1. A. Each F/SLM conducting a prescribed burn shall implement as many Emission Reduction Techniques and Smoke Management Techniques as are feasible subject to economic, technical, and safety feasibility criteria, and land management objectives.

2. B. Emission Reduction Techniques include:

   1. 1. Reducing biomass to be burned by use of techniques such as yarding or consolidation of unmerchandisable material, multi-product timber sales, or public firewood access, when economically feasible;
   2. 2. Reducing biomass to be burned by fuel exclusion practices such as preventing the fire from consuming dead snags or dead and downed woody material through lining, application of fire-retardant foam, or water;
   3. 3. Using mass ignition techniques such as aerial ignition by helicopter to produce high intensity fires of high fuel density areas such as logging slash decks;
   4. 4. Burning only fuels essential to meet resource management objectives;
   5. 5. Minimizing consumption and smoldering by burning under conditions of high fuel moisture of duff and litter;
   6. 6. Minimizing fuel consumption and smoldering by burning under conditions of high fuel moisture of large woody fuels;
   7. 7. Minimizing soil content when slash piles are constructed by using brush blades on material-moving equipment and by constructing piles under dry soil conditions or by using hand piling methods;
   8. 8. Burning fuels in piles or windrows;
   9. 9. Using a backing fire in grass fuels;
   10. 10. Burning fuels with an air curtain incinerator, as defined in R18-2-101, operated according to manufacturer specifications and meeting applicable state or local opacity requirements;
   11. 11. Extinguishing or mopping-up of smoldering fuels;
   12. 12. Chunking of piles and other consolidations of burning material to enhance flaming and fuel consumption, and to minimize smoke production;
   13. 13. Burning before litter fall, green-up of fuels, recently cut large fuels cure in areas with fuels reduction activity, and just before precipitation to reduce fuel smoldering and consumption;
   14. 14. Reduce the area burned, by only burning a portion of the area within a designated perimeter or through mosaic burning.

3. C. Smoke management techniques include:

   1. 1. Burning from March 15 through September 15, when meteorological conditions allow for good smoke dispersion;
   2. 2. Igniting burns under good-to-excellent ventilation conditions;
   3. 3. Suspending operations under poor smoke dispersion conditions;
   4. 4. Considering smoke impacts on local community activities and land users;
   5. 5. Burning piles when other burns are not feasible, such as when snow or rain is present;
   6. 6. Using mass ignition techniques such as aerial ignition by helicopter to produce high combustion efficiency with short duration impacts;
   7. 7. Using all opportunities that meet the burn prescription and all burn locations to spread smoke impacts over a broader time period and geographic area;
   8. 8. Burning during optimum mid-day dispersion hours, with all ignitions in a burn unit completed by 3:00 p.m. to prevent trapping smoke in inversion or diurnal windflow patterns;
   9. 9. Providing information on the adverse impacts of using green or wet wood as fuel when public firewood access is allowed;
   10. 10. Implementing maintenance burning in a periodic rotation to shorten prescribed fire duration and reduce excessive fuel accumulations that could result in excessive smoke production in a wildfire; and
   11. 11. Using fire-management strategies to shift smoke into more favorable smoke dispersion seasons.

Historical Note

Adopted effective October 8, 1996 (Supp. 96-4). Amended by final rulemaking at 10 A.A.R. 388, effective March 16, 2004 (Supp. 04-1). Amended by final rulemaking at 29 A.A.R. 1427 (June 30, 2023), effective August 7, 2023 (Supp. 23-2). Amended by final expedited rulemaking at 30 A.A.R. 2422 (July 26, 2024), with an immediate effective date of July 3, 2024 (Supp. 24-3).