About me
Could you live like this?
Environment's answer
Parks & Wildlife Planned burns
Forest Industry's answer
Photos
Health Department's Answer
Air Quality Monitoring
Is Smoke Dangerous
Asthma Foundation
Peaceful Demonstration
Correspondence
Links
Forum

cleanairtas.com
Site last updated: 02/07/2009

A citizens' court puts Environment Minister Michelle O'Byrne on trial.

Tasmania puts forestry before Health
with its deliberate pernicious planned burn smoke.
We are fighting for our lives because of environmental smoke pollution.
This site has gone global, please visit BurningIssues.org

per·ni·cious [par níshass] adj.
          1. causing serious harm: causing great harm, destruction, or death.
Encarta ® World English Dictionary © & (P) 1998-2004 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Asthma Foundation still refuses to lobby against planned burning for asthmatics !!...... see the Asthma Pages

Deliberately lit forestry fires (planned burns/logging burns/plantation burns) produce large quantities
of smoke across Tasmania, Australia which people are forced to breathe.
Planned clearing does not mean planned burning.
This smoke is causing misery to many people in the short term,
and the long term effects on the whole Tasmanian population are huge.

Tobacco smoke is burning vegetation. Forestry smoke is burning vegetation!
Millions of dollars are spent annually educating people about the harmful effects of cigarette smoke and yet Tasmanians are being made to 'smoke' this forestry residue.
The major toxic component of tobacco smoke is particulate matter. So, it is ok to be smothered in forestry smoke but deadly to inhale cigarette smoke?
A study for the US EPA, using tumour initiation tests on mice and Ames tests on bacteria,
concluded that woodsmoke was in fact 12 times as mutagenic (likely to cause cancer)
as the same quantity of tobacco smoke.

Burning solid fuel yields particulate pollution - solid particles smaller than a red blood cell which have been implicated in  2.1 million deaths world wide per year. .  "Particulate pollution is the most important contaminant in our air. ...we know that when particle levels go up, people die¹. "
 Indeed, wood smoke is chemically active in the body 40 times longer than tobacco².
1. Joel Schwartz, Ph.D., Harvard School of Public Health, E Magazine, Sept./Oct. 2002
2. Wm. A Pryor, Persistent Free Radicals in Woodsmoke: An ESR Spin Trapping Study, Free Radical Biology and Medicine 1989, 7(1): 17-21

Particulate Matter Mortality
"Based on reviews of the latest scientific literature, the Air Resources Board staff has concluded that particulate matter smaller than 2.5 microns (PM2.5) is much more toxic than previously estimated. New research suggests that even small increases in exposure increase the potential for earlier deaths." (CEPA - California Environmental Protection Agency) 

BEWARE:  This smoke is damaging you and your family's health and our environment.
Our Health Department and Environment Division should be especially concerned about small-particle pollution.
The tiniest particles can penetrate past the body's immune defences, travelling deep into the lungs and the bloodstream causing all sorts of other health problems you would never connect had come from this smoke.

Clean air is one of our most precious resources, essential for our survival and quality of life.
Note: When visiting a link, always use your back arrow to return to this site.

  If you are a non-smoker, then why are you being made to inhale forestry's harmful smoke?

Forestry are not even interested in the tons of wood they burn or the tons of smoke they release.
From information released under Freedom of Information:-
Between the 28/3/2008 and  4/7/2008 Forestry Tasmania conducted 536 planned burns.
Between the 28/3/2008 and 4/7/2008 the private forests conducted 450 planned burns.
Some of these burns lasted for days and smouldered much longer.
There are other smokeless methods available to forestry to get rid of their rubbish.
Our health does not fit in with forestry's polluting timetable.

The lifetime of PM 2.5 particle pollution is from days to weeks and their travel distance ranges from 100 to greater than 1000 kilometres (NRDC, 2000)

Any smoke causes distress, and can eventually cause death.
For this reason there can be no more deals or compromises being done to allow forestry planned burns to continue.
When it comes to Tasmanian's health this should be non negotiable.

Seeing an average adult breathes 11,000 litres of air a day (7-8 litres a minute) fine particle pollution from the smoke of burnt logging rubbish, poses a significant health threat for some of our most valuable and vulnerable people in our community. Children, adolescents, seniors, people with asthma and chronic lung diseases, people with chronic heart disease and diabetics are most at risk, but this effects you too. Our children in particular should not be subjected to this pollution because, being more active, they suck in more toxic particles.
"Children exposed to smoke in early childhood, have a higher risk of developing childhood asthma. Asthma cannot be cured."(Asthma Foundations Australia).
Tasmania has the highest rate of asthma in  Australia. Out of a population of 500,000 there are 65,000 with asthma (this does not include other lung conditions like COPD) and there are 15,000 children with the disease.
We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children. Native American Proverb.

   'Smoke management' means stopping the smoke at the source.
Not putting people on drugs while the smoke continues.

Our government has had years to fix this harmful pollution. They don't need more time to look at the problem.
WATCH the VIDEO World Environment Day 2008 (3.83Mb .wmv file).

Why should we be forced into our 'shelters' while forestry fire bomb us from outside.
I believe it is a basic human right to be able to breathe clean air and to go outside as we wish.

Many credible scientific studies link air pollution to sickness, diseases and death in humans and in animals.
No studies say forestry smoke is good for your health.
  Please read this one before you turn the page...
Particle Pollution Linked to Deep Vein Thrombosis and Blood Clots

Patersonia Smoke Diary....on Links Page

*** OPERATION SMOKE WATCH ***
A smoke watch trial is being conducted in Northern Tasmania with regards to environmental smoke pollution.
Tell cleanairtas where it is coming from.
If you consider the smoke a health worry seek treatment first.
Then ring or have someone ring the:
Public & Environmental Health Service free call 1800 671 738 (24 Hours a day/7 Days a week) and lodge a complaint.
And
The Environment Division on 1800 005 171 (24 hours/7 days a week.) and lodge a complaint.
And
The Forest Practices Association (FPA) on 6233 7966 during work hours and lodge a complaint.
You might choose not  to listen to burning propaganda when someone rings back.
If the FPA says they will only take complaints by filling out a form on the web, tell them you are registering by phone like they advise and ask them to acknowledge your complaint by return mail. If your complaint is not acknowledged by them then it has not been registered!

In all cases ask for your complaint to be recorded, ask for a copy to be sent to you, and ask what they intend to do about it.
Then please email the details, ie, date, time, duration of burn, wind direction, and any photos, etc., to cleanairtas.
Thank you for your participation. It is YOUR health, your LIFE.
Do this every day if smoke worries you.

Disclaimer: While every care has been taken in the preparation of material for this website,
we do not accept responsibility for any errors or omissions nor for
the result of actions taken on the basis of this information.
Note: The word "forestry" refers to the whole forestry industry, not only to Forestry Tasmania.

How to deal with troublesome smoke:  http://woodburnersmoke.net