[WizzyWigg]

This has been around and about for a while but this was in The Times and Telegraph this morning.


Calls for wood-burning stoves to come with health warnings

New stoves should highlight the 'negative medical consequences of the outdoor air pollution' they produce, says report

Telegraph Reporters
22 December 2023 • 6:00am
Around 1.7 million households in the UK have wood-burning stoves
Wood-burning stoves should be given health warnings, a report backed by 100 Conservative MPs has said.
New stoves should carry labels highlighting the “negative medical consequences of the outdoor air pollution” they produce, according to the report by Bright Blue, a centre-right think tank.
The think tank also argued that councils should be able to ban the use of the stoves on days where air pollution is particularly high through an amendment to the Clean Air Act, according to The Times.
It comes after ministers asked councils to issue £300 fines for people breaking rules on the devices earlier this year.
Around 1.7 million households in the UK have wood-burning stoves, an increase from 500,000 in 2013.
Owners are more likely to be well-off, the authors of Delivering Cleaner Air in a Socially Just Way said, adding that 42 per cent owned their own home.
“Because many of those who burn at home tend to be better off, it should be possible to reduce this source of pollution without harming those in a more precarious financial situation,” they wrote.
The report was supported by the Conservative Environment Network, a group of more than 100 Tory MPs.
Alexander Stafford, the Conservative MP for Rother Valley in South Yorkshire, told The Times: “We must ensure that our transition towards cleaner air is a just transition ... policies which ignore the needs of the least well-off are as useless as policies which will not provide adequate air pollution reduction.”
A Defra spokesman said: “There have been significant improvements in air quality at a national level since 2010 ... our Environment Act made it easier for local authorities to act on pollution from domestic burning in smoke control areas and it is their legal duty to do that by issuing fines as they deem necessary.”

[geoffers]

Afraid it tends to be Guardian (+Times & Telegraph) class warriors with a (wood) chip on their shoulders and an axe to grind who keep pushing this agenda.

Need to get rid of old, oil-buring diesels first, who are the worst polluters for all 12 months of the year.

Plenty of evidence from ULEZ zones how air quality is vastly improved by removing old diesels from the equation
https://www.bath.ac.uk/announcements...-policy-brief/

It's not the oily black grime from wood burning stove that I continually have to clean from my window frames etc

[retrotecchie]

@geoffers

Just looking at the figures quoted, I can see straight away that the figures are utterly wrong and extremely biassed towards the agenda that certain groups are trying to push. You can 'prove' anything you like if you choose the right statistics.

1.7 million stoves in use. How many fossil fueled cars? And how many g/MWh is produced in the generation of that electricity...they skipped over that statistic.

Me.....I'll just chuckle quietly to myself and appreciate the work that I and a couple of builder friends have been putting in here at the Manor over the last week.



It's saving me around 70% of my heating oil usage, and using firewood sourced from my own land which has not only been seasoned properly, but has already sucked rather a lot of CO2 out of the atmosphere and is thus net carbon neutral. And I have planted new trees to replace the felled ones, so they in turn will be doing their bit. The stove is a new Ecoburn standard which has a fifth of the measured particulate pollution of the pre-2018 DEFRA standard which used to be the limits to which stove manufacturers worked to.

I agree that for urban or suburban areas, they are not the best option, but for us folks off grid and in the boonies on an Atlantic coast in a sparsely populated area, they are a sensible source of low carbon heating if used properly and with the appropriate fuel.

[geoffers]

@retrotecchie 👍👏

[meldrewreborn]

Its about particulate matter not carbon dioxide emissions, because as @retrotecchie points out the wood has previously sucked the gas from the air, so in the long term its carbon neutral.

Wherever its emitted it adds to the levels in the atmosphere. And with even modern stoves emitting 400+ times the particulate matter than a gas boiler there has to be a case for banning them completely. Gas boilers have their own issues of course with net zero targets.

Need for some joined up thinking in government on all these issues. You have to wonder why if ordinary people on this forum can see the issues, why can't our political representatives?

[DebF_EONNext]

I understand that burning wood will give off some form of emissions but when you compare this to other fuel sources such as coal and diesel I feel those emissions are much more harmful to my health and the environment!

Like @geoffers mentioned ULEZ zones air quality has improved so much that it is being rolled out more and more within the UK, not only that but the amount of cars on the roads now has increased so much that it has to be having a more negative impact than a little wood burner!

I previously lived in the city and my neighbour had 5 in the household each had their own car, the eldest son also had a work van and to top it off the parents had a "weekend car" that they used not for work and their "fancy car" for when they went away on business or holidays - so this 1 household had 8 vehicles 🤯 never mind the parking chaos it caused in the street 😆 Can you imagine every person in just 1 city owning a car how much damage that could cause to the environment!

[retrotecchie]

@DebF_EONNext

Ecodesign Regulations for solid fuel local space heating appliances came into force in the UK on 1st January 2022
Although much of the attention has been focused on wood burning, the regulations apply to all solid fuel stoves, including boiler stoves. Having said that, the manufacturer must declare the fuel that will be used in the stove. The designated fuel must be tested with the stove. A multi fuel stove designated to burn coal will have a separate set of results to the same stove with wood. Most manufacturers will declare and test their stoves with wood.
In addition to minimum energy requirements, the regulations cover a broad range of emissions:
Particulate Matter (PM10 & PM2.5), CO₂, NOx, OGC (organic gaseous compounds) and CO. The new emission limits are significantly lower and more comprehensive than those required for Defra Exemption. The table below illustrates the reduction in emission limits for CO and PM. (NOx and OGC were not measured before Ecodesign). The reduction in the CO limit is 88% and the reduction in PM is 55%.

Based on these reductions it can be seen that Ecodesign will lead to a significant improvement in UK air quality.
The minimum net efficiency levels will effectively increase to 40% for an open fire and to 75% for closed stoves.
The efficiencies are calculated using a calculated “seasonal space heating efficiency”. For stoves, this is a 4% increase in efficiency.
Unlike the requirements for Defra Exemption, which only applies to smoke control areas, Ecodesign regulations apply to the whole country, so no matter where a new stove is to be installed it must comply with Ecodesign.
It is now illegal to manufacture after 1st January 2022 that do not comply with Ecodesign. However, stoves that are already in the supply chain (e.g. manufacturers’, distributors’, retailers’ warehouses or retailers’ showrooms) can still be sold and there is no legal requirement to update existing stove installations. An Ecodesign Enforcement Team has been set up within the National Measurement Office to verify that products manufactured comply with the regulations.
In addition, stoves will have to have an energy label. This label is referred to as the Ecolabel. The requirement to display the Ecolabel came into force before Ecodesign, on 1st January 2018.
Since 2018 all stoves displayed in a retailer’s showroom need to be displayed with its Ecolabel. Manufacturers must include a printed label in the stove packaging with a minimum of information in instructions or on a specification sheet.
Advertisements, brochures and technical material should include the A to G energy efficiency class for that model.
Similarly, product offers of sale through the Internet must display the energy label.
Modern stoves will typically be in band A and A+. For comparison an open fire will typically be in band G.

[retrotecchie]

@meldrewreborn

Typical flue emissions from a modern condensing natural gas boiler are around 1 milligramme of particulate matter per megajoule of energy consumed.

Figures for solid fuel stoves are about 20 to 70 milligrammes per megajoule, depending on the fuel used. The lower figure is for properly seasoned hardwood, and the upper figure is for 'dirtier' coal products.

So the figure of 400x you are citing is actually really somewhere between 20 and 70. An open fire running at an efficiency of around 30% and burning offcuts of old kitchen cabinets and MDF will chuck out around 400mg+ so is 400x times dirtier than a boiler!

[meldrewreborn]

@retrotecchie

I don’t see how any of these stoves can improve air quality unless they replace an older even dirtier stove. If they are new stoves they will only add to our pollution.

[Andy65]

@DebF_EONNext

Having more cars than a household can park on their own property is an ever increasing problem. ULEZ is, like average speed cameras etc, is just a mechanism for generating income off the back of air quality/safety. The fundamental reason for doing it is financial. I also think that they are attempts to dissuade motorists, as are EVs. The state of roads have never been so bad, money is being diverted to other 'causes' rather than maintain the roads as they used to be.