Monday: First Spare the Air Day Issued for East County

The first “Spare the Air” day has been issued by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District today which bans wood fires in the Bay Area which includes East Contra Costa County.

From November 1 through the end of February, under the Air District’s wood-burning regulation, when a Winter Spare the Air Alert has been called, burning wood, firelogs, pellets, or any other solid fuels in your fireplace, woodstove, or other wood-burning device is illegal.

Anyone who violates the burning ban will be given the option of taking a wood smoke awareness class or paying a $100 fine. A second violation is increased to a $500 fine.

Then ban includes Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara and parts of Sonoma and Solano counties.

Check Before You Burn
To find out if a Winter Spare the Air Alert is in effect, residents and business owners can do the following:

• Call 1-877-4NO-BURN (1-877-466-2876)
• Sign up for automatic phone alerts by calling 1-800-430-1515
• Sign up to receive email AirAlerts
• Download the Spare the Air App for iPhone or Android
• Download the Spare the Air widget to your website
• Connect with Spare the Air on Facebook, Twitter, or Google+

Health Effects of Particulate Matter (PM)
Particulate matter, also called PM or soot, consists of microscopically small solid particles or liquid droplets suspended in the air. The smaller the particles, the deeper they can penetrate into the respiratory system and the more hazardous they are to breathe.

Recent studies indicate that PM can have the following effects on our bodies:

• PM pollution can cause lung irritation, which leads to increased permeability in lung tissue.
• PM aggravates the severity of chronic lung diseases, causing rapid loss of airway function.
• PM causes inflammation of lung tissue, resulting in the release of chemicals that can impact heart function.
• PM causes changes in blood chemistry that can result in clots that may lead to heart attacks.
• PM can increase susceptibility to viral and bacterial pathogens leading to pneumonia in vulnerable persons who are unable to clear these infections.

The smaller-sized particles – those 2.5 micrometers or less in diameter, called PM2.5 – are of greatest health concern because they can pass through the nose and throat and be absorbed deep inside the lungs. PM 2.5 are sometimes called “fine” particles, and they are about 1/28th the diameter of a human hair or smaller.

In the Bay Area, wood burning accounts for about one-third of the airborne PM in the winter months. PM in wood smoke from the estimated 1.4 million fireplaces and wood stoves in the Bay Area has been a health concern for many years.

Source:
http://sparetheair.org/