Externalities and Open Field Burning: A Case Study

G RASS SEED GROWERS in the Willamette Valley contribute $35 million in gross sales annually to Oregon's economy. In 1972, 260,000 acres of grass seed crops were grown in the Willamette Valley. An estimated 148,000 acres are devoted to the production of both annual and perennial ryegrass, accounting for all ryegrass grown in the United States. The remaining 102,000 acres include the production of bentgrass, red fescue, chewings fescue, tall fescue, and Merion-Kentucky bluegrass grown for seed. The Willamette Valley produces approximately 50 percent of U. S.-grown bentgrass, 70 percent of the red fescue, and 95 percent of the chewings fescue [3, p. 4]. The Willamette Valley extends southward from Portland to a range of foothills south of Eugene-a total of 130 miles. It is bounded on the east by the Cascade Mountain range, and on the west by the Coastal range. Within these confines are found the major industrial centers of the state with 70 percent of the state's population of 2.1 million people, but only 14 percent of the state's land base. The geographic and demographic characteristics of the Willamette Valley add to the valley's major environmental quality problem--open field burning. The practice of open field burning has been used by the grass seed growers since the early 1940's. Field burning has proven to be an effective economic means for destroying blind-seed and ergot fungus, nematode, rusts, smut, and for eliminating grass seed residues (1.5 to 7 tons per acre) in annual and perennial crops grown in the Willamette Valley. On the other hand, the practice of field burning has become a "burning" issue in the Willamette Valley within the last four years. Heavy smoke emissions from field burning create serious problems for all metropolitan areas in the valley, but especially in the Eugene-Springfield area. In the summer, when burning is done, winds from the northwest force much of the valley's smoke into the Eugene area. Therefore, temperature inversion layers that prevent upper-atmospheric mixing and dispersion assure that smoke-filled air is retained in the Eugene area. The reduced visibility, due to the smoke, has increased traffic accident rates on highways, raised the ire level of property owners who complain of soiling problems and nuisance ef ects resulting in decreased property values, a d which may have increased the incidence of respiratory ailments, particularly from patients having previous respiratory illness [3, p. 5]. To bring open field burning under governmental control, Governor Tom McCall signed Act No. 563 into law on June 29, 1971. It contains major legislative changes, in both policy and direction, on the field burning problem. The stated purpose of the Act is to phase out open field burning in the Willamette Valley as soon as a feasible alternative method of field sanitation is available. At the present, the Oregon State University Agricultural Engineering Department is conducting research on a pollutionfree mobile field sanitizer, but the development is still in the experimental stage. The Act also provides that, in any case, ". . . after January 1, 1975, no person shall open burn" grass or cereal grain fields in the Willamette Valley. This law gave authority for the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to manage field burning until 1975. The issuance of burning permits is determined by the DEQ weighing the economic consequences, the feasibility of alternative actions, and considering weather conditions and other factors necessary to protect the public health and welfare [4]. The Act also created a $0.50 per acre service cost to the grass seed growers. That is, the $0.50 covers the cost of clerical help related to regulating field burning, covers the cost of monitoring field burning by an airplane (operated by the Oregon Seed C uncil), and supports the development of a feasible alternative to field burning.