Moving firewood in Tennessee: external quarantine, kiln certification and labels

This page reports what the official source says. It is not legal advice: ask the office named here. It follows chapter 0080-06-09 of the Rules of the Tennessee Department of Agriculture, in force from September 12, 2021, and the department's own guides to it.

The quarantine area

According to the rule text, the rule designates as quarantine areas the states and provinces outside Tennessee, with an exception for counties that share a border with Tennessee. It names those counties by state: four in Alabama, two in Arkansas, six in Georgia, seventeen in Kentucky, six in Mississippi, two in Missouri, ten in North Carolina and five in Virginia. The department's plain language guide calls it an external quarantine covering all areas outside Tennessee except counties touching the Tennessee border. The rule also lets the department temporarily quarantine any other area if symptoms of pests commonly spread by firewood are seen there, if infested firewood is shipped into it, or if firewood shares a container, producer or shipper with infested wood.

What counts as firewood

The rule defines firewood as wood four feet or less in length, split or not, advertised, offered for sale or sold as fuel, including kindling, logs, boards or timbers. It leaves out kiln dried dimensional lumber and wood chipped smaller than 2 cm. It also leaves out logs or wood going commercially to sawmills, pulp and paper mills, pellet plants, plywood plants, biomass refineries or power plants, artisan manufacturing such as cabinets and furniture, composite wood plants, and facilities that treat wood to heat-treatment standards. The rule's regulated articles are firewood plus any equipment, shipping material or vehicle exposed to firewood.

Treatment, paperwork and labels

The rule defines treating as heating and holding a core temperature of 160 degrees F for at least 75 minutes.
Nobody ships firewood into the state or out of a quarantined area unless the load comes with a treatment certificate, a compliance agreement or written authorization from the department.
Package sales carry a declaration of the compliance agreement number and treatment schedule, a statement that the package holds firewood, the net quantity, the name and address of the manufacturer, packer or distributor, and the origin by county and state.
Bulk sales come with a delivery ticket or receipt that carries the compliance agreement number and treatment schedule, the name and address of who measured the wood, the date delivered, the quantity delivered in cords or cubic meters, the quantity the price is based on if different, and the origin by county and state.

What the department's pages add

According to the firewood certification page, Tennessee's certification offers two heat treatments, 140 degrees F for 60 minutes or 160 degrees F for 75 minutes, and the certification fee is US$100 annually. The department's kiln certification manual sets out how a producer is certified.

It says heat treated wood and kiln dried wood differ: heat treatment is a measure of temperature, kiln drying a measure of moisture content.
It lists the requirements: an internal wood temperature of 60 degrees C for 60 minutes or 71 degrees C for 75 minutes, a kiln with a thermocouple, and records of the run date, start and end times and the time the required temperature was reached.
It says treated wood is stored in a covered area at least 6 inches off the ground, to prevent infestation by imported fire ants.
Certification runs in three steps: a producer workplan with a diagram of the facility, a pre-inspection meeting by phone or email, and a physical inspection with temperature probes placed through the kiln.
A kiln that passes gets a compliance agreement and a stamp, issued for six months or one year depending on the results, with an annual fee of US$100. Changes to the kiln, heat source, basket arrangement or run duration require recertification.

Inspections and penalties

The rule lets the department enter any location or conveyance during normal business hours where it has reason to believe firewood is kept, and inspect as often as it deems necessary. Section .07 says each violation is grounds for stop movement orders, injunctions and criminal charges, and that a breach of a compliance agreement is a separate violation. Under section .08 a stop movement order can be lifted once the wood is treated, returned or destroyed at the owner's expense. If the wood is not treated or returned within ten days of the order, the department may order it destroyed at the owner's expense. A petition for review has to reach the department in writing within ten days of the order, or the order becomes final.

For other states and provinces see the table on moving wood and firewood.