Let's not give up fireplace

Those in our community who suffer from asthma and lung diseases when they are exposed to smoke are making quite the case for regulations that would restrict wood-burning fireplaces. To use an often-repeated presidential phrase, "I feel their pain," but let's put some perspective on this issue: They are in the minority.

The author of a recent letter to the editor ("Welcome new rules would restrict wood smoke," The Reporter, Nov. 11) reports that the Bay Area Air Quality Management District is proposing a regulation to reduce emissions of particulate matter (PM) from wood-burning devices, including stoves and indoor and outdoor fireplaces. The district has found that smoke containing particles smaller than 10 microns has been emanating from these indoor and outdoor fireplaces.

How do you suppose this proposed reduction is to be effected? Maybe, through use of an elaborate chimney filter/scrubber, such as the costly ones used by industry, which at least can write it off their taxes as a business expense. The alternative for the homeowner is inevitable: Do without using your fireplace or fire pit.

Burning wood for heat and the cooking of food has been used since ... well, almost forever. It was done crudely for the longest time in such places as log cabins and old tenement buildings. Though life was short for many in that period, the cause of death was not attributed to smoke inhalation, and many a historical figure lived to a ripe old age with wood smoke all about them.

Autumn for me - and many others - is signaled by the aroma emanating from wood burning in a fireplace, or from leaves raked into a pile and sent to heaven as a burnt offering. There is something soothing about watching the flames dance about as they consume the logs in the fireplace. A fire crackling in the fire pit on the patio adds to the ambiance that makes for a pleasant occasion to share with family or friends on a cool evening.

At this time, we are spared reliance on burning wood for our domestic and industrial uses, as we have gas and oil for our immediate needs and coal for the generation of power. In some small way, we also have nuclear power. This is all going to change in the not-too-distant future, and it doesn't take a Nostrodamus to figure it out.

Though the United States and California have abundant resources of gas and oil, we have not been permitted to get them. Plenty of gas and oil comes from abroad, but using it is constrained by several factors: reliance on aging refineries, few in number and with no new ones envisioned or allowed as it might "despoil the environment," and an insistence on "boutique" gasoline formulas not used elsewhere.

The nuclear energy industry had a few missteps early in its development, which have since been corrected as evidenced by its use in other countries, such as France, Japan, Germany and Russia. But there are those within our community who have seized upon issues of the past to curtail future development. To offset this lack of preparedness, they extol conservation, which is a fine idea ... for a static population.

Evidence is everywhere, though, that the population of California is growing and will continue to grow into the foreseeable future. If we do not create more energy, the per capita amount available will decline. Where it gets gruesome is when those such as Al Gore turn on all of their lights and there isn't enough power for ours. "All people are equal, but some are more equal than others," George Orwell noted in "Animal Farm."

Proposed alternate sources of energy - wind, solar or bio-sourced - have their virtues and their shortcomings. To imagine that they would somehow supplant current sources of energy or might be sufficient to supply future demand, is the product of a fervent puerile imagination. (The technical term for this kind of thinking is "scientific sciolism," meaning a display of sham learning designed to deceive or impress. It is a common affliction among the Hollywood glitterati, strident C-minus college students, science reporters and researchers whose project grant money is about to run out.)

To date, the execution of the alternate energy resource program has distorted market realities, causing consumer prices to go up directly and indirectly. Remember what food prices were just a few months ago?

The government levies extra taxes and fees on the consuming public and then allocates a portion as rebates to those who comply with its energy saving program. A lot also goes to those ostensibly investing in creating the desired alternate energy programs, such as windmill farms, solar panel installations or biochemical plants. They are fine projects in themselves, but why should public tax money be used to finance them? This is called "rent-seeking," which means getting money from or via the government that you couldn't earn through exchange in the open marketplace.

Pacific Gas & Electric in particular has been tacking an extra fee onto our bill and thanks us for our donation by assuring us that it will put it to good use to save the environment. I ask, if the credibility of the Senate and Congress is it an all-time low, how can that of a similar monopolistic bureaucracy be higher?

When comes a summer heat wave, we are advised to dial back on our consumption of electricity to accommodate the additional air-conditioners coming on-line. Soon comes the winter, when escalating demand for heat causes energy prices to rise ever higher.

With heating, cooking and lighting costs going up, where might a family save on expenses - maybe enough for Christmas for the children? By using a wood-burning stove.

Yet just as the family is getting warm and cozy after a long, cold night, there is knock on the door. As a daughter unlatches the door, it is flung wide open, slamming her to the wall as six uniformed agents storm in. "Aha!" they cry. "You are burning wood in an unapproved device in nonconformance with Regulation 6, Rule 3 of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District and are under arrest. Your device is hereby confiscated and you are fined $5,000 for your willful disregard for the welfare of others in our community."