet Burning Technologies

In 2010, the Alliance for Green Heat and VU University Amsterdam undertook a joint research project which showed that heating with wood pellets can emit about one tenth the carbon as heating with oil and one sixth the carbon if heating with natural gas. Somehow, this study is now circulating on the web again and we are getting lots of requests for it.

From the executive summary:

"Pellet use leads to emission as low as 6.04 g CO2/MJ, whereas the lowest polluting fossil fuel emits 62.8 g CO2/MJ. The most important conclusions in this report are that the used wood must, ideally, not be shipped from the West Coast of Canada to Europe and the wood used must be harvested sustainably for the carbon neutrality to be maintained. The latter aspects in the LCA and logistics chains are the most important features of the delicate CO2 balance of this source of heat. Debates about this topic are still in progress, both among scientists and legislators, and provides, in itself, a great opportunity for further research."

For the full paper: http://www.forgreenheat.org/issues/docs/TomdeHaan.pdf

Featured Opinion: Product Stewardship and Pellet Bags

Green heat is great – except where it generates waste in another area, such as pellet bags. What is your industry doing in terms of producer responsibility when it comes to pellet bags? The Chittenden Solid Waste District manages the waste and recyclables for a quarter of the population of Vermont. We get calls all the time about recycling pellet bags. After all, the bags all have the recycling symbol printed on them. As you must know, not everything with a recycling symbol stamped on it are actually recyclable at all or in most regions. Here, we have to tell your customers’ customers to reuse them or throw them in the trash.

That’s because filmy plastic is difficult for single-stream recycling facilities to sort out. That’s also because residue from the pellets is considered contamination by recycling markets, and we don’t have the staff, time, or facilities to rinse them all out, let them dry, and get them to market. I would venture to guess that most of your markets are in the same situation, where they cannot accept bags for recycling. Another reason is that some bags are made of laminated layers of plastic(s), which is also unacceptable in most markets. We simply do not have the resources to set up a program for accepting all the types of products that producers market.

Product stewardship is becoming less of a buzz word and more of the law of the land these days. To force computer manufacturers to produce products containing fewer toxins and more easily recyclable, laws have been passed to require them to take back their own products in several states. Same thing with some mercury-containing products, such as thermostats and CFLs. Same thing with paint. Same thing with a growing list of products, spurred on by municipalities whose resources are exhausted from being expected to manage myriad products that were not designed with responsible disposal in mind.

Why not get ahead of the game and come up with a product stewardship program in your industry. Have your vendors accept the bags back from customers and back-haul them to a central location where you can prepare them for recycling, and find a recycler that will accept contaminated bags?

If your efforts are geared towards making pellet stoves ubiquitous, you must take responsibility for the waste you are causing people to generate as a result.

Regards,

Clare Innes

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Clare Innes

Marketing & Communications Coordinator

Chittenden Solid Waste District

Phone: 802-872-8100 ext. 207

Williston, VT