As a physician who has spent 30-plus years practicing in the Pioneer Valley I saw many patients suffer and die from lung disease. Wood burning was often a factor, and one of the questions I’d ask of a patient with a respiratory illness was whether they used a wood stove.

Wood burning is a major source of the tiny particles known as PM2.5 emissions (PM2.5 is particulate matter, less than the diameter of a human hair — less than 2.5 μm or microns) — which are a major cause of lung disease. Breathing these tiny particles causes or aggravates emphysema and asthma. Why would we want to subject our whole population to the equivalent of living in a poorly ventilated home with a leaking wood stove?

The wood products industry has also been promoting wood pellet burning in our schools and residential buildings, exposing our children to the potential life -hortening effects of these 2.5 particle emissions.

Our state Legislature is considering doubling the existing subsidy for burning woody biomass. This would make more people, especially those living near these facilities, susceptible to the suffering of lung disease. I am asking people concerned about this to let the legislatures Ways and Means Committee know that a doubling of the subsidy for biomass burning in Massachusetts is exactly the opposite of what we need for our health and the climate.

Alternatively, S.2137/H.3211 is a bill that will make commercial scaled and institutional heating facilities that burn wood fuels ineligible for subsidies under Massachusetts’ Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard (APS). These facilities include wood-burning boilers and furnaces, which emit a disproportionately large amount of carbon dioxide and other air pollution in Massachusetts.

Our money spent on higher utility rates, in the form of subsidies, should go to other non-emitting technologies under the APS such as solar hot water, air source heat pumps, and geothermal systems. Instead of forcing ratepayers to pay for the expansion of large-scale wood burning, please ask your senators and representatives to support bill S.2137/H.3211.

Dr. Constance Lentz

Montague