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Utah is sitting on $500,000 in grants to install free furnaces.

But nearly six months after the Legislature made the money available, not a single homeowner has stepped forward to take advantage of a program that is meant to reduce the wintertime emissions that foul the air along the Wasatch Front.

This week, the Utah Air Quality Board will adjust wood-burning regulations, including reopening a registry of stove-owning homeowners in hopes of making more Utahns eligible for the conversion program.

The grants available range from $5,000 for a furnace to as much as $10,000 to install gas lines.

"We are offering to put in all the duct work and, if necessary, we would run natural gas to the building," said David McNeill, a branch manager with the Division of Air Quality.

Air-quality watchdogs also will consider Gov. Gary Herbert's request to ban residential wood burning throughout the inversion season — from November to March. With the change, there would be no more "yellow" or "red" burn days along the Wasatch Front. There would just be a five-month-long no-burning season.

The change would be opened to public comment through Feb. 9 and would not take effect until Nov. 1, 2015.

Another measure would extend that ban to include most businesses and institutions, including the Capitol's two fireplaces.

Restaurants, however, would be exempt.

In the meantime, the Salt Lake County Health Board will consider next week a proposal to use the state's voluntary no-burn alerts to trigger full bans in Utah's most populous county.

Wood plays a large role in Utah's winter buildup of particulates.

Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment contends that smoke is a health threat at any level, on par with secondhand cigarette smoke.

"Our position is founded on the current science that shows the extreme risk associated with wood smoke, which is all the reason to minimize this stuff as much as possible," said Tim Wagner, the group's executive director.

Wagner says creating more exemptions for wood burners is inconsistent.

"There are programs in place to transition these people away from wood to high-efficiency natural-gas furnaces. That is low-hanging fruit," he said. "When you issue more exemptions, you lose credibility on the issue, and it's not fair to those trying to comply."

The clean-air group Breathe Utah used private money this year to swap out five solid-fuel heating devices in Salt Lake County, including a relic coal furnace in a Sugar House home.

But the state has struck out so far finding any takers for the giveaways. That may be due to the shrunken number of homes that are even eligible for a free conversion.

To qualify for a free conversion, a residence must be on the state's registry of homes where wood is the sole source of heat. The homes listed are exempt from the burn bans the state imposes in seven northern Utah counties when wintertime particulate pollution approaches unhealthy levels.

Contacted by The Salt Lake Tribune in November, one Utah County resident, who has relied on wood for 25 years, said her family was unaware of the subsidized conversions. She and others said they enjoy the ambiance and quality of the heat radiating from their wood stoves and like avoiding a utility bill.

While well-seasoned logs can retail for $250 a cord, firewood is often available at low or no cost — most Utahns live in close proximity to a national forest.

The "sole-source" club was closed to new members in June 2013. But since then, air-quality regulators discovered most of the registry's 207 homes no longer belonged because they have a new heat source.

Now, 38 homes remain, most of them in Utah County at the southern end of Utah's "nonattainment" zone, which stretches all the way up to the Idaho line.

The registry lists six homes in Davis, Weber, Box Elder and Cache counties.

"We know there are people out there who haven't registered," McNeill said. Utah Division of Air Quality (DAQ) staff on Wednesday will ask the Air Quality Board to reopen the registry for six months.

This winter, the state intends to step up enforcement with the help of county health departments, so there will be more incentive for sole-sourcers to register.

"Once it closes, it's closed," McNeill said. "When we catch them [burning on no-burn days], they can't say, 'We are sole source.' That excuse is gone — even if it's true."

The board also may vote to extend the burn ban to nonresidences. But pizza and barbecue aficionados need not fear: Exemptions would keep Utah restaurants' wood-fired ovens and grills lit.

And the ski communities high up Little and Big Cottonwood canyons want some consideration, too.

"An outright restriction of burning during those days would be a hardship on our operations for a very little reduction in solid fuel burning emissions, a reduction that has no effect on the Salt Lake Valley inversions," Alta Town Administrator John Guldner wrote in comments to DAQ.

Most of Alta's lodges and rental condos have converted to propane for the sake of convenience and safety. But 16 fireplaces remain in commercial establishments. The Rustler, Alta Lodge and the Peruvian, for example, burn wood in open hearths that fill common areas with a warm glow.

"There are a few that want to keep it because guests demand it," Guldner said in an interview. "It's part of the ambiance of the ski lodge. We are definitely pro-environment, and we don't want to do anything to screw up the atmosphere."

He noted power outages, common during winter, disable most propane heaters, so many cabins still keep wood on hand, even though just one Alta home is on the sole-source list.

Another rule change, already in effect this winter, exempts ceremonial burning "when conducted by a Native American spiritual adviser." The exemption was enacted in response to tribal representatives who were concerned the burn ban would shut down sweat-lodge rituals.

DAQ, meanwhile, wants to put a lid on the waste-to-energy movement, which seeks to burn wood and other "biomass" to generate steam or electricity. Such facilities tap a renewable-energy source — the tons of waste wood harvested in national forest restoration projects. But retrofitting a school or a hospital with such burners is a poor environmental choice for the Wasatch Front, officials say.

"It might happen elsewhere, but it won't happen here," McNeill said. "It doesn't makes sense to take out a perfectly good natural-gas furnace.

"It doesn't matter how you burn it," he added. "Even if it's the cleanest EPA-certified wood stove, it still pollutes 100 times more than natural gas."

State Air Quality Board Meeting

— Board members are expected to reopen the "sole-source" registry of wood-burning homeowners and limit exemptions to the state's wood-burning ban.

December 3, 2014, at 1:30 p.m.

195 North 1950 West, Room 1015

Salt Lake City, Utah 84116. › XX