By JOSEPH FITZGERALD

NORTH SMITHFIELD — A proposed ordinance regulating outdoor wood burning furnaces has been drafted and submitted to the Town Council, which will review the document and consider preliminary passage of the ordinance on Monday.

The council’s first reading of the ordinance at 7 p.m. at the Kendall-Dean School comes nine days before a moratorium on new installations of outdoor wood burning furnaces expires Sept. 23.
The council executed the six-month moratorium in February and when it expired on Aug. 1, the panel voted to extend it until Sept. 23. The extension was needed to prevent new installations until the town was ready to adopt local regulations that could either set strict regulations or ban the stoves altogether.
Those regulations are now set to be adopted.
The town has been working with an expert consultant hired by the town to help the community study the effects of wood burning furnaces and draft a local ordinance that would regulate and control them.
The council had been considering the moratorium for months following a private nuisance case between two Pound Hill Road neighbors over one of the neighbor’s use of an outdoor wood burning furnace. The local case in question involves resident Keith Klockars of 676 Pound Hill Road, who has been operating an outside wood boiler manufactured by Minnasota-based Central Boiler, Inc. Klockars’ neighbor, John Wilbur, who lives 200 feet from Klockars’ house, has complained to town officials about constant clouds of thick smoke he says has made it impossible for his family to enjoy their backyard.
An outdoor wood furnace resembles a small utility building that sits outdoors and contains a wood fired, water-jacketed stove. The hot water is circulated through underground pipes to the inside of the house, where they are hooked to a heat exchanger in the majority of cases. In some cases, they can be directly plumbed to the hot water heater or tied in with an existing floor heating system or boiler.
Proponents say outdoor wood furnaces are simple, clean and efficient. Instead of moving the wood and corresponding mess and bugs indoors, the wood burning furnace is outdoors next to the wood. Indoor air pollution is also cut to zero by moving the fire and smoke outside. Users typically load it once at night and once in the morning.
Opponents point to the fact that wood burning furnaces cause dense smoke that impacts neighbors by creating a nuisance and health problems. Most units come equipped with very short stacks and the smoke from these low stacks disperses poorly.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recommends emissions and air quality standards, but does not regulate where and when the wood-fired burners can be installed or used. A growing number of communities nationwide are setting their own rules on the increasingly popular wood boilers, which are not federally regulated. Some states, including Connecticut and Maine, have regulations and let their municipalities adopt even stricter limits or ban the boilers altogether. Massachusetts has considered statewide rules but has not enacted them.
“The Town Council recognizes and finds that although outdoor hydronic heaters or outdoor wood burners may represent an economical alternative to conventional heating systems, such systems should not be located or used in a such a manner as to compromise the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of the town resulting from harmful emissions, offensive odors, smoke, soot, fumes, ash or other conditions that may also otherwise constitute a nuisance from the use and operation of outdoor furnaces,” the ordinance states.
Allowable fuels, according to the ordinance, include clean wood, wood pellets made from clean wood and home heating oil or natural gas.
According to the ordinance, a permit will be required to construct, install and operate any outdoor wood furnace. Permits will be issued only for the heating season, which begins on Oct. 15 and expires April 1. A $25 application fee for the permit will apply.
The stoves can only be installed on lots of 2.75 acres or more and can be no closer than 200 feet from any lot line; 50 feet from any structure; and 400 feet from any residential structure not on the property serviced by the furnace.
The unit, according to the ordinance, must be located in the back yard, behind the structure to be serviced. They also cannot be located within 1,000 feet of any school, church, or public water supply, source or aquifer.
Stoves can only be in operation during the heating season, which will be from Oct. 15 to April 1. Stacks or chimneys on the stoves cannot be taller than 18 feet and must comply with particulate emission standards. According to the ordinance, no furnace can be installed unless it has been certified to meet a particulate matter emission limit of 0.32 lb/MMBtu heat output.
Failure to comply with the terms of the ordinance will result in a fine of $200 for each offense. Each second day of the offense will result in a $300 fine and each offense thereafter will be $500. Anyone who is convicted of a third offense will have the permit revoked.