State weighs biomass boost
Some lawmakers seek more incentives before banning burns
By Staff reports
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Florez's air-pollution bills
Here is a description of the nine air-quality-related bills introduced by state Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter:
SB700: Ends a decades-long exemption that agriculture has had from federal clean laws. Major sources of agricultural pollution, such as large dairies, would have to get federal permits to operate. Status: Ready for vote by Assembly.
SB701: $4.5 billion bond to help fund programs to clean the air in the San Joaquin Valley and elsewhere. Status: Ready for vote by Senate Appropriations Committee.
SB703: Intended to revise electricity rate schedules to make electric power more competitive with the price of diesel fuel for farmers and give them an incentive to switch to this clean fuel source. Status: Ready for vote by Senate.
SB704: Provides $6 million to biomass facilities as an incentive to burn more farm waste. Status: Ready for vote by Assembly.
SB705: Phases out open field burning of agricultural waste by 2010 in the San Joaquin Valley. Status: Rejected Thursday, but could be voted again by Assembly.
SB707: Prohibits large dairies from opening a new facility or expanding an existing one within three miles of a town or school without the community or school board's support. Status: Ready for vote by Assembly.
SB708: Allows vehicle smog checks to be conducted at sobriety checkpoints and increases fines for second and subsequent vehicle gross-polluting violations to a maximum of $285. Status: Passed by Assembly and goes to final vote in Senate.
SB709: Gives the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control Board some authority to deal with vehicles, allowing the board to require ride-sharing programs for companies of 100 or more employees and to set fees on cars and other pollution sources to raise funds for clean air programs. Status: Ready for vote by Assembly.
Efforts to help provide alternative methods to dispose of agricultural waste, and perhaps clear the way for a ban on ag burning, are pending on the Assembly floor.
SB704, another in a series of air-quality bills by state Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter, would provide $6 million to subsidize biomass facilities so they can afford to use farm waste for fuel.
Assemblywoman Nicole Parra, D-Hanford, said even more help is needed before she's ready to go along with an eventual ban on ag-waste burning.
"It's a good start," Parra said, but "it's not enough."
She and Assemblywoman Barbara Matthews, D-Tracy, chairwoman of the Assembly Agriculture Committee, both voted Thursday against Florez's SB705, along with Valley Republicans. The bill would phase out open-field burning of ag waste beginning in 2005
Assemblywoman Sarah Reyes, D-Fresno, who managed SB705 on the Assembly floor, said air pollution is threatening both the economy and the health of the region, especially of children.
She said the phase-out period in the bill would give Valley officials time to secure adequate funding to develop biomass plants and other alternatives to open field burning.
"What I'm hearing is you want the carrot" of $6 million, Reyes said, "but you don't want the stick" of an eventual ban.
There are eight operating biomass facilities in the Valley, plus a few idle plants, according to Julee Malinowski-Ball, a lobbyist for the California Biomass Energy Alliance, a trade association.
She said subsidies are necessary because it's more labor intensive to clean dirt and other debris from farm waste and haul it to the facility than to burn construction debris delivered on pallets, which is part of what the Valley facilities are using for fuel right now.
Still, Malinowski-Ball said the Valley's biomass power generators burned 900,000 tons of farm waste in 2002. She said the biomass facilities probably could handle most of the Valley's farm waste, but some of it they could never handle.
Biomass-burning power plants have received state subsidies in the past, but that money has been slashed because of the state deficit.
"We absolutely need long-term funding" for biomass facilities, she said.
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