This document contrasts the proposed regulations on wood burning with the realities of enforcement and public behavior. It summarizes the key proposals, including prohibiting the most polluting fuels, ensuring only the cleanest stoves are sold, and updating legislation on smoke. However, it argues these proposals ignore realities like lack of enforcement of existing laws, the public not making optimal choices even with education, and the challenges of regulating wet wood sales and storage. Overall it concludes the plans will not work due to stalled reform, industry priorities of sales over cleanliness, inability to standardize fuels from tree services, and failure to address wood burning in air quality problem areas.

1. Woodburning
in the real world?
Jack Pease Editor, Air
Quality Bulletin and hobby-
firewood seller - with a foot
in both camps contrasts
theory with reality

2. New proposals and health effects
• 1/ Health effects: taken as read – we know woodsmoke is bad;
• 2/ Regulation - currently controlled through Clean Air Act with Defra proposing ‘new’
controls within the Air Quality Strategy consultation and more recently a specific
consultation on wood quality.
Key points:
• 1/ We will legislate to prohibit the sale of the most polluting fuels.
• 2/ We will ensure only the cleanest stoves are available for sale by 2022.
• 3/ We will update outmoded legislation on ‘dark smoke’ from chimneys and underused
provisions on Smoke Control Areas to bring these into the 21st century with more flexible,
proportionate enforcement powers for local government.
• 4/ We will ensure that consumers understand what they can do to reduce their impact from
emissions from domestic burning
• 5/ Wet wood controls

3. Proposals v reality: 1
“1/ We will legislate to prohibit the sale of the most polluting
fuels.” Just like the Clean Air Act has been enforced (not)?
(Response: none)
Economy coal sold as
‘perfect for burning
on a budget’
Fuel openly on sale in
London and not covered
up from the rain

4. Proposals v reality: 2
“2/ We will ensure only the cleanest stoves are available for
sale by 2022.”
But one stove is equivalent to six trucks...
And haven’t we heard promises that new
technology will fix emissions before (vehicle
Euro standards failed to deliver)?
One stove equivalent to six trucks?

5. Proposals v reality 3
3/ We will update outmoded legislation on ‘dark smoke’ from chimneys and
underused provisions on Smoke Control Areas to bring these into the 21st
century with more flexible, proportionate enforcement powers for local
government.
Enforcement is already effectively non existent –
Government deregulation obsession now looking at
‘one in three out’!
If its not a duty then it won’t happen, even if it is a
duty it is unlikely to happen. There’s history here...

6. Proposals v reality 4
4/ We will ensure that consumers understand what they can do to
reduce their impact from emissions from domestic burning
The public cannot be trusted (en-masse) to make the right choices even if the impact is obvious (e.g. even with
current climate change/pollution frenzy they choose to drive short distances, choose diesel, choose oversize
4x4s, choose to remove DPFs, chip their car, speeding, over-acceleration etc etc.) With wood - how can a
consumer be expected to make the right choice?
Education?
Do
consumers
really read
this at the
point of
sale?
Dry when bought

7. Proposals v reality 5
5/ Wet wood. Government is promoting Woodsure - a sort of quality assurance scheme.
Ignores the reality of tree surgery where lots of small tree surgeons have no storage
facilities, and if they do are uncovered, and more likely to sell trailer loads of logs green
and wet. Hard to regulate - hard to see how to change without setting up industrial-scale
timber processing yards
...duly tipped on your driveway - but
what is it!
Open storage of wood
then sold by the ‘trailer
load’...

8. ‘Wet’ wood
How can we expect the public to understand what wet wood
is? The ‘learned’ understanding of wood burning has been lost.
Mainland
Europeans have
retained their
understanding of
how to prepare,
stack and burn
wood

9. ‘Wet’ wood
How is anyone supposed to know when they order a trailer-load -or buy
wood whether it is ...
• Seasoned and dry (good)
• Seasoned but wet (not good)
• Unseasoned and dry (bad)
• Unseasoned and wet (disastrous)
• Or indeed hardwood (good - but not Willow or Poplar) or softwood (bad)?
A £5 moisture meter is a good start
(20% is the magic number for
moisture content but ....
Wet newly felled Oak: needs two
years seasoning
Dry old pine: very dry but no heat
and full of resin

10. What about
nuisance?
Nuisance is barely mentioned.
The stove/firewood industry
is talks of ‘clean burning fuel’
and ‘clean burning stoves’
and all that will neatly provide
a best practical means
defence against any
enforcement of nuisance.
This is the reality of living
next to a serial woodburner
(this one in a south London
smokeless zone and AQMA)
Nothing can be done about
it being a ‘clean’ appliance.
What is this resident’s
exposure?

11. EHO’s tales
To be expanded if time permits..
• 1/ Surrey EHO: Wood burner in Yurt in Garden.
• 2/ Newcastle allotments: 12 burners in sheds burning wastewood
• 3/ Pizza ovens - mobile and fixed
• 4/ Defra ‘approved’ appliances: are they really clean?
• 5/ Kiln drying: hugely energy intensive
• 6/ “Clean” stove leaflets: future mis-selling scandal
• 7/ No means of private nuisance if SCA/CAA certified
• 8/ Skip diving in approved stoves
• 9/ Intentional burning of rubbish

12. Conclusions: Current plans will not work on many
levels:
• 1/ Public education has never worked whether it be seatbelts, mobile phones in cars or speeding -
it always needs enforcement;
• 2/ Promises of reform of CAA is permanently stalled and unlikely to go anywhere given
deregulation agenda and lack of local authority enforcement ability;
• 3/ Industry led schemes rarely work as it is in the business of selling stoves and fuels - the
cleanest solution is no stove
• 4/ Wood fuel certification will be problematic as this tree surgery and firewood are incapable of
being standardised
• 5/ Nothing in the plans will stop skipdiving/wood fairies/bad customer storage/burning rubbish
• 6/ The elephant in the room on why we are allowing woodburning in AQMAs/CAZs at all is not up
for discussion
email: jackpease@empublishing.co.uk