Emissions Reduction Techniques (ERTs)

1. Emissions Reduction Techniques (ERTs) ERT Task Team February 23, 2005 Salt Lake City, UT

2. Rationale Provide a method for integrating ERTs into reporting and emissions inventories AND maintain incentives to managers to apply ERT’s. ETT Task Team

3. Objectives • Develop a consistent process for translating ERT reports into modified EIs. • Translate emission reductions into emissions foregone. • Includes non-burning alternatives? • Baseline EI x multiplier(s) = Emissions output. ETT Task Team

4. Challenge How do we apply ERT calculations consistently across different ecosystems? ETT Task Team

5. Bases for comparisonERT vs. no ERT • Applied to the same “treated” acres? • USFS land managers mandated to treat fuels, with credit given for changing fire regime condition class. • So…should we includes non-burning alternatives, because treated acres are treated acres, therefore emissions reduced to zero? ETT Task Team

6. Goal of the ERT TT • Produce spreadsheet (relatively simple) to identify the following w.r.t. each ERT method. • Location in EI process. • Computational method. • Appropriate multiplier (e.g., acreage, tons/acre, percentage reductions, emissions factors). • Crude uncertainty level (high, acceptable, or unknown) associated with each computation. Largely based on work of National WF Coordination Group ERT’s for Four Vegetation Covers…for now Grass – Brush – Timber – Crops ETT Task Team

7. ETT Task Team

8. ETT Task Team

9. Issues for ERT methods • Can we separate burning from non-burning alternatives? • Many-to-one relationship between “types” and “methods” preserved? • Application of multiple ERTs at different scales? Issues for ERT methods • How to combine apples and oranges. • How to put some of these techniques in context of mandate on Federal lands, e.g., “reduce area burned” and even “reduce consumption”. ETT Task Team

10. Bob Habek – MT DEQ Incorporate info from Smoke Management Guide for Rx and WF 2001 Edition exp. Table 8.4 Critical Feedback ETT Task Team

11. Next Steps (March) • Obtain critical feedback from ERT TT members on *relatively simple* spreadsheet. • Arrive at *final* design of spreadsheet. • “Fill-in-the-Blanks” using ERT TT, outer-circle, and/or contract $$ to accomplish. • FEJF Review & Approval ETT Task Team

12. Discussion ETT Task Team