FAIRBANKS -- The Fairbanks North Star Borough addressed carbon monoxide pollution problems with an inspection and maintenance program for cars and trucks.

Officials are now taking a look at wood stoves to solve a different air pollution problem that threatens residents: particulate.

Mayor Jim Whitaker said the borough will consider a wood stove and outdoor boiler trade-in program to reduce inefficient home heating systems within the borough.

Particulate pollution common in Fairbanks consists of airborne dust and soot small enough to find its way deep into the lungs when inhaled by normal breathing. The pollution is generated by inefficient combustion. The pollution peaks during cold winter days.

Exposure carries long-term risks that includes chronic bronchitis, decreased lung function and, for people with heart or lung disease, shorter lives.

Whitaker said he expects a heating system trade-in program to include some type of incentive, possibly a break on property taxes, to encourage residents to switch old home heaters for more efficient ones.

He expects to introduce the measure within a couple of months.

The plan likely will be unpopular and may seem like government intrusion on residents' right to heat their homes as they choose, he said. However, the community's collective air pollution problem already is intrusive, he said.

The tentative plan, he said, includes restrictions and incentives that borough officials believe are "appropriate and legal."

"It's going to be the subject, I'm sure, of great debate," he said.

Borough officials said they'll ask the Alaska Legislature to change state law to allow a proposed tax incentive.

Air quality experts said they continue to investigate "hot spots" around Fairbanks that seem to produce or attract more air pollution.

It might take until 2010 to pinpoint details linked to what's causing the pollution, which has placed Fairbanks on the Environmental Protection Agency's short list of troubled communities.

The EPA is expected to require local officials to submit a pollution-prevention plan in 2012 and meet the plan's goals two years later.

The borough plans to work with the EPA to test car emissions at low temperatures next winter, according to air-quality specialist Jim Conner. The borough originally hoped to present a comprehensive report in 2009 from the federally funded study.

The study started last winter and was scheduled to run through next spring but federal environmental authorities have expanded the geographic area local and state agencies must monitor.

Conner said his team has so far found a few neighborhoods where the particulate pollution problem seems strongest.

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