Best Available Control Measures

The application of best available control measures (BACM) for prescribed fire is a required element of State implementation plans for PM10 nonattainment areas that are significantly impacted by prescribed fire smoke (EPA 1992a). The application of BACM is also a requirement of EPAs Air Quality Policy on Wildland and Prescribed Fires (EPA 1998). EPAs BACM guidance includes basic smoke management program elements and emissions reduction techniques that can be used by land managers to minimize air quality impacts from fire.

Briefly, the BACM guidance notes that there are two basic approaches to minimizing the impact of prescribed fire on air quality:

1. Emission reduction: At least 24 methods within six major classifications have been have been used to reduce emissions from prescribed burning (Hardy and others 2001) by reducing the area burned; reducing the fuel load by reducing the fuel production, or fuel consumption, or both; scheduling burns before new fuels appear; and increasing combustion efficiency.
   
   
2. Emission redistribution: These techniques reduce the impact of the pollutants emitted on sensitive locations or regional haze through smoke dilution or transport and include burning when dispersion is good, cooperating with other burners in a single airshed to schedule burns, avoiding sensitive areas, burning smaller units, and burning more frequently.

Although each method can be discussed independently, fire practitioners often choose fire and fuels manipulation techniques that complement or are at least consistent with meteorological scheduling for maximum smoke dispersion and favorable plume transport.