On climate change

Off Topic
#181

Hey guys it is US Super-bowl (football) Sunday. So the wife let me escape out of the house.

DavidB as you know from personal correspondences with me I am actually an old 1960/1970’s green. Remember that I was born, still live out on the USofA now-gone overboard “left” coast. Been watching the PNW cities downtown protestor riots out here? I can go just 18 miles away and watch train track blocking protestors.
Sorry man. I broke with the greens when they declared my woodstoving (no matter how clean I could do it) was pee’loot’ion. That I was a Tree-killing planet rapist. That I should instead be using 1500 mile shipped in Canadian “natural gas”. No gas lines out here Rural. No Urban broadband fiber optic cable. We barely get 3G cell now.
Concerently our politically grown strong greens out here jumped both feet onto the ALL CARBONS ARE EVIL.
What bogus silly nonsense. Turn-in and rebury all of your diamond bling-bling then.
So I tell all I am a Dirt-Brown-Mud now. Wear a lot of browns and tans anymore.
Before you can ever have green growing you must have good soil. Alive Dirt. With the 9 months rain here - mud.
2 year old goddaughter Elmo lover thinks I am the brown-green Oscar the Grouch.

Fellows you are missing Keon V.L.'s points again.
Do. You. Locally. Affect the folks around you locally with your doing example.
IF enough would do that in their own corners of the world, the world would shift the arc degree or two for the titanic we all stuck on to miss, or survivable slid past the iceberg.

Internet, pub, bar, club, church, rah-rah rally gabbling you are all just preaching preaching to the choir. Accomplished nothing real with all of the back patting.

Now my exaggerated points with “greedy motor racing”, “worldwide jetting around”, big energy wasteful stadium sports and all such WAS . . . just who gets to decide what should be eliminated, restricted, outlawed?
Who?
You? Me? My Aussie-Shepard dog, Ruby?
Some now third generation social-progressive degree’d college/university educated? I am talking 1/4 of my named blood family here entrenched Urban living thinking my folks and myself as Rural choosing to be un-cultured, un-edu-ma-cated Hicks.
Who decides? Another 1/4 of my named/blooded family who believed “What was good for GM (or Ford) was good for America.” “What was good for Boeing/Wherehauser/International Paper/Simpson Timber/Kaiser Ind/Reynolds Metals/Freigtliner/Peterbuilt/their trade unions was good for ALL in my state.” Yeah good for those “in”. Able to big diesel pickup turbo around on their jacked up unions demanded earnings. A lot of us later comes left out beginning in the the 1970’s.
And now in my state of Washington the moved in “new” money’ed Tech-Elites able to out bid any local boy or gal on affordable housing, foods and fuels? Them? THEY get to decide??

Screw all of that noise.
I decide for me and mine.
You all must too.
If you ain’t hands on Doing for yourself, yours, your physically adjacent neighbor at least SOME daily, you just another “send me your $9.99 a month with your agree signature proxy assignment.” “We ( with salaries of +$125,000 a year along with full paid medical/dental/vision and retirement golden parachute) will take care of the rest. Trust us.”

Fellows over above harvesting and wood heating for two houses in the last year I have Old-man Uncle Grouch by-passed 5 of the vastly different philosophy family men and gone directly to my adult female relatives with “make your own power when needed mini-generators”. Done this with one neighbor gal now too. More planned for the upcoming year.
Practical woman do want electrical power for the children needed things. For their own woman care needs.

Impractical woman (my own departed Mother) will write, scream out, march, rally, train track sit blocking oil, coal and nuke disposal transport trains. I ate a lot of really terrible overcooked one-pot meals while Mon was so busy out saving the world with her latest cause. Mom could not bake a cherry pie. Dad could do pies, soups, roasts and breads.

Ha! Previous to D-I-Y woodgas power, after telling the NRA gone oeverbard political to stuff it, I promoted family/friends woman into personal gun ownership. So they could protect themselves and their kids and not have to demand on a man for this. Nothing more dangerous than a momma-kind feeling her young are in danger. No testosterone balls-stoopid then. But sheer brains, courage and techniques. Cornel Colt may have made men equal. Smith&Wesson made any woman the equal of any man.

D-I-Y mean doing it yourself, for your self and yours.
This magic giving genie of cheap available dino-carbons energy will not be put back into it’s bottle.Will be used. Until it is used up, enough to no longer be made cheap and available.
Just because someone brings a new keg of beer to a party doesn’t mean you have to binge-out and go stupid.

Be smart. Cut your uses. Tell all of the gate keepers then you have already decided for you and yours.
Tell them to go actually get down in the dirt, real hoeing for their cakes and pizza-pies, then be breads and furit/meat pies. Do some actual daily sweating for some of their their heats, cooling and electricity.
Tell them you have your own religion. Your own creeds. You no longer need their overblown creativity. With you having to pay the creative artists.
DOing makes you humble, healthy and wise.

J-I-C Steve Unruh

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#182

you know I love ya steve!

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#183

One of your best, Steve!

#184

I can see Steve likes folks to take the bull by the horns! I have to agree, even if the ever increasing burdens of legislation and regulation remove more of our ability to make your own decisions year after year. To me, the first world is quickly becoming a place where ideology is trumping the overall wellbeing of the Citizenry. This understanding has spurred me to take action in order to offset said burdens, and in this pursuit, woodgas has great potential. It can offset new taxation, lower the cost of living, bring considerable transportation and energy independence, and greatly reduce your contribution to the bureaucracy who’s actions first spurred you into action. That’s worth a lot to me, so therefore it is worth a lot of "doing":blush:.

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#185

Washington State has the stiffest woodstove laws in the nation but they make approved appliances. The caveat is you also need another source of heat besides wood, so you need like an electric heat (of some sort) or NG/propane which is actually also a requirement for most home loans. I think our state requires it too. Our emissions for wood stoves were pushed by the NG industry in our state.

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#186

Sean and Steve you should look at the Tarm gasification boilers when I bought mine it was rated just as clean as the oil boilers. I was actually surprised it was rated so clean because it was the first time I had seen that type of setup. But they don’t give them things away. I do miss that boiler.
If they came and tried to stop me from burning wood they would have a real fight on their hands!
As to the other source of heat you don’t have to have it for the state here but if you want insurance you have to have something like oil or gas which is on a thermostat. I have a combo wood oil furnace. Tarm makes one of those. Just remember oil tanks do run out sometimes…

#187

You know, this is where all the activism and finger pointing ends. If folks don’t have the money, then they won’t be doing much on the compliance, regulatory, or personal fronts as far as cleaning things up. The necessities of life will always take priority.

And this is what you end up with. I like ATV’ing (no offence to previous posters :slight_smile: ), and will run 100+ km per week in the summer. Guess what I see out in the back 40? Piles of junk that is/was expensive to get rid of, roofing materials, tires, mysterious piles of “dirt”, burn barrels, old furniture, concrete. The minute regulation kicks in, so do the fees, and the whole thing backfires. The school of unintended consequences comes back for another lesson.

The idea that everyone plays by the rules when the piggy bank is empty has never panned out. There is only one dump left for my region, it is privately owned and for profit. The costs are nuts! It’s been two years since the last public landfill closed up, and there has been steadily increasing piles of garbage out on the back roads and trails. Out of sight out of mind I guess. Life gets more expensive every year, folks react within their personal limitations. Some will skimp on groceries or other areas to afford the dump fees and higher heating fuels, others will dump their garbage illegally and burn wood for heating.

One word on ATV’s :slight_smile: . I have two, both are fuel injected, and have air injection and other emissions controls. The newer machines do have limits put on them as far as pollutants go. I ride local from my driveway so no truck, no hauling (many do this in my area), and I’m the guy giving the younger riders little hints regarding their bloody loud exhausts and where you’d best not tear things up.

#188

That is one of my biggest pet peeves. The town dump should be required to take everything that members of the town have to get rid of for free. Out dump won’t take certain things or charges for some of them and you see the same thing back to what it was 50 plus years ago trash out in the woods.

#189

where we are they had to raise dump fees to match the urban areas. What was happening was contractors with cottages were using the cheap local fees for disposing of their urban reno debris. Dumping has always happened, always will. Dump fees will always be too high for some people. Strawman, enjoy your ATV we all have our hobbies.

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#190

David that is why I think all towns should take anything from their members for free. Then there is no incentive to take things to a different town dump. Being a land owner who has has to clean up illegal dumping on my land I think that is the only solution. But enough ranting.

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#191

We used to have a “transfer station” and I would bring in 2-3 ton loads of building materials, concrete, shingles, you name it - it ran 25.00 per load, no matter the weight. Now, with the only place left it’s $105.00 per ton. you show up with a trunkful of junk - it’s a 45.00 minimum.

I shudder to think how much garbage is being dumped into the outdoor boilers and open fires these days.

#192

If you really feel that way, all you have to do is get a bunch of like minded residents to go to the annual meeting and make a motion of the sort. Before approving the annual budget, you may have to add monies to the budget to cover the expense. Metal can be sold, but some of it requires special handling such as micro waves and refrigerators, so selling steel doesn’t very often garner any revenue. Glass has no value for recycling because it is nothing but heated sand. Probably best used for fill in road construction, after processing it. Tin cans do have some market, but in our case it is over 70 miles one way from the town. Paper products are saleable but you have to have a machine to bale it. And there is garbage which the town will have to pay to put into the dump you were trying to avoid. Then of course you must have labor to see that people follow the rules. You may get assistance from the DNR, but my experience is, they like to pay for posters to keep the towns people informed of the hours etc. Whether it is the DNR or the Town that runs the recycle center. it all comes out of your pocket ( I forgot plastic which must be sorted, and I know it is reusable, but I’m not sure how much of the expenses can be recooped.) TomC

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#193

Our town does take most of your common stuff you mentioned. Where it gets me is they want you to pay for some of it maybe it isn’t alot of money $20 for a refrigerator and the likes but that is enough some people just won’t do it and I find them out in my woods. Or the fact they have a size limit on a tire they will take. I have tractor tires that regardless how much i am willing to pay the town dump they simply will not take them. So what do you do with something like that? The only way I can get rid of them is to have the place I buy the tire mount my new ones. Tractor tires are easy to mount just alot of labor so I can save a ton doing it myself but I can’t dispose of the used tire anywhere. The problem with your idea of doing it at a town by town level Tom is just what David said if one town is less expensive the next town over will send trash. It really has to be mandated state wide for it to work. I know it will cost the town money but that just means the people who are dumping in the woods have to actually pay their part to get rid of stuff.
As to sorting trash we have to do that already plastics by their numbers electronics in one spot tin aluminum cardboard glass tires metal it all gets sorted as you dump it now. I would rather see our taxes reflect a realistic cost of dealing with our trash then have it end up all over the place on back roads. Maybe if people see how much it costs the town in their taxes they will start to think twice about our throwaway society.

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#194

Ha! Hard to keep up with you fellows. My brain is again slowing w-a-y down.

Yes SeanO you are correct. Washington State does have some of the strictest wood-heating emissions compliance regulation on the planet. Only stricter when like in parts of sowCal and others it is made flat illegal.
When we remodeled the old 1904 farmhouse back in 1995/6 I was not allowed to put back in the woodstove until we had a non-wood-heating primary space heating system installed, inspected and approved. $4,000. for permits, system and inspections. Electric forced air system. Boring, bland heat.
Then . . . not allowed to put the old wood stove back into service even with another $3,000 for the new codes mandated, all SS chimney, and corner air-gapped/concrete board, ceramic tile faced, hearth walls and flooring.
No. “All woodheating stoves must be Washington State (EPA Phase II) tested/certified with a metal data plate attached”.
$1,000. for that first, too small compliance stove. A $700. cute cast iron stove in all other states. Our Jotel 901.
Most manufactures just dropped out of the Washington State market.
And until very recently ALL outside wood boiler systems were just ALL disallowed/illegal. I’ve seen two bootlegged systems here in my county that were neighbors smokes-seen reported, busted, and forced removed. One manufacturer now supposedly had one of their OWB systems WA certified. Magazine ad’s info. Unreliable.
As always someone will step up and prove they can challenge an intended exclusion regulatory system by design complying.
QuadraFire stoves made in Colville, Washington has become our go-to. Our third and fourth bought woodstoves, we are currently using.

Not cheap. Not easy. Challenging the, “everybody knows” and “you-must” dragons in life.
Not always can you just get away with just-do-it, ask-forgiveness-later.
Why I can never actually vehicle drive-on-wood convert. No more forgiveness for that scoff-law Steve Unruh left in the Washington State Dept of Ecology pot anymore.

J-I-C Steve Unruh

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#195

Steve I think I would consider moving. Lol like I would my family has been here since before the revolutionary war. But I sure as heck would make a fuss. I love my wood heat love everything about it.

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#196

Our town finances the re-cycle program through our taxis. Now why would they take their junk out to your woods and dump it if they are already paying to dump it at the Town Re-cycle Center?? If that $20 fee for refrigerators is too much, have the Town increase the Recycle tax and take them free gratis. The tires should be handled when you buy new tires. Even without mounting the new tire the dealer can add the “disposal” charge to the bill and you return the tire when you are ready.TomC

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#197

Tom I think the point is they don’t want to pay the $20 when they can just drive out into the woods off the back side of the development they live in and dump it out there. All I know is I keep having to deal with it on several occasions fish and game has told me they caught people and straightened it out. Just frustrating and all because the town sees the dump as a way to raise money.

#198

As I said, have the town raise the tax and take everything free gratis. As a previous town chairman I can assure the town would love to get out of the business of recycling and give up the funds they get, but then the roads would be covered with trash. Be happy you have a town that has a system even though it isn’t perfect. TomC

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#199

Those are typical building code updates for remodeling, mostly for fire, but the washington state air quality stuff looks like it was passed in 1992, so you missed that. A few areas also offering rebates.

But you -can- make electric. :slight_smile: You are going to have a harder time making NG. There are several ways to heat with electric. Geothermal might be the least bland.

Usually the “exclusion regulatory system” is put in place because someone has proven they -can- actually meet the goal.

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#200

There are a few things going on with trash. The first, is pits have to be lined to prevent leaching, and covered to protect methane from escaping. Then they have to test water and such. Which is different then having a piece of land and just throwing it on, and in most cases the city dump was wetlands.

The second issue for like fridges i the freon leaking and proper disposal of it, thus the 20 dollars, you see similar tags on crap like old crt tv’s, and electronics because of the weird heavy metals they contain in small quantities.

Another issue, is people don’t want to haul it to the dump. it is easier to cart it out back, then to load it on to a road worthy vehicle.

I know of one township that subsidizes trash pickup once a month. They added recycling to that as well which cuts out a lot trash. But basically they hire a garbage truck, and a recycle bin, and you go dump your trash once a month. I don’t know what they charge for a pickup load anymore but it really isn’t that much relative to weekly trash pickup. It is like a dollar a bag for trash, so you dump like 6 bags, and 5 of them are recyclables and so you only pay a dollar for the other bag. It isn’t bad.

The old building materials, in some cases can be recycled and old tires around here we have to pay a state recycling fee, and some of them are upcycled into like rubberized playgrounds and some of them are actually pyrolized into oils. I thought you could take your tires in, and they would add them to their pile for a small fee. Maybe it isn’t so small, I don’t know.

We also have a couple of toxic waste events around here. For like lead paint, tv’s, fridges, tires, etc. you have to pay a fee but it is subsidized, and done in bulk so it is cheaper.

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