September 2018. Cooking with wood or coal is linked to increased risk of respiratory illness and death Yet another study links cooking with wood or coal to increased risk of respiratory illness & death, this time in never smokers in China, where a third of the homes uses solid fuels. Participants had no lung or other diseases when the study started. September 2018. Greenbiz reports on the Global Climate Action Summit: super-greenhouse-pollutants, including methane and black carbon, contributing as much as 50% of current warming. "Mitigation of super pollutants is the only way to keep it below 2 degrees by 2050, while we are waiting for the CO2 measures to kick in," said Veerabhadran Ramanathan, distinguished professor of atmospheric and climate sciences at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, at the University of California, San Diego. September 2018. Air pollution particles found in mothers' placentas. Unicef executive director Anthony Lake recently warned of the danger of air pollution to babies: “Not only do pollutants harm babies’ developing lungs, they can permanently damage their developing brains – and, thus, their futures.” September 2018. Every Fleming lives in danger zone for particulate matter (via Google Translate) "Of all pollutants in the air, particulate matter is the deadliest. And every Fleming lives in an environment where the concentration is unhealthy, says the annual report from the Flemish Environment Agency (VMM). Wood stoves and fireplaces may have thousands of deaths on their conscience." September 2018.‘Green’ home heating fuels causing ‘extreme levels of air pollution. Irish Times. The increasing use of solid fuels such as wood chippings and peat products to heat homes is causing “extreme air pollution” in Dublin, scientists at NUI Galway have found. Comment: Despite the aggressive marketing, wood stoves in fact speed up global warming and increase the risk of dangerous climate change. September 2018. Victorians planning to see the light! CSIRO developing low-cost printed solar panels "The initial investment in silicon-based solar panels makes them prohibitively expensive for many homeowners and most renters. But cheaper printed panels (that don't last as long as their silicon counterparts) would allow a short-term payoff that could be within reach for renters, according to Professor Dastoor. September 2018. CSIRO: Could the Aussie barbeque go up in smoke? ..." barbeques aren’t our dominant source of smoke pollution. In southern Australia particularly, smoke from wood heaters and fireplaces are generally the dominant source of domestic wood-smoke... an investigation into particle composition at Liverpool, Sydney, identified wood smoke as a major source of air pollution, making up about 40 per cent of PM2.5 during winter but dropping to almost zero during summer. "You might not be able to see it but when your fire is smouldering smoke is still there. Exposure to particles and the toxic chemicals found in smoke has been associated with asthma, chronic lung disease, heart problems, cancer, and premature births and deaths." August 2018. The Guardian view on air pollution: it’s time for politicians to clean up. "Recent history shows that when well-evidenced public health measures deliver benefits in improved safety and wellbeing, people accept them with little fuss. The 11-year-old ban on smoking in public places and 35-year-old law making seatbelts compulsory are good examples ... Individual responsibility has a role to play in all this. Those of us who are able to should think about our choices to drive, walk, cycle, or use a wood-burning stove, just as we should be aware of what we eat and drink." August 2018. Mayor wants to rid Copenhagen of polluting wood-burning stoves. "Wood-burning stoves may help to spread ‘hygge’, but they are also increasingly coming under scrutiny as a source of air pollution. August 2018. Forget the fires, Californians should be worried about air quality all year. Northern California’s raging wildfires have blotted the skies with acrid smoke for weeks, but the air quality has still been better than a bad winter day.  August 2018. Wood-burning stoves, the picturesque polluters The Economist. "Earlier this year ministers also suggested that new stoves should face much stricter limits on emissions. Yet even the stoves that pass this new standard, labelled as eco-friendly, emit three times more particles per hour than a lorry. An article in the British Medical Journal called for a “polluter-pays” tax on new stoves, to equal the associated health costs, which it put at £889 ($1,150) per stove each year in inner London." August 2018. American Public Health Association, EHHI, American Lung Association and many others oppose moves to delay the introduction of stricter wood stove standards. According to the most recent National Air Toxics Assessment, residential wood heating accounted for 50 percent of all “area source” air toxic cancer risks nationwide in 2011. That means that the air toxics from residential wood heating accounted for as much cancer risk as all the other smaller sources that exist often in multiple sites in a community, like gas stations and dry cleaners. August 2018. "Durwood Zaelke, president of the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development in the US, said “There are other strategies for managing short-lived climate pollutants we should start with [including] cutting black carbon [soot, from fossil fuel burning], methane and HFC refrigerants. We need to think of climate change mitigation like a staggered race, where short-lived pollutants get a fast start and CO2 reductions eventually catch up and provide more and more cooling.” If these measures were taken, it could reduce temperature rises by up to 0.6C by 2050 and by 1.2C by the end of this century." August 2018. Armidale’s air quality worse than Hong Kong and Singapore " Greens energy spokesperson Jeremy Buckingham slammed the government for sitting on its hands, particularly when it had a legal obligation to reduce air pollution. “It is outrageous that Armidale residents are breathing highly polluted air while the government refuses a relatively inexpensive and easy fix,” Mr Buckingham said. “The Greens estimate that for as little as two million dollars you could clean up Armidale’s air quality to ensure it meets the required health standards. August 2018. Feeling tired? Smoke could have an effect on your energy level "These fine particles compounded by complex interactions between the amount of sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide in air pollution can destroy red blood cells, known as erythrocytes, and can also lower the body's oxygen-carrying capacity. That means the heart, brain and the rest of the body are not getting the amount of oxygen they are used to, which in turn makes you feel sleepy." July 2018. Nature Research Journal: Robust relationship between air quality and infant mortality in Africa "We find that a 10 μg m−3 increase in PM2.5 concentration is associated with a 9% (95% confidence interval, 4–14%) rise in infant mortality across the dataset. This effect has not declined over the last 15 years and does not diminish with higher levels of household wealth. Our estimates suggest that PM2.5 concentrations above minimum exposure levels were responsible for 22% (95% confidence interval, 9–35%) of infant deaths in our 30 study countries and led to 449,000 (95% confidence interval, 194,000–709,000) additional deaths of infants in 2015, an estimate that is more than three times higher than existing estimates that attribute death of infants to poor air quality for these countries" July 2018. 'Like having a smoker in the house': Why wood heaters in winter are bad for us. 'It is estimated that the burden on Victoria's health system due to pollution from wood heaters is $8 billion over 10 years." "The neighbours can't see why it's a problem at all, they don't see why it's an issue," she says. One incident that did seem to improve things, she says, was the sight of her then nine-year-old daughter being taken away in ambulance in the middle of the night after a suspected asthma attack. However the change in behaviour didn't last long. See also: Sunday Sunrise, 8 July 2018. July 2018. Australia's Clean Air Myth. Just two weeks ago the air quality index (AQI) in Melbourne was stuck at around 100 for days due to small particulates from wood burning - you can see the view from near where I live in the photo below. Newspaper headlines, however, made it seem like weather was causing the pollution, instead of, well, the pollution itself ... Air pollution is impacting upon health and productivity across Australia, and we need rigorous and enforceable legislation to deal with it. But I don't see this happening until the media and our governments stop pushing the myth that our air is already clean. July 2018. Get up to $4,000 to replace your old wood burning fireplace The SLO (San Luis Obispo) County Air Pollution Control District, California has funding available to help residents clean up their wood-burning stoves and fireplaces. "Fine particles from wood smoke can cause breathing problems for many residents, especially those with pre-existing conditions such as asthma or other lung and heart diseases, while long-term exposure has been linked to reduced lung function and growth in children, as well as lung cancer. "Help protect our blue skies and the health of yourself, your family and your neighbors by replacing that old wood-burning device with a cleaner-burning natural gas or propane device and receive up to $4,000! • $4,000 for eligible low-income applicants that go from a wood burning fireplace to a gas insert; or, • $2,000 for standard incentive applicants that go from a wood burning fireplace to a gas insert." July 2018. Scottish study links air pollution spikes to hospital admissions. Air pollution has been ‘clearly linked’ to spikes in breathing problem-related admissions to hospitals and visits to GPs, researchers in Scotland have claimed. Researchers at the University of Dundee studied nearly 15 years of data for air pollution levels in Dundee, Perth and the surrounding area and matched it to medical records of 450 patients who suffer from bronchiectasis, a long-term chronic condition similar to COPD. Commenting on the findings, Professor James Chalmers, GSK/British Lung Foundation Professor of Respiratory Research in the School of Medicine at Dundee, said the study demonstrated a clear correlation between air pollution and visits to the health services. The study was funded by the British Lung Foundation and is published in the European Respiratory Journal. June 2018. Asthmatics warned about poor air quality from fog & lack of wind in Melbourne. A lack of wind and heavy fog in Melbourne has led emissions from wood heaters and other pollution sources to linger in the air, with authorities to advise those with asthma to take extra caution. The state's environmental authority has warned that elevated levels of PM2.5 particles - tiny pollution particles 30 times smaller than the width of a human hair generally found in wood smoke - have reduced the air quality in the city. "[It] may be unhealthy for sensitive groups... including people over 65, children 14 years and younger, pregnant women and those with existing heart or lung conditions," the Environmental Protection Agency said. "These people should reduce prolonged or heavy physical activity and, where possible, limit the time spent outdoors." University of Melbourne professor and expert in air quality control Peter Rayner said the PM2.5 particles are a completely different to those which were detected during the thunderstorm asthma tragedy. "Those were really small pollen particles, from a different source, and they were in crazy high concentration. Those numbers were off the scale." He said PM2.5 particles usually come from wood smoke and can be worrying due to their size. "They can get very deep into your lungs." Professor Rayner said the poor air quality warning should raise questions about the use of wood heaters in concentrated urban areas. "Probably the biggest acute source for these things locally is people using wood heaters. In lots of cities of people around the world can't turn them on in these conditions. It's enough to ask the question, is wood heating in big cities really a good way of keeping warm in these conditions?" he said. Also: ABC News: Melbourne's 'fog' is actually particulate pollution and Any exposure of particulate matter air pollution harmful, researchers warn June 2018. Air pollution increases risk of type 2 diabetes. Around one in seven cases of the disease were directly caused by air pollution around the world in 2016 - about 3.2 million cases in total. Rsearchers from the Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, Missouri, looked at data from 1.7 million US veterans who were followed for eight and a half years. They found the risk of developing type 2 diabetes went up 10 per cent for every 10 microgram per cubic metre increase in fine particulate matter in the air. The link was considered to be ‘significant’ even for low levels of air pollution which are considered to be safe. See also: Air pollution contributes significantly to diabetes globally. Even low pollution levels can pose health risk. Town promises to do more to tackle air pollution, now linked to diabetes. June 2018. Wood-fire stoves can cause dementia. “We have seen that people who live in areas where wood-fire stoves are common run a greater risk of being affected, and that also goes for people who live next to someone who uses wood-fire stoves,” said Anna Oudin, a researcher in occupational and environmental medicine at Umea University’s department of public health and clinical medicine. "The risk for residents living in areas with the highest rate of smoke from wood fires to be hit by dementia, or dementia-related diseases, was 30% higher compared to other residents in the town of Umea. "In households that had their own wood-fire stoves the risk was 70% higher." Journal paper: Association between air pollution from residential wood burning and dementia incidence in a longitudinal study in Northern Sweden. June 2018. New Scientist. We really must stop burning wood. Air pollution expert Gary Fuller, King's College London, says: "Having a neighbour with a wood burner is like having 8 trucks sitting in your street with the engines idling all night....Oh, if you think that burning wood is at least better for the climate, you are wrong. In most cases, sticking with gas central heating and properly insulating your home is less harmful in global warming terms than switching to a wood burner" Australians are waking up to the fact that modern efficient heater-air-conditioners that deliver 5 times as much heat to the home as it uses in electric power (and can run on 100% green power) are a lot more affordable and have lower running costs than gas or buying firewood. June 2018. Campfire Evolution: propane is safer, easier, cheaper and healthier than wood Campers need not despair. Propane fire pits with lava rocks are not only safer to use, but healthier on the lungs, and far less expensive than the little bundles of firewood sold in campgrounds. Fire pits connect to standard 20-pound propane tanks and are widely allowed at campgrounds, even during campfire bans. They can be so safe that you can put your hand underneath them, even when lit, without burning yourself, thereby reducing the risk of igniting dry grasses or wood debris underneath. May 2018. Sydney smoke: Why the city is blanketed, and whether it's dangerous the air has been so bad that NSW Ambulance paramedics said they had responded to a huge increase in cases involving asthma and breathing difficulties. By 2.30pm paramedics were called to 53 cases in 47 suburbs across Sydney — a 75 per cent increase on the same time last week, when paramedics responded to 30 cases involving asthma or breathing problems. Almost a third of the cases related to young children, NSW Ambulance said. "Paediatric cases don't normally make up one third of our workload on a daily basis," Inspector Giles Buchannan said - see Sydney's air quality worse than Beijing Wood smoke is the largest source of the fine particles that penetrate deep into the lungs and enter the bloodstream. Data from the Centre for Air pollution, energy and health Research (CAR) shows hazard reduction burns and bushfires were linked to almost 200 premature deaths and more than 1,200 hospitalisations in Sydney over a 12-year period. Long-term exposure to PM2.5 particles — those smaller than 2.5 micrometres — also causes 520 premature deaths each year in Sydney, according to the NSW Environment Protection Authority. CAR has recommended health risks be factored into managing fires and has called for better collaboration between health, environment and fire authorities. Asthma Australia senior manager Anthony Flynn said fire protection measures must balance with health requirements. "Air quality is one area where people don't have a choice," Mr Flynn said. "So, those responsible for creating poor air need to assume the cost and consequences of their actions and invest in whatever they can to help asthma sufferers stay out of trouble. "As a community it's important to stop bushfires, but it's also important to reduce the hazard for people with asthma and breathing difficulties." May 2018. ACCC chair says electricity price spike due to network charges, not carbon tax or renewables. The timing of the carbon tax was “unfortunate” because it coincided with soaring electricity network costs that have underpinned increases to household bills. If voters had known this years ago, we might have been able to constrain the gold plating of the grid and now be enjoying more affordable renewable power. May 2018. Burning issue: Are wood-burning stoves going to get the chop? Millions of households with open fires and wood-burning stoves could face curbs on their use after the government unveiled plans to clean up the UK’s air quality ... It's a brave person who spends thousands on a wood-burning stove in London. See also: Consultation proposes reducing pollutants, including particulates from wood burners and ammonia from farms – but does little to tackle diesel emissions. Biomass: another renewables plan that’s gone up in smoke. "Everyone knew — or ought to have known — about diesel, too. I mean, the fact that the process of burning diesel generates about 20 times more lung-infesting sooty particulates than does the burning of petrol. Indeed, the threat to health from exposure to diesel exhaust had been known from at least the 1950s. But in 2001 the then chancellor, Gordon Brown, promulgated a system of incentivising the use of diesel via vehicle tax, as part of the CO2 emission reduction campaign (diesel cars are more fuel-efficient than petrol ones. The result of the tax incentives was that the proportion of cars on our roads using diesel nearly trebled in a decade) ... The government will conduct a cross-departmental review into the role of biomass in future policy for low carbon energy and heat, focusing on the air quality impacts. But why ever has it taken so long?" Most-polluting wood burners could be banned in an effort to improve air quality. The government is planning to bring in tougher regulations on household wood burners and fires in a bit to cut UK air pollution. New legislation will mean that only cleaner fuels and stoves will be sold for domestic heating, under the proposals being put out for consultation. Councils will also be given new powers to bring in "clean air zones" by limiting what people can burn or bringing in "no-burn days". The clean air strategy is intended to cut the cost of air pollution to society by £1bn a year by 2020, and by £2.5bn a year by 2030. It also aims to halve the number of people living in areas where tiny particles known PM2.5 are above safe levels set by the World Health Organisation. These tiny particles can be breathed into the lungs and get into the bloodstream, causing health problems including heart disease, strokes and lung cancer. Officials say almost two-fifths of PM2.5 comes from domestic wood burners and open fires, which just 7.5 per cent of homes have. May 2018. BMJ Open: daily woodsmoke exposure greater than 4 ug/m3 increases the risk of heart failure. In Tasmania's two major cites of Hobart and Launceston, air pollution is mainly associated with wood-burning for winter heating. Heart failure (HF) is the leading cause of hospitalisation and rehospitalisation for adults aged over 65 years. In multivariable analyses of air pollution and heart failure in Hobart and Launceston, PM2.5 significantly predicted HF incidence (RR=1.12 (1.01–1.24)). Stratified analyses showed that PM2.5 was associated with readmissions among patients not taking beta-blockers but not among those taking beta-blockers (pinteraction=0.011). Conclusions PM2.5 predicted HF incidence, independent of other environmental factors. A possible threshold of PM2.5=4 µg/m3 is far below the daily Australian national standard of 25 µg/m3. In Israel, a study published in 2013 found that a 10 μg/m3 increase in long-term PM2.5 exposure was associated with a 50% increase in multiple recurrences of cardiovascular events (MI, heart failure and stroke). May 2018. Skin responsible for greater exposure to carcinogens in barbecue smoke than lungs. Researchers divided volunteers into groups at an outdoor barbecue to provide them with varying degrees of exposure to the food and the smoke. After analyzing urine samples from the volunteers, the researchers concluded that, as expected, diet accounted for the largest amount of PAH exposure. However, the skin was the second-highest exposure route, followed by inhalation. They say oils in barbecue fumes likely enhance skin uptake of PAHs. The team also found that while clothes may reduce skin exposure to PAHs over the short term, once clothing is saturated with barbecue smoke, the skin can take in considerable amounts of PAHs from them. They suggest washing clothes soon after leaving a grilling area to reduce exposure. May 2018. Air pollution worse inside London classrooms than outside. Children in London schools are being exposed to higher levels of damaging air pollution inside the classroom than outside, putting them at risk of lifelong health problems, a new study has revealed. Young children – who are more vulnerable to airborne pollutants than adults – are breathing in fine particle pollution (PM10 and the even smaller PM2.5) at levels which are higher than the annual World Health Organisation guidelines of 10μg/m3 and 20μg/m3 respectively May 2018. Turnbull government 'knew for years' about network rorts. Lily D'Ambrosio, Victoria's energy, environment and climate change minister, said: "The Commonwealth has known for years that consumers were being ripped off by power companies but they did nothing about it," Ms D'Ambrosio told Fairfax Media on Tuesday. "We welcome [the AER's] investigation - we called for it," she said. "If the Turnbull government hadn't dragged their feet, it would have happened a long time ago." May 2018. Fuel reduction a smokescreen for logging burns. When the Environmental Protection Authority observed “very poor” air quality across multiple air monitoring stations, logging burns increased the levels of pollution in addition to the smoke originating from fuel reduction burns. May 2018. "They created over a third of all the particle pollution in London in 2016." ... After two decades of being shunned as a negligible source of pollution, the rise of wood burners and fire pits has taken many academics by surprise explains Dr Gary Fuller who runs Kings College’s London Air Quality Network. “One thing that has crept in under the radar is wood burning,” says Fuller. “If you go back to the 1950s and 60s it was acknowledged that London had a solid fuel air pollution problem but then we thought that had gone away. However the return to home wood burning that we’ve seen since the turn of the century is really making quite an impact in London.” May 2018. Most-polluting wood burners could be banned in effort to improve UK air Quality. "The clean air strategy is intended to cut the cost of air pollution to society by £1bn a year by 2020, and by £2.5bn a year by 2030. "It also aims to halve the number of people living in areas where tiny particles known PM2.5 are above safe levels set by the World Health Organisation. "These tiny particles can be breathed into the lungs and get into the bloodstream, causing health problems including heart disease, strokes and lung cancer. "Officials say almost two-fifths of PM2.5 comes from domestic wood burners and open fires, which just 7.5 per cent of homes have." May 2018. Air officials enthusiastic about winter air quality improvement — with a caveat "This program continues to be one of the most cost-effective means of reducing air pollution where and when it matters most, in valley neighborhoods during the winter season," he said. "Every year we see more families taking advantage of the district’s grant program to switch from a dirty wood burning device to a cleaner device, most often a gas device — or simply choosing not to use a wood burning device." "These daily decisions result in cleaner air for everyone in the valley, he said. "Based on recent analysis, and even considering the high PM values seen this past winter due to wildfire smoke and poor dispersion, the Bakersfield area’s air quality this past winter season was 38 percent better than it would have been without the district’s residential wood burning rule in place," Sheikh said. May 2018. Air pollution during pregnancy tied to high blood pressure in kids Each 5 ug/m3 increase in PM 2.5 exposure in the womb was associated with a 3.39 percentile increase in what’s known as systolic blood pressure, the “top number” that represents the pressure blood exerts against artery walls when the heart beats. “We believe that when pregnant women breathe air with high levels of fine particulate matter, it causes an inflammatory response that alters genetic expression and fetal growth and development, on the pathway to high blood pressure in childhood,” said study co-author Noel Mueller of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore. In-womb air pollution exposure associated with higher blood pressure in childhood Children exposed to higher levels of air pollution during the third trimester of their mother's pregnancy had a higher risk of elevated blood pressure in childhood, according to an articles published in the American Heart Association's journal Hypertension. Researchers examined 1,293 mothers and their children who were part of the large, ongoing Boston (USA) Birth Cohort study. Blood pressure was measured at each childhood physical examination at 3- to 9- years old. "Ours is one of the first studies to show breathing polluted air during pregnancy may have a direct negative influence on the cardiovascular health of the offspring during childhood," said Noel T. Mueller, Ph.D., M.P.H., senior author of the study and an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland. "High blood pressure during childhood often leads to high blood pressure in adulthood and hypertension is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease." May 2018. Premature birth rates drop in california after coal and oil plants shut down. A study, published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, found that the rate of premature births dropped from 7 to 5.1 percent after the plants were shuttered, between 2001 and 2011. “The ah-ha moment was probably just seeing what a large, estimated effect size we got,” said lead author Joan Casey, who is a post-doctoral fellow at UC Berkeley. “We were pretty shocked by it—to the point that we did many, many additional analyses to try to make it go away, and didn’t succeed.” May 2018. Renew Economy: Queensland’s Mackay Regional Council's $1.97 million PV system will save $16.89 million on electricity bills over next 20 years – even after maintenance and replacement inverters. May 2018. Leichhardt's solar car-park shade to return 14% with 7-year payback. "Sydney suburb of Leichhardt is joining the retail sector-wide shift to solar, with plans to install a 430kW rooftop PV system on a purpose built carpark shading structure. The $1.2 million solar system is expected to supply 40 per cent of the facility’s energy demand, and slash its reliance on an already constrained grid. Local Government Super, which owns the shopping centre, says expects the return on investment from the PV system will be somewhere around 14 per cent per annum, with a payback period of just over seven years. May 2018. Renew Economy: Frydenberg chooses not to challenge Jones, although the facts are well known. "This government has no better argument to pursue a rapid change than the plunging cost of wind and solar, and the reshaping of the grid with battery and other storage, and smart technologies like demand management. "The government knows this. Its advisors know this. But they don’t tell that to Jones, or the “millions” that listen to his program, and nor do they take on the right wing of their own party. "Instead, they choose to ignore climate action, demonise renewables, describe ambitious wind and solar targets as reckless, warn that a rapid transition will cause the lights to go out, and push projects like Snowy 2.0 that make no sense without a lot more renewables." May 2018. According to the Environmental Protection Agency wood smoke contains a variety of harmful chemicals, including fine particles, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, hydrocarbons, benzene, xylene and formaldehyde. "The EPA says up to 85 per cent of winter fine particle pollution comes from wood heaters in some areas of NSW. Orange could be in this category.... "Fine particle pollution such as is derived from wood smoke accounts for 3000 deaths per year. Most affected are infants and young children, people suffering from respiratory and heart complaints and the frail and elderly. It must be stressed, however, that wood smoke pollution is bad for everyone . "May 2018. One wood-fire chimney can pollute an entire neighbourhood if it is not used correctly, a senior researcher says ... there are a lot of problems associated with heating wood. Dr Johnston said, in terms of local air quality, wood-fire heaters are the most polluting source of home heating known to humanity. Dr Johnston said she would always promote an alternative heating source if it was available. Moving away from wood-fire heating required several strategies, but three that might be relevant to Northern Tasmania include subsidies for technology like pellets, cheaper electricity prices and tax breaks for efficient heating, Dr Johnston said. May 2018. Emitting excessive wood smoke could see residents fined $1590. Under updated state pollution control laws, Tasmanians could be slapped with a $1590 fine if they emit smoke that is visible for more than 10 minutes. The law is enforced by councils and applies to a range of heaters, fireplaces, barbecues, hot water heating appliances and cooking appliances. City of Launceston general manager Michael Stretton said the council takes an educational approach to managing wood smoke complaints. "Where we can identify individual properties that are the subject of complaints, we discuss the issue with the owners and provide some educational material on efficient use of wood heaters,” he said. “In some circumstances, it has been necessary to issue caution notices to address some complaints.” May 2018. EarthSense maps give homeowners insight into air pollution levels UK: Homebuyers in the UK can for the first time access detailed information on a property’s exposure to air pollution. A partnership between EarthSense, the air quality measuring specialist, and environmental risk analyst Future Climate Info (FCI) will see air quality data included in environmental reports requested by conveyancers and solicitors during the property buying process ... FCI environmental reports, included in search packs provided by solicitors and conveyancers, will now give a clear index rating from 0 (a generally clean environment with very low chance of Nitrogen Dioxide – NO2 – levels exceeding annual legal limits) to 6 (polluted environments with major implications for human health). April 2018. Prolonged exposure to air pollution leads to genetic changes in rat brains. Prolonged exposure to particulate matter in air pollution in the Los Angeles Basin triggered inflammation and the appearance of cancer-related genes in the brains of rats, a Cedars-Sinai study has found. The study found that coarse particulate matter in the region's air pollution found its way into bodily systems in two ways: inhaled through the lungs, where trace metals and other materials enter the bloodstream and then the brain; and through the nose, where the materials are absorbed more directly into the brain. Reference: Coarse particulate matter (PM2.5–10) in Los Angeles Basin air induces expression of inflammation and cancer biomarkers in rat brains. Scientific Reports, 2018; 8 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-23885-3 April 2018. Air pollution is causing crime in London, claim LSE scientists. “Higher levels of air pollution cause an increase in crime,” Dr Sefi Roth, an expert in environmental economics at LSE who co-authored the report, stated to The Independent. April 2018. Wood burners add to air pollution. Frank Kelly, professor of environmental health at King’s College London, said research by his department had found that emissions from burning coal and wood in the capital had been underestimated. “As traffic emissions increasingly are brought under control, these domestic emissions, if not decreased, will dominate,” he said April 2018. Greens call for taskforce on Armidale Region's high child mortality rates. Being listed as the area with the highest childhood mortality rates in NSW should be enough to make Armidale Regional Council look for solutions ... We need to understand the relative contributions of our high air pollution levels, disadvantage and poor housing," Cr Robinson said. April 2018. Armidale Region has highest child mortality in NSW. A report in April 2018 by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare found that from 2011-2015 Armidale Region had the highest rate of child mortality in NSW. Poverty, low school engagement and overcrowded housing exacerbate the problem. But so does air pollution. The “Growing up in New Zealand” study found that every additional modern woodstove per hectare increased by 7% the risk children under 3 would need hospital emergency treatment (for all causes except accidents). With to 10 woodstoves per hectare emitting smoke that's often trapped the valley, Armidale's woodsmoke pollution has a significant impact on health and was estimated to cause 38% of visits to GP for respiratory complaints in winter. The NSW Asthma Foundation warned that: wood smoke emissions in winter pose a bigger immediate health danger in built-up urban areas than cars or cigarettes. Australian Lung Foundation spokesman Dr James Markos said that real-life emissions from new wood-heaters have little relationship to measurements from a perfectly operated test model under laboratory conditions. . The chief medical officer of NSW said that wood heaters are so detrimental to health she supports banning and phasing them out in built-up urban areas. A review by the New Scientist in 2017 concluded that log-burning stoves are harming our health and speeding up global warming Woodsmoke contains the same and very similar chemicals to cigarette smoke, and was found to cause 12 to 30 times as many tumours in mice and mutations in bacteria as the same amount of cigarette smoke. Studies in Canada found that just 5 ug/m3 of increased PM2.5 pollution increased heart attacks by 19% when the pollution was mainly from wood burning. Armidale’s woodsmoke often increases PM2.5 pollution by 5 times this amount. Heart attacks and strokes are the tip of the iceberg. The PM2.5 and toxic chemicals in woodsmoke also increase the risk of lung diseases, cancers, Alzheimer’s, cot deaths, still and premature births, genetic damage in babies, stunted lung development, reduced IQ in children and behavioural problems such as anxiety, attention deficit and autism. Tackling woodsmoke pollution has been shown to save many lives. When Launceston residents understood the health effects of woodsmoke, the proportion of households using wood heating fell dramatically from 66% to 30% and average particulate air pollution during winter fell by 40%. The result was 28% fewer deaths in winter from respiratory disease and 20% fewer deaths from cardiovascular disease. As well as having the highest child mortality rates in NSW, Armidale region is part of New England North West, where male life expectancy is 3.7 years less than the average for Sydney. High pollution continues in Armidale because many residents listen to propaganda from vested interests. In previous years, similar propaganda techniques were used by the tobacco and asbestos industries. Local sustainability charity Starfish offered to help fix the problem by coordinating a demonstration project to show that non-polluting heating can be affordable and environmentally friendly. The cost would be less than the consultancy fees for the controversial designs and plans for traffic in the Armidale Mall that sparked outrage. Despite the obvious need, administrator Tiley did not put any of the $15 million amalgamation money towards clean, healthier air. Perhaps being known as the region with the highest childhood mortality rates in NSW will encourage the current council to think twice about priorities, and make better health, environmentally-friendly, sustainable heating, and statistics that don’t discourage new residents a higher priority that extravagant infrastructure. April 2018. Even the briefest increase in airborne fine particulate matter PM2.5, pollution-causing particles that are about 3 percent of the diameter of human hair, is associated with the development of acute lower respiratory infection (ALRI) in young children, according to newly published research. Increases in PM2.5 levels also led to increased doctor visits for these lung infections. The groundbreaking study, "Short-Term Elevation of Fine Particulate Matter Air Pollution and Acute Lower Respiratory Infection," is the largest to date on this health concern, involving more than 100,000 patients. The research team found ALRI associated with elevated levels of PM2.5 in both children and adults -- even in newborns and toddlers up to age two, who represented 77% (112,467) of those who had an ALRI diagnosis. This study was performed in a location where the average daily PM2.5 level is lower than places like Los Angeles and New York. "Overall, it took about 2-3 weeks for the ALRI hospitalizations or clinic visits to occur in this study after the rapid rise in PM2.5 had been observed," said Dr. Horne. In an analysis of death rates among the study population, 17 children ages 0-2, nine children ages 3-17 and 81 adults (18+) died within 30 days of diagnosis with ALRI. In theorizing about the connection between PM2.5 and ALRI, Dr. Horne said: "The air pollution itself may make the human body more susceptible to infection or may impair the body's ability to fight off the infectious agents. It may be that PM2.5 causes damage to the airway so that a virus can successfully cause an infection or that PM2.5 impairs the immune response so that the body mounts a less effective response in fighting off the infection. Journal Paper: Short-term Elevation of Fine Particulate Matter Air Pollution and Acute Lower Respiratory Infection See Also: Utah study: Even slight bump in pollution affects young lungs On winter days with PM2.5 above 20 ug/m3, the largest single source of PM2.5 pollution in Utah is woodsmoke. Even the briefest exposure to air pollution can trigger an acute respiratory infection in young children April 2018. Maternal inflammation linked to baby’s brain development "Growing evidence supports a link between chronic inflammation during pregnancy and poor neurological outcomes for offspring, including an increased likelihood of a number of cognitive and psychiatric conditions such as ADHD, major depression and schizophrenia.
"Moreover, it is known that certain markers of inflammation, like the protein interleukin-6, are expressed throughout the developing brain. But precisely how inflammation influences foetal brain development is unclear. "In an effort to learn more, researchers at the Oregon Health and Science University, in collaboration with researchers in Berlin and California, collected blood samples from 84 expectant mothers during each trimester of their pregnancies, and then tested the blood samples for levels interleukin-6. "When the infants were four weeks old, they underwent MRI scans to determine their brain connectivity patterns. "The researchers discovered that variations in levels of interleukin-6 during pregnancy were directly associated with small differences in neural connectivity patterns in the infants’ brains, suggesting that inflammation levels during pregnancy are linked with changes in neural communication in newborns." April 2018. The American Lung Association (ALA) warns of the health concern from residential wood burning because of the high concentration of inhaled smoke exposure, particularly in sensitive groups such as newborns, infants, children and lung-compromised individuals. Wood smoke from woodstoves and residential burning is a major contributor to south Lincoln County’s air quality conditions, particularly during fall and winter when wood burning is at its peak. Smoke is composed of many small carbon particles. These pieces of organic matter from smoke, along with dust and other particles, become suspended in the air and are referred to as particulate matter. Because of their small size, these particles can become deeply embedded in the lungs, damaging small blood vessels, airways and the heart. According to the ALA, burning wood produces emissions that are harmful to human health. Wood smoke also produces fine particle pollution by releasing carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds, and chemicals such as formaldehyde that contribute significantly to climate change pollution. ALA states that short-term wood smoke exposure can affect people with lung disease, causing coughing, wheezing, asthma attacks and acute bronchitis, and may increase susceptibility to respiratory infection. Long-term exposures can lead to reduced lung function, heart attacks, lung cancer and even premature death ... Please be responsible and considerate when burning (waste) this season for the young, the old and the sick around you who may be greatly impacted from the smoke you create. If you decide not to burn but have wood and yard clean up to dispose of, the Lincoln County Landfill accepts all yard debris from your cleanup projects, free of charge. April 2018. New York State: Bethlehem business ordered to shut down polluting wood boiler Daniel Blair, owner of Blair Excavating and Contractors, agreed to take down the boiler used to heat his facility at 682 Elm Ave. by May 15 and not to resell the boiler to anyone else in New York, according to DEC order. DEC regional officials agreed to suspend a $3,000 fine against Blair as long as the boiler is removed. State inspectors tested the boiler on Feb. 9 in response to complaints of excessive smoke, said DEC spokesman Rick Georgeson. ...As complaints about such boilers grew, DEC in 2010 set stricter pollution limits on wood boilers sold in the state. But it did allow dealers to sell off their inventories of non-compliant boilers, a move opposed by some environmental groups. Still, owners of boilers that exceed state opacity limits can be cited by DEC for the violation. April 2018. Cosy and deadly. Wood-burning stoves are in fashion but cause serious pollution. "Unlike, say, a coal-fired power station, domestic wood-fires discharge pollutants straight into populated areas, and they do so at times of day when people are at home. Unlike other fuels, wood is untaxed in Denmark. Wood-burning increased 2.5 times in 2000 to 2015. Green-minded Europeans keen to change behaviour in poor countries might first sniff the air closer to home."
March 2018. Exposure to fine particles during fetal life was associated with a thinner outer layer of the brain, called the cortex, in several regions. The study showed that these brain abnormalities contribute in part to difficulty with inhibitory control—the ability to regulate self-control over temptations and impulsive behavior—which is related to mental health problems such as addictive behavior and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. The study used a population-based cohort in the Netherlands, which enrolled pregnant women and followed the children from fetal life onward. Dr. Guxens and colleagues assessed air pollution levels at home during the fetal life of 783 children. The data were collected by air pollution monitoring campaigns, and included levels of nitrogen dioxide (a prominent air pollutant caused by traffic and cigarette smoking), coarse particles, and fine particles. Brain imaging performed when the children were between 6 and 10 years old revealed abnormalities in the thickness of the brain cortex of the precuneus and rostral middle frontal region. Despite the relationship between these brain structure alterations and fine particle exposure, the average residential levels of fine particles in the study were well below the current acceptable limit set by the EU. March 2018. Genetic study of Quebec residents finds air pollution trumps ancestry. "Air pollution leaves its mark on the human body, not just in the throats and lungs of those who breathe it in, but in their very DNA, a newly published Canadian study has found. The work provides a unique window into how environmental exposures can switch various genes on or off, creating a gene expression signature that may interact with or override other inherited factors and even offer an early signal of future health problems."
March 2018. Dutch lobby group calls for action on polluting wood-burning stoves. The government should discourage the use of wood-burning stoves in the Netherlands because of the impact on health and air quality, a group made up of local councils, research institutes and local health councils said on Tuesday ... some organisations, such as environmental group Milieudefensie and Amsterdam city council want a total ban, broadcaster RTL said. March 2018. Guardian Pollutionwatch: Cold snap worsens particle load of air Particle pollution increases as the wind slows down and chilly weather prompts the lighting of more wood fires ... Normally wood smoke is measured during the evenings, but many people choose to keep warm in that cold period in front of a wood fire at home during the day. Wood smoke particles were measured throughout day-time hours across southern England from 1 March into the weekend.
Over a timescale of hours and days wood smoke can undergo chemical reactions and produce more particle pollution. There is evidence that this added to the air pollution over England. A change of wind direction bought milder and fresher air on 4 March.
March 2018. Bad Air Day – Is Wood Smoke Choking Out The PNW? When Clive Powsey moved from the outskirts of Toronto, Ontario, to Cumberland, British Columbia, he thought he was leaving his exercise-induced asthma behind for a “clean-air paradise.” On first whiff, it made sense. The small town sits between rainforest-covered mountains and the open waters of the Strait of Georgia. But by the first winter in his new home, Powsey was hacking worse than he ever had out east.
In the spring his lungs cleared up, but every fall the congestion returned. Thinking the wood stove in his studio was the culprit, he stopped using it. His asthma got worse. He started getting pneumonia. Then one fall he went to Vancouver for a week and his lungs cleared up. “I thought, ‘Oh my god. The air quality in Vancouver is better than Cumberland,’” he says. Powsey started looking for proof, and what he found is shocking. The air-clogging culprit is not some industrial polluter, in fact there aren’t any. Rather, it’s Powsey’s neighbours doing something that’s entwined in the island lifestyle and our DNA: burning firewood.
February 2018. Defra seeks views on wood and coal emissions. A call for evidence on the use of coal and other solid fuels used for heating homes has today (30 January) been launched for a 4-week period by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. "...domestic burning of house coal, smokeless solid fuels and wood are believed to be the single largest contributors of particulate matter (PM) emissions. These accounted for around 40% of total UK PM2.5 emissions in 2015, according to Defra. ... “We must be mindful that pollution is about more than just transport. Poor air quality affects public health, the economy, and the environment, which is why we are determined to do more. However, if we make the switch to burning cleaner domestic fuel, we can continue to enjoy burning wood and smokeless coal in stoves and fires in our homes.”
February 2018. Brussels to make public transport free on high air pollution days. The new rules will also see car speed limits cut and wood-burning stoves banned in a drive to improve air quality in the city February 2018. Is your wood stove choking you? How indoor fires are suffocating cities Cars and trucks get more attention but nationally, domestic wood burning is the largest single source of PM2.5. According to one analysis of government data, it produces more than twice as much as all road traffic. While concerns about diesel vehicles focus largely on the nitrogen dioxide they produce, the evidence tying particulates to death and disease is even more powerful. According to Leigh Crilley, an atmospheric chemist at the University of Birmingham, wood smoke also carries more carcinogens than diesel or petrol exhaust. The increasing popularity of wood fires, scientists warn, threatens to erase any progress big cities might achieve in reducing pollution from traffic. “It’s overtaking the gains we’re making,” Crilley said. .... One study from 2014 found that wood smoke was adding more particle pollution to London’s air than the first two phases of the city’s low-emission zone were expected to remove. In London and Birmingham, King’s College researchers reported wood accounted for up to 31% of locally produced particulates. And across Europe, wood burning is worsening pollution in capitals such as Paris, Berlin and Lisbon. ... “We have yet another stupid decision,” says Birkett. “In the same way they myopically pursued diesel, they have also myopically pursued wood burning”. February 2018. 'Scary' new evidence suggests Utah’s bad air may be harmful to babies in utero. Dr Blagev, director of the Schmidt Chest Clinic at Intermountain Medical Center in Utah, where a high proportion of wintertime pollution is woodsmoke explains: “Some effects are really well studied and we are really sure that the air pollution contributes to let’s say low birth weight - or increased mortality. Multiple studies point to a connection between bad air days and lifelong health problems for babies conceived and or born during periods of pollution.
Doctors for years have told us to avoid bad air especially if you have asthma, but now all women in Utah may need to think about changing their habits during their childbearing years. Research from around the world is stacking up pin-pointing pollution-related issues that can alter the long-term health of their babies. Expectant moms have been asked to put down cigarettes and alcohol, watch their diets and be careful of medications. The latest recommendation coming from OBGYN’s? Stay inside if the air isn’t clean.
February 2018. Exposure to Air Pollution Could Reduce IQ Levels Long Term Researchers at the University of Southern California and UCLA Center for Health Policy Research tracked more than 1,300 pre-teens living in neighborhoods across Los Angeles and surrounding counties over a 12-year period. They tested the teens’ IQ levels at ages 9 to 11, and in young adulthood between ages 18 to 20. The scientists then used EPA data to retroactively calculate air pollution levels around the homes where the teens lived. They focused on fine-particle pollution, which comes from cars, power plants and other sources. These particles are about 30 times smaller than the width of a human hair, and can pass into the lungs and blood stream.
For every increase of 2.5 micrograms per cubic meter in the fine-particle pollution level surrounding the teens’ homes, their performance IQ score dropped 1 point, the researchers found. ... Lower IQ is tied to reduced-earning power over a person’s lifetime, as well as poorer mental and physical health, Wang said. This has an effect for society as a whole, she said. Just a 1-point drop in IQ level among a portion of the population can result in billions of dollars in losses to the U.S. economy, previous studies have estimated. Teen Exposure to Air Pollution Could Reduce IQ Levels Long Term Living in a polluted area as a pre-teen and teenager may have long-lasting, detrimental effects on a person’s ability to reason and problem solve, a new study suggests. February 2018. No safe level of air pollution, Utah doctors declare at rally to release annual report "Even low levels of pollution put the state’s youngest residents at risk of sudden infant death syndrome and other maladies, according to an annual research review by concerned Utah doctors. "The doctors, most members of the advocacy group Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, gathered at the state Capitol on Saturday to release their annual report on nation-wide research investigating the possible health effects of Utah’s air pollution.
"Particles have been measured in the human blood stream after just 15 minutes of exposure to air pollution, Moench said, and they have been observed to remain there for as long as three months. So January’s pollution, he said, is still impacting Utahns in April when the air has cleared. "One recent study demonstrated that infants who are exposed to small particulate pollution are 2-3 times more likely to die from sudden infant death syndrome, Matthew Peterson, a reproductive endocrinologist, told members of the public on Saturday. About 20 percent of pre-term births may also be attributed to air pollution, Peterson said."
"Particles in the blood stream trigger inflammation, Moench said, which in turn increases the likelihood of heart attack and stroke. Their presence is also linked to the development of cancer, especially breast, bladder and lung cancers. Other studies, Moench said, have found particulates lodged in people’s brains and linked air pollution to autism and Alzheimer’s. Air pollution may also decrease children’s focus and memory retention in school, Moench said.
"But it’s not just the very young or the very old who are at risk. Moench pointed to another recent study that found particulate pollution caused elevated blood pressure and increased the production of stress hormones in young adults.
"Air pollution may also affect our genes. Courtney Henley, an anesthesiologist at LDS Hospital, highlighted research that suggested air pollution damaged genetic materials in developing infants exposed while they were in the womb. These children were at greater risk of developing heart disease, thyroid disfunction, obesity, diabetes and even osteoporosis later in life, she said."
February 2018. Polluted Air May Pollute Our Morality A combination of archival and experimental studies indicates that exposure to air pollution, either physically or mentally, is linked with unethical behavior such as crime and cheating. In one study, the researchers examined air pollution and crime data for 9,360 US cities collected over a 9-year period. See also: Air Pollution Leads to More Violence
Increased air pollution linked to bad teenage behavior Tiny, toxic particles creep into developing brains, cause inflammation and may damage brain pathways responsible for emotion and decisions. The study followed 682 children in Greater Los Angeles for nine years starting when they were 9, and linked higher levels of air pollution to increased teenage delinquency. The results are a reminder of the importance of clean air and the need for more foliage in urban spaces. The insidious effects are compounded by poor parent-child relationships and parental mental and social distress, researchers report. Acute Air Pollution Exposure and Risk of Suicide Completion
February 2018. Stanford study shows wood smoke can harm the brain "We're finding in young adults that there may be an increased risk of psychiatric problems like depression," said Stanford pediatrics professor Eric Zee. And in kids and teens, "it also affects grades and test scores and things like that."
Zee said the tiny particles from smoke can inflame the lungs, and in turn cause inflammation all over the body, including in the brain. The study found regular exposure to smoke can speed up the brain's aging process, even in kids. "With neurological problems in growth and development and in one's later years," said Zee. For the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, the study adds more fuel to the fire behind the years-long campaign to snuff out wood burning, especially on Spare the Air days.... "That's the importance of this study," he said. "That it isn't just sensitive individuals. It's all of us." "If we just think before we burn, that could really change our neighborhoods," Ho said. Burning wood is illegal during winter Spare the Air alerts, but the district offers incentives all year round to get rid of your fireplace, or convert it to gas. "Don't have a fire in your fireplace," at your next holiday party, said Stevenson. "Turn on your TV on that yule log, right?" Podcast: Dr. Eric Zee who specializes in pulmonary medicine at Stanford Children’s Health, Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital explains how wood burning affects children. February 2018. Hey, SoCal, don't toss another log onto the fire until you read this It's been cold, with temperatures dipping into the 40s and below — that's practically near blizzard conditions for Southern California. So what's the harm in stoking the fireplace with a blazing log? Plenty, alas. That's why health officials are begging Southern California residents to take the "Check-Before-You-Burn" pledge — between Nov. 1 and Feb. 28, when atmospheric conditions conspire to make air quality particularly bad.
January 2018. BMJ: for heart attacks and strokes, just one cigarette a day half as damaging as smoking twenty A review in the British Medical Journal shows that smoking 1 cigarette a day the increased risk of heart attacks by about half as much as smoking 20 cigarettes a day and strokes by about a third as much. An editorial elaborates: "The substantial risk of CHD associated with “low” exposure to tobacco smoke first came to light in the 1990s. Despite much lower levels of smoke exposure than active smoking, in a seminal meta-analysis in the BMJ, Law and colleagues calculated a 30% increase in CHD risk among people who had never smoked but were exposed to second-hand smoke (19 studies) and a 39% increase in CHD risk among smokers smoking one cigarette a day (five studies)." Recent research shows that the health damage from "low" exposures to PM2.5 pollution is similar. A Canadian study reported that a 10 ug/m3 increase in annual PM2.5 exposure increase the risk of deaths from ischemic heart disease by 30%. Another Canadian study investigated the effect of air pollution and discovered a much greater increase in hospital admissions for heart attacks when the particles came from burning wood for winter heating. On such days, a 10 ug/m3 increase 3-day mean PM2.5 pollution increased heart attack admissions in those aged 65 and over by 38%.
Based on a relative risk of CHD from smoking 20 cigarette a day of 2.5 and current smoking rate of 15.8% of UK adults, the effect of smoking-related CHD is (2.5 - 1)*0.158 = a 24% increase in CHD in the population as a whole, less than the 30% increase in deaths deaths from ischemic heart disease for a 10 ug/m3 increase in PM2.5 exposure or the 38% increase in hospital admissions for heart attacks for a 10 ug/m3 increase in 3-day PM2.5 associated with home wood burning.
January 2018. Low level air pollution costs the economy billions of dollars in lost productivity At air pollution levels well below current regulatory standards in the United States, Graff Zivin says they've found impacts of air pollution on agricultural, manufacturing, and call centre work productivity. There is also a new line of research where evidence is showing that exposure to low level air pollution to the fetus or in the first year of life when the brain is still developing, can have lasting negative cognitive impacts. "There are a range of studies now that have shown that even a short amount of exposure to modest levels of pollution in utero and the first year of life leads to demonstrable impacts on intellectual performance on standardized tests in middle school, in high school," says Graff Zivin. "We also find from other studies that we even see the imprints of that exposure 30 years later on the earnings of workers."
January 2018. $800,000 in rebates to replace fireplaces snapped up in 15 hours by Bay Area homeowners The air district offered rebates of $750 to decommission and seal off a wood burning fireplace, $1,000 to switch to a natural-gas fireplace insert, and $3,500 to switch to an electric heat pump. “People recognize the value and convenience of switching from wood-burning to natural gas that protects you and your family from the health impacts of wood smoke,” said Ralph Borrmann, an air quality district spokesman.
The Bay area does not permit the installation of wood stoves in new homes and sellers of an existing homes with wood-burning fireplaces are required to give buyers a disclosure statement warning of the health risks of wood smoke. In addition wood burning is not allowed on 'Spare the Air' days - a total of 17 days to February 2018. Spare the Air, Bay Area - facebook post: "Exposure to wood smoke—like cigarette smoke—has been linked to serious respiratory illnesses and even increased risk of heart attacks." January 2018. Large heat pump project set for north London. "Four hundred flats over eight tower blocks in the London borough of Enfield will be retrofitted with Shoebox heat pumps manufactured by Kensa Contracting’s sister company Kensa Heat Pumps, and connected to the largest collection of district arrays of its kind.
"Specification Online reports that the project is planned for completion in October 2018, with the heating upgrade resulting in residents’ energy bills reducing by 30-50%."
January 2018. Wood heating sparks smog warning in Gatineau, Maniwaki, Ottawa Environment Canada has issued a warning, blaming wood burning for particulates. January 2018. The Effects Of Air Pollution On Human Health "Air pollution is almost as deadly as tobacco. In 2016, it was linked to the deaths of 6.1 million people, according the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. "And it might harm you even before you take your first breath. December 2017. Want to enjoy the fire and avoid the smoke? Choose a cleaner burn option! The Lung Association of Saskatchewan is concerned about the lung health of all Saskatoon residents. We urge Saskatoon City Council to implement a bylaw prohibiting the activity of backyard wood burning fire pits and new construction indoor wood burning fire places. Homeowners should have the option to choose anything that is cleaner in terms of air quality. There are some alternatives to wood-burning fire pits including natural gas, propane and ethanol/gel fire pits. These options are better because they do not require the use of wood, thereby eliminating the harmful effects of wood smoke on health. December 2017. Exposure to air pollution just before or after conception raises risk of birth defects. Women exposed to air pollution just prior to conception or during the first month of pregnancy face an increased risk of their children being born with birth defects, such as cleft lip or palate or abnormal hearts. "The most susceptible time of exposure appears to be the one month before and after conception," says Emily DeFranco, DO, a physician at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center and the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, and senior author of the study. "Public health efforts should continue to highlight the importance of minimizing population-level exposure to harmful particulate matter in the air."
December 2017. Air pollution has more dire effects: It can lead to lower IQ in children. Indian times article citing research in the USA that "women exposed to air pollution during preconception period or one month after the conception have increased risk of their children being born with birth defects like cleft lip or palate or abnormal hearts ...The birth certificate data was used from the Ohio Department of Health and particulate matter data from the US Environmental Protection Agency's 57 monitoring stations throughout Ohio to study the impact of air pollutant." Dr Praveen Gupta , Director Neurology, Fortis Gurgaon, said, "With the current scenario, the situation is getting worse. Air Pollution has adverse effect on children, it causes irritability, suffocation, decreased attention and concentration leading to poor performance. The pollutants through their blood travels to different parts of the body including brain, which causes decrease in IQ level and other related problems." December 2017. Largest-ever study of 22 million US deaths shows no safe level of PM2.5 or Ozone Pollution. A study on short-term air pollution followed work published by some of the same researchers in June showing that multiple years of exposure to air pollution—even at levels well below the “safe” level mandated by the US government—increased premature deaths in the country. That research concluded that if the level of PM2.5 could be lowered by just 1 ug/m3 nationwide, roughly 12,000 premature deaths would be avoided every year. And if ozone levels could be lowered by just 1 part per billion, another 1,900 premature deaths would be avoided annually.
 The graph (left, click to enlarge) shows the estimated relationships between mortality and PM2.5 and O3 pollution. Results for concentrations below about 20 ug/m3 PM2.5 and from 30-55 ppm O3 are pretty precise, but those for higher levels of PM2.5 pollution or outside 30-55 ppm O3 are less precise, because of the small proportion of days in these categories. The strudy authors concluded: "In the US Medicare population from 2000-2012, shortterm exposures toPM2.5 and warm-season ozone were significantly associated with increased risk of mortality. This risk occurred at levels below current national air quality standards, suggesting that these standards may need to be reevaluated." 'Safe' levels? Small amounts of air pollution linked to more death for senior citizens. Elderly people have a higher risk of dying after short-term exposure to particulate air pollution and ozone, according to a new study from Harvard. The levels of pollution linked to premature deaths were below current U.S. health standards set by the Environmental Protection Agency—and the impacts were disproportionately worse for the poor, women and black people. The study is the "most comprehensive study of short-term exposure to pollution and mortality to date," said senior author of the study, Francesca Dominici, a professor of biostatistics and co-director of the Harvard Data Science Initiative. "We wanted to know if air pollution at levels well below safety standards set by the EPA is possibly increasing mortality," she said. "The answer is yes." Dominici and colleagues looked at daily levels of particulate matter 2.5 micrometers or less in diameter (PM 2.5) and ozone across the U.S. They compared the levels with deaths from people on Medicare from 2000 to 2012.
For each 10 microgram per cubic meter daily increase in PM2.5 (all year round) and each 10 parts per billion daily increase in ozone (measured during warm months), the daily mortality rate increased by 1.05 percent and 0.51 percent, respectively. During the study time, about 22 million people in the Medicare population died. The risk was the same across the country: "No matter where you live—in cities, in the suburbs, or in rural areas—as long as you breathe air pollution, you are at risk," said lead author Qian Di, a PhD student in Harvard's Department of Environmental Health
December 2017. Roaring Christmas fire threatened by pollution fears "The problem has increased in recent years, as traditional fires have come back into fashion — especially in affluent neighbourhoods. Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, wrote to Mr Gove in September seeking powers to ban wood-burning stoves in some neighbourhoods, as part of wider proposals to improve air quality in the capital. Researchers at King’s College London found that during a period of heavy smog last January, half the toxic emissions in some parts of the city came from burning wood. The UK government has already focused on voluntary measures, such as a certification scheme to identify and promote dried wood to consumers. “We are raising consumer awareness about the impact of burning wood on health and working with industry to help reduce harmful emissions,” a government spokesman said, adding that the government’s clean air strategy, addressing all sources of air pollution, would be published in 2018." Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary, is to launch a consultation in the New Year which will examine pollutants caused by wet wood and smoky coal. Its findings will feed into the Government's clean air strategy, which is being published in the Autumn. Wood-burning stoves face crack down amid health warnings. "A source told The Telegraph that the consultation will be "very open" and rather than recommending specific policies will invite submissions about the problem. However, there has been growing concern over their environmental impact. Researchers at King’s College London have found that wood-burning in the capital accounts for up to 31 per cent of the city’s particulate pollution, up from 10 per cent in the past. November 2017. Address air quality issues now There is no lower limit at which the air quality will not cause health problems. That’s the message Island Health’s medical officer Paul Hasselback told the Regional District Board at its inaugural regular meeting in Nanaimo Tuesday, Nov. 14., 2017 November 2017. Air Pollution Has Now Been Linked To More Cancers Around The Body Now though a new large-scale study carried out by the Barcelona Institute of Global Health and supported by the American Cancer Society has found there could be associations between air pollutants and kidney, bladder and colorectal cancer. November 2017. Your mental health could be harmed by the air you breathe. "The higher the level of particulates in the air, a new study shows, the greater the indications of psychological distress. .. Every increase in pollution of 5 micrograms per cubic meter had the same effect as a 1.5-year loss in education." Air pollution outdoors can make you worse at your desk job. Steffen Meyer and Michaela Pagel took data on stock trades made by more than 100,000 private investors in Germany from 2003 to 2015 and paired the information with data on air quality, weather and traffic from the closest of more than 1,600 monitoring stations. The researchers found that a modest increase in outdoor PM10 — 12 micrograms of the pollutant per cubic meter — reduced investors' propensity to trade by nearly 10%. They characterized that effect as "large and significant," akin to the decrease in trading observed on a nice sunny day versus a cloudy one. It's worth pointing out that a 12-microgram increase in PM10 is not a whole lot — on any given day in Germany, levels of the pollutant usually fluctuate between zero and 40 micrograms, and often more than that. "The negative effects of pollution on white-collar work productivity are much more severe than previously thought." November 2017. Woodsmoke-affected community told: "More air pollution means shorter lives" “Poor air quality is a contributor to poor health,” said Michael Brauer, a professor at the School of Population and Public Health at the University of British Columbia. “I don’t want to give you the impression that, if there is air pollution, everyone is dropping dead,” said Brauer. “That is not the case.” “If you live in a polluted community as opposed to a cleaner city you won’t live as long. If you live in a more polluted neighbourhood you will die sooner.” Brauer said that there isn’t a specific air pollution disease, but that it leads to poorer outcomes for many diseases. Sarah Henderson, a senior scientist and epidemiologist at the BC Centre for Disease Control, described why wood smoke is toxic. She said that fine particulate matter, tiny solids that are the result of incomplete combustion, are able to travel deep into our lungs.
The very fine particles classified as PM 2.5 are the most concern said Henderson, because there size triggers an immune response that can have serious consequences.“The particles go deep into your lungs and your body attacks them. It senses a foreign invader like a virus. Unfortunately they can’t kill it, so the white blood cells keep attacking them and it leads to a state of sustained inflammation,” she said.
This sustained inflammation can be deadly depending on a person’s health.Henderson said that on very smoky days it can lead some people to have a heart attack or a stroke. “When you live in a smoky community it puts the whole population at risk of developing things like heart disease,” she said.
“When you think of other sources of pollution, motor vehicles and industry, we brought those under really tight control,” she said. “A car today emits 3% of what a car 20 years ago could emit. “What we haven’t done is controlled emissions from residential wood stoves.”
November 2017. Campaigners delighted after Stoke Prior wood burner firm Flog-a-Log told to go. Neighbours of a wood burner firm which made their lives "living hell" have proclaimed victory after its bosses were told to cease operations within six months. Stoke Prior firm Flog-a-Log began installation of a biomass boiler system and 14 flues in January 2016 without approval, and had retrospective planning permission refused. The company appealed, but an investigation by the Planning Inspectorate has now upheld the decision. November 2017. Women should watch out for chronic bronchitis, lung experts say. "Treatment involves quitting smoking, certain medications (mainly corticosteroids for treating inflammation), regular physical exercise, oxygen therapy in the most severe cases, and avoiding exposure to substances that can lead to the disease (wood or charcoal smoke from cooking, etc.)." October 2017. Extreme air pollution in Ireland caused by ‘burning of solid fuel’ There should be no cause for complacency in Europe or Ireland over the findings of the Lancet medical journal’s major study of the global health impacts of pollution, which shows air pollution as the single biggest cause of deaths. Prof Colin O’Dowd, director of NUIG’s Centre for Climate and Air Pollution Studies said: "even in developed western-world cities [including Dublin] with well-developed air pollution policies, there are regular occurrences of extreme air pollution events not too dissimilar to those encountered in developing megacities (eg Beijing)”. These “extreme air pollution events are driven by burning of solid residential fuel (namely, peat, wood and biomass) and even though less than 4 per cent solid fuel is consumed, this accounts disproportionately for 70 per cent of the pollution”. Diesel accounted for far less pollutants in the form of particulate matter than might be expected – at between 5 and 10 per cent. He added: “The major concern is that these fuels are promoted as being ‘green’ or ‘low-carbon’ in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, but are devastating in terms of air pollution... and their consumption is predicted to increase significantly, thus turning back the clock in terms of clean air policy in the developed world.” October 2017. New $$ available to turn wood stoves into gas "cited wood smoke's "significant" role in particulate emissions, noting that one wood-burning stove emits the equivalent of 90 sport utility vehicles over its lifetime. Changing from wood to gas eliminates 95 percent of the associated emissions, according to UCAIR.... October 2017. The Times: dangers of wood-burning fires in cities "Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, has called for wood-burning fires to be banned in parts of the capital with poor air quality (News, September 29). October 2017. Extreme air pollution in Ireland caused by ‘burning of solid fuel’ Prof O’Dowd confirmed “extraordinary levels of air pollution” exceeding WHO guidelines were found in Dublin during one in five winter days last year. These occurred at night due to domestic heating activity, while daytime air pollution levels (mainly from traffic), reached less than 10 per cent of night time peaks. These “extreme air pollution events are driven by burning of solid residential fuel (namely, peat, wood and biomass) and even though less than 4 per cent solid fuel is consumed, this accounts disproportionately for 70 per cent of the pollution”. Diesel accounted for far less pollutants in the form of particulate matter than might be expected – at between 5 and 10 per cent. He added: “The major concern is that these fuels are promoted as being ‘green’ or ‘low-carbon’ in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, but are devastating in terms of air pollution... and their consumption is predicted to increase significantly, thus turning back the clock in terms of clean air policy in the developed world.” It's also completely misleading to promote log-burning stoves as climate friendly. A New Scientist review concluded that log-burning stoves are harming our health and speeding up global warming October 2017. Air pollution blamed for 500,000 early deaths in Europe in 2014. "By far the biggest killer was PM2.5, the soup of tiny particles measuring 2.5 micrometres across or less. These claimed an estimated 428,000 premature deaths across the 41 European countries tracked in 2014. The main source, contributing 57 per cent of PM2.5 emissions in 2015, was domestic wood burning, especially in eastern Europe." October 2017. Prenatal Air Pollution and Newborns' Predisposition to Accelerated Biological Aging Telomere length at birth has been related to life expectancy. For a 5-μg/m3 increase in residential PM2.5 exposure during pregnancy, cord blood telomeres were 9% shorter and placental telomeres 13% shorter. An association between prenatal air pollution exposure and telomere length at birth could provide new insights in the environmental influence on molecular longevity. Telomere length is a marker of biological aging that may provide a cellular memory of exposures to oxidative stress and inflammation.
October 2017. Burning driftwood makes dangerous smoke. The lung association says it best: “Never burn wood that has been taken from salt water. Chlorine combines with the smoke to produce dioxins and furans, which are dangerous carcinogens.”
October 2017. London air has dangerous levels of toxic particles Londoners are breathing in air that exceeds global guidelines for one of the most dangerous toxic particles, it has been revealed. New figures released by London Mayor Sadiq Khan show every area in the capital exceeds World Health Organisation (WHO) limits for PM2.5. PM2.5 are toxic air particles which can increase the likelihood of respiratory and cardiovascular diseases.Mr Khan said it was "sickening" that not one London area met WHO standards. "This research is another damning indictment of the toxic air that all Londoners are forced to breathe every day", he said.
The findings of the London Atmospheric Emissions Inventory show nearly 95% of the capital's population live in areas that exceed the guidelines by 50% or more. On 23 October, the Mayor's new T-Charge will come into force to remove older, more polluting vehicles from central London."I am doing everything in my powers to significantly reduce NOx emissions by introducing the T-Charge to drive down the number of dirty vehicles polluting our roads and our lungs and implementing an Ultra Low Emission Zone with even tighter standards", he said.
'Unhealthy’ PM2.5 levels in evidence across London. "The Mayor also signed London up to the UN Environment and WHO ‘Breathe Life’ campaign, the first ‘mega-city’, committing to meeting the 10 μg/m3 WHO PM2.5 limit by 2030 – cementing the pledge set out in the London Environment Strategy published in August". A map of PM2.5 concentrations by location across London is available and a report on PM2.5 noting that nearly 95 percent of the capital’s population live in areas of London that exceed the WHO PM2.5 guideline limit by 50% or more."I also urge the government to devolve powers to me so I can get on with tackling the dangerous toxic air particles - known as PM2.5 - that we know come from construction sites and wood burning stoves. It's measures like these that we need to get on with now to protect our children and our children's children." October 2017. Air Pollution Tied to Kidney Disease. "PM 2.5 particles are small enough to enter the bloodstream where they make their way to the kidneys, which are especially prone to injury from pollutants. "The scientists calculate that “unhealthy” pollution levels lead to an annual increase of 44,793 cases of chronic kidney disease, and 2,438 cases of end-stage kidney disease requiring dialysis. Even levels below those considered “safe” increased risk." October 2017. Air in 44 UK cities and towns too dangerous to breathe, UN pollution report Out of 51 UK cities and towns listed in an air quality database, 44 fail the WHO's test for fine sooty particles smaller than 2.5 microns across that have been linked to heart disease and premature death. Exposure to the particles, known as PM2.5s, should not exceed 10 micrograms per cubic metre of air, according to the health organisation. But in numerous British population centres annual average levels are higher, sometimes by a significant degree, it is claimed. Glasgow emerged as one of the polluted cities, with a PM2.5s concentration of 16 micrograms per cubic metre. London and Leeds both had 15 micrograms of the particles in every cubic metre-sized parcel of air, Cardiff and Birmingham 14, and Manchester 13. Perhaps surprisingly, the seaside resort of Eastbourne and port city of Southampton equalled London's exposure level, while the dreaming spires of Oxford were surrounded by air as polluted by fine particles as Cardiff. October 2017. COMEAP report on NO2 mortality due in 2017. “The evidence was pushing us to think that NO2 has some independent effect, but we weren’t sure of the size of that and we weren’t sure if it was really NO2 or something else,” Professor Kelly told the conference. Perhaps the best option would be to devote about two thirds of our resources fighting PM2.5 because we know it's extremely dangerous and that there's no safe level of PM2.5 pollution, and the remaining third on NO2 because we don't know how dangerous it is - estimates of premature deaths from NO2 range from 23%-50% of pollution-related deaths. September 2017. Del Mar asks for ban on wood-burning fireplaces "It’s not the overall air quality that matters as much as the fireplace next door, said Rick Ehrenfeld, a former Del Mar planning commissioner and review board member.
“If I’m sitting next to someone who’s smoking a cigarette, I don’t care what the overall air quality is,” Ehrenfeld said. "A ban on wood-burning fireplaces in new residential construction will eventually eliminate them in all homes, he said." September 2017. Air pollution: London Mayor Sadiq Khan calls for ban on wood-burning stoves. "Khan said: “Non-transport sources contribute half of the deadly emissions in London, so we need a hard-hitting plan of action to combat them similar to moves I am taking to reduce pollution from road vehicles.
“With more than 400 schools located in areas exceeding legal pollution levels, and such significant health impacts on our most vulnerable communities, we cannot wait any longer, and I am calling on government to provide the capital with the necessary powers to effectively tackle harmful emissions from a variety of sources.”
The mayor has asked the environment department to amend the Clean Air Act to allow for the creation of zero-emission zones where the burning of solid fuel is not allowed from 2025 onwards."
Ban wood-burning stoves? Not in my back flue! "How could they ever have believed that diesel was a clean fuel? Some people don’t have the sense they were born with.
"Except, of course, that the whole wood-burning myth comes under this category too. In order to embrace the harmless naked flame idea, one had merely blithely to suppress common sense. Global anti-poverty and justice campaigners, for example, have been highlighting the damage to health caused to women who cook over open fires for decades. Cooking on an open fire has been likened to smoking 400 cigarettes an hour and is linked, research suggests, to four million premature deaths each year. "How anyone ever believed that directing all this filth into the air outside our homes made all that danger go away is the actual mystery here." September 2017. NSW EPA Clean Air Stakeholder Survey - more respondents concerned about wood smoke (61%) than any other source of pollution, including transport and fuels (48%), coal mining (46%) or power stations (38%). • The document lists research and opportunities for improving air quality, including:
• Phase out/ban wood heaters• Use mobile, low-cost sensors to target local emission sources (eg, using particle counters) • Map local wood smoke pollution hot spots • Fund replacement of wood heaters with cleaner alternatives (especially where financial hardship) • Give Councils powers to deal with wood smoke more effectively • Explore new public awareness approaches for wood smoke • Concern about the upcoming EPA wood smoke campaign message, "If you can smell it you are already breathing it", based on difficulties it raises for Local Government as responsible for regulation but with limited powers, and the additional concern it may cause communities about their local air quality. • Return to the "Don't light up tonight" advice for wood heaters when inversions or extremely still conditions are expected. • Require heaters to be removed before houses are offered for sale and/or do not allow new wood heaters to be installed. • Research in Tasmania and New Zealand shows that stricter "standards" based on the current AS4013 test do not result in any significant pollution reduction as standards do not represent real-life operation. September 2017. British Lung Foundation Recommends "Avoid open fires and wood-burning stoves. If you can, use gas or electricity to cook and to heat your home." and "If you’re thinking about buying a wood-burning stove, please think about the outdoor air pollution it will cause to your neighbours’ air quality and to the quality of the air entering your own home."
September 2017. City bans wood-burning fireplaces in new homes "Under current guidelines, property owners are encouraged but not required to use gas-burning devices only. In April the DRB voted 6-1 to recommend City Council consider prohibiting wood-burning fireplaces and stoves in new construction. To make a point, resident Rich Ehrenfeld showed a video featuring a house with a burning cigarette where the chimney should be. He said the analogy may be extreme but it makes sense.
If I’m sitting next to someone smoking a cigarette, I don’t care about the overall air quality, he said. It’s the same for sensitive receptors. They can’t work in their yards if someone is using a wood-burning fireplace.
“A lot of data points to … maybe gas is better for the environment,” he added. “Gas is not great. It’s not the ultimate thing to burn gas. But it’s a whole lot better and the C02 that’s given off by burning gas in a fireplace is about half what the C02 that’s given up in a wood-burning fireplace.”
He said the prohibition should result in wood-burners phasing themselves out over time".
September 2017. Worried about the effects of smoke from wood-burners? Here are some alternative options for your fireplace Some scientists believe they are more harmful than traffic pollution. That’s because wood-burning produces particulates — tiny toxic particles that get into the lungs, the blood and even the brain. They can cause heart attacks and lung problems and can be particularly damaging for children. A recent study showed the biggest source of these dangerous soot particles is wood-burning, a third of which occurs in homes. New generations of the stoves will be more efficient at reducing emissions, but they won’t be able to eradicate them. So, for some wood-burner owners, the love affair is over. If you do decide to ditch it, what can you do with the fireplace? September 2017. New York's mayor Bill de Blasio celebrated Earth Day on Tuesday by proposing more regulations — including a ban on new wood-burning fireplaces. Instead of wood-burning fireplaces, de Blasio wants to allow only cleaner-burning units, such as those that use natural gas ... “Today’s reforms — the biggest in a generation — will make a fundamental difference for thousands of New Yorkers living with asthma, and pave the way for other cities around the nation to follow suit.”
September 2017. Montreal's famous bagel shops under fire for wood-burning ovens. Montreal residents are going before city council on Monday to demand a ban on wood-burning ovens at several famous bagel shops because they say not enough has been done to address air pollution.
Francois Grenier, who lives on the same block where Fairmount Bagels has stood since 1949, says he has been asking the city to deal with the wood-burning ovens for more than 20 years. “I’m suffering,” he says. “The first time I had a big asthma crisis. Since then I had to close my windows in the summer when the wind was coming from southwest, so I’m living in air-conditioning.” ... "We reduced the emissions by 70 percent," he said. That's still about 30 per cent above the city’s emission standards, according to Morena, but he says they will have a filter in place by early next year that should further reduce emissions. September 2017. Smoke gets in your eyes. "Wood fired fire pits may lure people to a place to eat or drink, yet the smoke can also cause serious health problems. If you live or your business is in a crowded area and you have a wood fired fire pit, why not switch to propane? Propane burns clean, hot and smokeless and will not cause health problems for you, those you love, and those nearby
."
August 2017. Air pollution almost as bad for babies as smoking during pregnancy. A new study carried out by the universities of Edinburgh and Aberdeen has revealed that Scottish babies  The research also showed that mothers who smoked during pregnancy, but who were exposed to less pollution, gave birth to children with similar defects. The study only took into account a sampling pool in the northeast of Scotland, where air pollution is less pronounced than in cities like Edinburgh and Glasgow. Average PM2.5 concentrations during the study were 7.2 micrograms per cubic metre, far below the annual average of 10 mcg per cubic metre recommended by the WHO. The graph shows that a 5 ug/m3 increase in PM2.5 exposure has a significant detrimental effect on unborn babies' skull size (measured in terms of a SD score for bi-parietal diameter measurement). Lead scientist Dr Tom Clemens explained that his team’s findings showed that “a foetus with a non-smoking mother exposed to high pollution levels is only slightly better off than one with a smoking mother exposed to low levels of pollution”. Clemens urged the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the European Union to review their separate definitions of what emission levels are considered acceptable. August 2017. Emergency Department Visits of Young Children and Long-Term Exposure to Neighbourhood Smoke From Household Heating. A single household per hectare heating with wood or coal increases the risk of an infant under 3 having a non-accidental visit to an emergency department by 7%. "Policies that reduce smoke pollution from domestic heating by as little as one household per hectare using solid fuel burners could improve child health."
August 2017. Chile takes action on air pollution. Firewood produces as much as 94 per cent of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) emissions in some Chilean cities, according to the Ministry of Environment. But lack of money is preventing many households from switching to cleaner energy sources... Every year in Chile, air pollution costs the health sector at least $670 million and is the root cause of the 127,000 emergency health consultations and more than 4,000 premature deaths.
To address this challenge, in 2014, the Government launched a programme in the centre-south region to replace 200,000 firewood heaters with more energy-efficient heaters such as new gas, paraffin or wood pellet-based heaters. “This year we have seen the effects and the benefits of atmospheric decontamination plans that we did not notice in previous years, due to drought and bad ventilation conditions,” says Environment Minister Marcelo Mena. Mena revealed that between 1 April and 29 June 2017 severe air pollution episodes in the main cities of the centre-south region were 45 per cent lower than in the same period of 2016. August 2017. Air pollution to blame for soaring numbers of non-smokers who develop lung cancer Doctors at leading cancer centres in London warned that high levels of pollution are causing a spike in cases of lung cancer. They said, if the trend continues, the number of lung cancer deaths among non-smokers will overtake those who smoke within a decade.
August 2017. Current air quality issues should make people rethink their wood stoves. "Currently we're engulfed in smoky air throughout southern BC with health warnings about the air quality. The smoke from wildfires is worrying. It's like living inside a highly polluted city.
" So why do we willingly create a similar situation throughout the winter months with outdoor burning and a plethora of wood-burning appliances polluting our valley which create their own air-quality warnings?..." "We replaced a wood stove with a ductless electric heat pump soon after purchasing our home here. Our hydro bills are low and we have the significant benefit of summertime air-conditioning. It's a choice that many might make with a bit of encouragement or assistance. It's wonderful that some members of local councils and other levels of government are supporting efforts for cleaner air. But current rebate opportunities are limited and especially limited in helping people select a heat pump, which is the greenest alternative...." August 2017.
Dangers from burning wood. With all of the recent criticisms of diesel cars, I feel it is necessary to point out the pollution that is caused by wood-burners and garden bonfires.Known as PM2.5s, defined as having a diameter of one four-hundredth-of-a-millimetre or less, approximately 30 times smaller than the thickness of a human hair, these particles can penetrate deep into the lungs and have been implicated in exacerbating both lung and cardiovascular diseases. According to the European Environment Agency, PM2.5s are responsible for 37,800 premature deaths in Britain annually and while wood-burning stoves are portrayed, particularly by the manufacturers, as the eco-friendly option, the single biggest source for these particles is wood-burning, a third of which at least occurs actually in our homes. The fact is that the makers of wood-burning stoves and boilers have been allowed to circumvent long-standing laws aimed at preventing smog. (Letter to West Sussex County Times). August 2017. Hospitals in British Columbia See Massive Spike In Patients With Respiratory Problems. Poor air quality persists throughout the southern half of British Columbia as tinder-dry conditions continue to fuel wildfires. Dr. Bonnie Henry, deputy provincial health officer, said there has been a recent spike in emergency calls and hospital visits from people suffering from respiratory and other conditions related to the smoke and heat, particularly in the Lower Mainland. The increase can be from 20 per cent to 50 per cent more than we've seen in the past 10 years in the same area. "Depending on the day and the time of day, the increase can be from 20 per cent to 50 per cent more than we've seen in the past 10 years in the same area," Henry said. The BC Ambulance Service is monitoring the situation and staffing accordingly, Henry said, and health authorities are reminding the public to take precautions such as exercising indoors to avoid health problems. ... People with medical conditions, infants and the elderly are encouraged to stay indoors — ideally in air-conditioned environments — as well as keep any necessary medications handy and stay hydrated. 911 calls for breathing issues jump as smoky haze chokes Vancouver’s air quality "People are being advised to avoid any strenuous activity outside." Metro Vancouver air quality worse than Beijing: St. Paul’s respirologist. “That’s very rare. Most of the time we beat Beijing hands down. But over the next few days I’m afraid the quality of air in Beijing will be better.” According to a real-time air pollution data collected by the World Air Quality Index project, the air quality index in Burnaby was at an ‘unhealthy’ level on Friday (index of 110), while Beijing was at a ‘moderate’ one (index of 99). .August 2017. Burning firewood is an airborne public health hazard Dr. Brian Moench. "If someone from the American Lung Association knocked on your door suggesting that you join their fundraising project by buying vouchers for discounts on cigarettes, proclaiming, “It’s all for a good cause,” you might think you have just entered an alternate reality universe.
"Unfortunately, the Humboldt Senior Resource Center has been living for many years in just such an alternate reality. The HSRC is once again selling discounted firewood vouchers for seniors ... For a person that doesn’t smoke, burning firewood for home heating is probably the worst thing you can do for your own health and longevity, and that of all your neighbors. "Thousands of medical studies have proven beyond any doubt that air pollution causes or exacerbates virtually the same entire list of health outcomes as cigarettes do — heart attacks, strokes, asthma, pneumonia, high blood pressure, shortened life expectancy, chromosomal damage, Alzheimer’s, every kind of pregnancy complication, still births, and even sudden death. "But all air pollution is not created equal. Wood smoke is the most toxic type of pollution in most cities, more dangerous than auto pollution and most industrial pollution. Lighting a wood fire in your house is essentially starting up your own mini-toxic waste incinerator." August 2017. Former Labour government Minister, Brian Wilson on wood stove installation: "With further confirmation that wood burners cause damage to neighbours health (see Sunday times 16th July 2017 and the comprehensive Mikee5 contribution on GBF) it surely becomes priority to minimise health impact and not maximise the damage potential by facilitating release of the deadly emissions close to the ground . With confirmation that 31% of toxic fine particles are already created by wood burners and with 200,000 additional units installed each year guaranteeing air quality damage equating to millions of extra diesel vehicles operating in the UK it would appear time for the application of joined up thinking, due diligence and duty of care ....
NOX production is a further concern especially when aware nitrogen content in the fuel can vary by a factor of 20 plus, a Scottish Nov 2008 report confirmed wood burning creates levels of toxic pollution many times higher than equivalent gas or oil. Fire Authorities report a substantial increase in domestic chimney fires due to wood burning which further confirms pollution content in the emissions. The contribution to reported 40,000 UK deaths due to air pollution annually surely warrants investigation and action. Rgds Brian Wilson." Source: UK green building forum, thread about wood stove installation:
August 2017. Wood-heater emissions causing poor air quality warning in Melbourne CBD Pregnant women and people with heart and lung conditions should limit their time outdoors in Melbourne's CBD due to poor air quality.
A warning from the Environment Protection Authority has been in place for most of Thursday, with an afternoon update stating air quality is "unhealthy for sensitive groups".
The elevated level of PM2.5 particles is likely due to wood-heater emissions and other sources of urban pollution not being dispersed because of still atmospheric conditions, the environmental watchdog said. August 2017. Indian startup Avant Garde Innovations has developed a low-cost wind turbine that can generate 3-5 kW hours of electricity daily. The size of a ceiling fan, this wind turbine can generate 5 kWh/kW per day — enough electricity to power an entire house for a lifetime — with just a one-time cost of US$750.
August 2017. UK’s largest heat pump to warm 350 homes. New heating decarbonisation targets have been set by the UK government and large heat pumps are expected to play a key role in meeting these standards. ... “We’re looking to gain fuel poverty alleviation for Hillpark Drive, Glasgow, UK. It is a 350 home social housing estate built in the 1970s currently fitted with electric storage heating. ...
The 400 kW/h air source heat pump is designed to be installed at an energy centre and connected to a centralised district heating network which will deliver low carbon heat to six buildings plugged into the scheme. At 8 metres long and 10,000 kg in weight, the air source heat pump incorporates in-built control systems to enable remote monitoring and ensure optimum efficiency throughout its life-cycle, an expected 20+ years. With the use of the robust industrial manufacturing components, higher water temperatures of 60°C are achieved, allowing for regular radiators to be used.
Air source heat pumps are perfect for the UK’s mild climate as warmth is extracted from the outside air and then boosted up for distribution via a “wet” central heating system to the whole housing community. This will be the first time an ASHP installation in Britain will provide central renewable heating for a block of high rise buildings. August 2017. Wildfire smoke from British Columbia + historic heat wave hitting Western Washington have counties across Washington state issuing burn bans. For, example, King County has a Stage 1 air quality burn ban. No charcoal barbeques, fire pits, chimeneas, fire bowls, or similar free-standing devices, campfires or bonfires, fireplaces, uncertified wood stoves, or uncertified inserts, agricultural fires (as described in the agricultural burn permit).
Health experts warn of effects of smoke Smoke in the air poses a health concern, as gases and particles are taken in that can cause lung and eye issues. Flathead County health officer Hillary Hanson explained the danger of smoke.
"What we're most concerned with is that fine particle, because that's what people are breathing into their lungs, and that's what can cause the issues," Hanson said.
July 2017. Wood-burners harm neighbours’ health. If your neighbours have a wood-burning stove, they could be wrecking your health, scientists have warned. They found that every wood stove releases billions of tiny toxic particles into the air that can drift into nearby homes, especially at low wind speeds.
“Even modest wood-burning in densely populated residential areas may lead to pollution exposures comparable to those from traffic sources,” Gary Fuller, a researcher at King’s College London, told a conference last week. He analysed pollution levels and sources in cities such as London, Manchester, Birmingham and Norwich, showing that wood-burning accounted for up to 31% of toxic particles in the air.
He also found that suburban toxin levels peaked in the evenings and on Sundays, when more people were at home. July 2017. Utah physicians group alarmed by studies linking more deaths to air pollution. An association of Utah doctors is calling for more stringent limits on air pollution in light of new evidence they say shows air quality is more critical to human health than once thought. Members of Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment said they would seek lower limits on ambient air pollution, urge state leaders to plan more carefully for future growth, and press for a review of rules restricting emissions from wood-burning stoves, restaurants and fireworks.
"There is no safe level of air pollution that we can inhale," said Brian Moench, president of Utah Physicians. "So if there is a standard, it's arbitrary" and based on factors such as politics and economic costs. July 2017. Smoke campaign puts heat on wood heaters. Announced by the Minister for the Environment and Heritage Mick Gentleman, the ‘Burn Right Tonight’ campaign will also encourage them to switch to more sustainable alternatives to keep Canberra’s air clean. “Smoke from domestic wood heaters remains the largest source of air pollution in the Territory,” Mr Gentleman said. July 2017. Impressionism: Civilization is going up in smoke, one chiminea at a time. "In
our city will have a ban on open backyard fires just so the neighbourhood doesn’t go up in flames in the event of a dry season, or to prevent the smoke from your slightly damp, crappy firewood, purchased at the local gas station, doesn’t send plumes of suffocating smoke up and into the blades of your neighbour’s cooling fan, filling his domain with stifling fumes.
This is the very definition what is means to be civilized: We don’t fill each others homes with smoke."
July 2017. Increased air pollution cuts victims' lifespan by a decade, costing billions. A new study in the August issue of Ecological Indicators shows that, on average, an increase in pollution particles in the air of 10 micrograms per cubic meter cuts victims' life expectancy by 9-11 years - more than previously thought. June 2017. Air pollution exposure may hasten death, even at levels deemed 'safe'. A study of 97% of the US population aged 65 or older - more than 60 million adults - linked long-term exposure to PM2.5 to a substantially increased risk of premature death. The analysis found no sign of a “safe” level of pollution, below which the risk of dying early tapered off.
The Harvard University scientists who conducted the study calculated that reducing PM2.5 pollution by just 1 ug/m3 nationwide would save about 12,000 lives each year in the USA.
The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that, in areas where annual PM2.5 exposure was less than 12 ug/m3, an increase of just 1 ug/m3 increased the risk of premature death by 1.26%. June 2017. Following complaints, Cambridge restaurant ordered to stop cooking with charcoal and wood. Cambridge health officials have ordered the owners of Shepard Restaurant & Bar in Cambridge to immediately stop using charcoal and wood for cooking following complaints from neighbors that smoke was seeping into their homes and affecting their health.
Legal Notice of Decision. June 2017. New smoke pollution rules make it harder to ignore burn bans. " FAIRBANKS — Want to burn wood or coal when the air is bad? You’ll need a waiver under new rules adopted Monday by the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly.
"That goes for people even if they have a newer-model stove and they are burning dry wood. The fine for burning without a waiver is $100. To get a waiver, burners will have to prove their stoves are approved, their wood is stored properly and they know how to burn cleanly, according to the package of new rules proposed by Borough Mayor Karl Kassel, amended by the assembly and approved in a 7-2 vote."
June 2017. Air pollution: the toll on public health (appendix to: Montreal bagels and the pollution problem). "In 2011, Quebec’s public health institute and Montreal’s public health agency collaborated on a study to quantify the health impacts of wood stoves in Rivière-des-Prairies, where a large proportion of residential homes use wood for heating.
"Across a population of 34,000, the researchers found that the increased presence of fine particulate emissions from wood burning was causing on average in a given year of approximately 1,000 to 3,000 days of acute respiratory symptoms, 29 to 92 days of asthma symptoms, 700 to 2,100 days of reduced activity, four to 11 days of acute childhood bronchitis, and up to two premature deaths."
June 2017. Tasmanians who upset their neighbours by burning excessively green and toxic firewood could soon be hit with an immediate fix order by compliance officers.
The State Government proposal would mostly target residents whose woodheater smoke emissions choke those living in close proximity and cause respiratory problems. Under current regulations, households and small businesses served with a written notice by EPA and council officers to reduce smoke are given 21 days to fix the problem. It is now proposed officers be given the power to order an immediate fix to the public health problem that plagues certain suburbs particularly in Launceston and Hobart. June 2017. Rebates offered to put out wood fires. The Minister for Climate Change and Sustainability, Shane Rattenbury has encouraged householders to replace their wood heaters to help improve the ACT’s air quality.
May 2017. NSW EPA probes coal-fired power plants over pollution claims - another example of hopelessly inadequate government supervision "The Bayswater power station in the Hunter Valley was only required to report pollution from one of its four generation units. Staff were instructed to supply lower sulphur coal to the unit being monitored while dirtier coal was burnt in the other three, according to participants attending a public meeting held with current plant owners AGL in Muswellbrook in March."
He encouraged Canberrans to take advantage of ACT Government rebates this winter and said the Actsmart Wood Heater Replacement Program offered incentives for the removal and disposal of domestic wood-burning heaters. “During winter, Tuggeranong can be particularly affected by wood smoke, which gets trapped in the valley,” Mr Rattenbury said. “The fine particulate matter in this smoke is detrimental to our health and our air quality.” May 2017. Christchurch smokebusters to hit the streets for third year. Three two-person groups will be roving the city from June 6, looking for chimneys producing visible smoke. New rules came into effect this year requiring replacement of wood burners that are at least 15 years old. National rules require that Christchurch have three or fewer high air pollution nights each year. Last year, the first winter in which the rules were in place, Christchurch had five. It has had two so far this year. Timaru remains well off meeting the target: it had 27 high air pollution nights last year, and three this year. May 2017. Air pollution linked to DNA damage in children. Conclusions: These preliminary findings suggest that exposure to ambient PAH may play a role in telomere shortening“The fine particulate matter in this smoke is detrimental to our health and our air quality.”  May 2017. Heart attack risk increases 17-fold following respiratory infections. Woodsmoke contains toxic chemicals such as acrolein that reduce the ability of the lungs to fight infection. This research helps explain why breathing woodsmoke increases the risk of heart attacks as well as lung diseases.
"This is the first study to report an association between respiratory infections such as pneumonia, influenza and bronchitis and increased risk of heart attack in patients confirmed by coronary angiography (a special X-Ray to detect heart artery blockages). Our findings confirm what has been suggested in prior studies that a respiratory infection can act as a trigger for a heart attack," said senior author Professor Geoffrey Tofler, cardiologist from University of Sydney, Royal North Shore Hospital and Heart Research Australia.
May 2017. Poor air quality expected in Melbourne and Geelong. "Environment Protection Authority Victoria (EPA) advises that air quality in Melbourne and Geelong may be unhealthy for sensitive groups today due to elevated levels of PM2.5 particles. Sensitive groups include people over 65, children 14 years and younger, pregnant women and those with existing heart or lung conditions. These people should reduce prolonged or heavy physical activity and, where possible, limit the time spent outdoors. The elevated levels of PM2.5 are likely due to wood heater emissions and other urban sources of pollution not being dispersed because of still atmospheric conditions over past 24 hours. today." May 2017. Saskatchewan Lung Association says wood-burning firepits dangerous for people with health conditions
Concerned citizens, including the Saskatchewan Lung Association, made presentations to a city committee on Monday, asking that wood-burning backyard firepits be completely banned. They argued that smoke from neighbouring yards can be dangerous to people with lung and heart conditions. This issue is long overdue," said Saskatchewan Lung Association vice-president of health promotion, Jennifer May told CBC News."We encourage the people of Saskatoon to be good neighbours and foster a healthy community." May said backyard smoke can travel lengthy distances and can affect people with asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). "Honestly, I think a lot of people don't even realize when they're sitting outside and having their fire, they're not realizing some of the impacts they're having on some members of their community," said May. The idea has precedent in other Canadian cities like Toronto, Ottawa, Vancouver and Kelowna, which have already have outright bans. May would like people to start using alternatives, like propane and natural gas heaters instead. May 2017. Bay Area air hits healthy milestone thanks to tough wood-burning rules. SAN FRANCISCO — The Bay Area has cleaned up its air enough to meet the federal health standard for soot and fine pollution particles after a long and controversial campaign to reduce wood burning. Bay Area air quality regulators said it’s good news for people at risk of asthma and emphysema attacks, strokes and heart attacks, and other ailments aggravated by the fine pollution particles. Likened to very tiny razor blades, the particles and droplets finer than the width of a human hair are called PM 2.5. They invade human respiratory and circulatory systems, health experts say.
“Meeting this air quality milestone is truly a clean air success story for the Bay Area, and the air district’s 2008 wood-burning rule has played a significant role helping us meet the standard,” said Jack Broadbent, the chief executive officer of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. The wood-burning rule banned wood fires during Spare the Air days when unhealthy air is predicted. The rule also banned old-fashioned, wood-burning fireplaces and stoves in new construction. April 2017. Air pollution: 'Heart disease link found' Several studies show that air pollution such as woodsmoke increases the risk of heart disease. Launceston's successful woodsmoke program reduced deaths in winter from respiratory disease by 28% and cardiovascular disease by 20%. A Canadian study reported a 19% increase in the risk of heart attack among people 65 and older. The researches "noticed that the association was stronger when more of the air pollution came from wood burning,"
In order to understand how this occurs, scientists asked 14 healthy volunteers to breathe in air containing gold nano-particles, which scientists consider inert, while exercising for two hours. A day later, researchers found that gold nano-particles had made their way into the bloodstream of most participants.And for some people, the particles remained in the body for months - they were detected in people's urine three months later. In another similar experiment, researchers asked three patients with clogged-up blood vessels to breathe in air containing tiny gold nanoparticles. A day later, when the patients had part of their damaged blood vessels surgically removed, there was evidence of this gold building up in the diseased parts of vessels.
This study sheds further light on how air pollution particles get into the bloodstream and damage our health.
See also: Researchers from McGill and Health Canada find that air pollution from wood burning linked to increased risk of heart attacks in seniors.
April 2017. Spare the Air, Cool the Climate. The new 2017 Bay Area Clean Air Plan aims to limit fossil fuel combustion, stop methane leaks, make buildings more efficient and eliminate wood burning to reduce particulate and black carbon emissions.
Wood smoke and soot fouling Marin’s air Lung Association study slams area. Bonnie Holmes-Gen, senior director of air quality and climate change for the American Lung Association (ALA) in California said: “wintertime wood smoke tends to be the major culprit increasing particle pollution or soot levels in Marin County and the reason for the unhealthy days. Wood smoke pollution can get trapped in the region during stagnant winter conditions
See also: Santa Barbara County Wood Smoke Reduction Program US$1,000 to replace a wood stove or fireplace with a natural gas or propane fireplace insert or freestanding stove or electric heat pump, or US$500 to remove a wood stove or fireplace. April 2017. Pilot Program Aims to Snuff Harmful Wood Smoke. A voluntary pilot program that encourages homeowners to Heat Clean, Save Green by providing $500 to remove or $1,000 to replace a wood-burning fireplaces or woodstove with non-polluting heating. This program is similar to other successful voluntary programs throughout California, in line with state efforts to reduce levels of both particulate matter and black carbon, a short-lived climate pollutant emitted when wood burns. Kittitas County Holding Wood Stove Buy-Back Old home-heating wood stoves can be turned in for a cash incentive. Those with qualifying stoves will receive a $250 check in about three weeks from the event. Stoves must be in working order and free of firebrick... April 2017. Link between air pollution and breast cancer discovered. Research has suggested that increased exposure to soot particles could lead to denser breast tissue, which is one of the strongest risk factors linked to breast cancer ... Researchers from the University of Florida, US, looked at 279,967 women to discover if there was a link between pollution and breast cancer. It is thought that increases in PM2.5 impact the body's hormone levels, which can trigger different tissue types in the breast to start growing. Dense breast tissue tends to contain less fat, but more glandular tissue, which increases the chance of cells becoming cancerous.
On top of this, cancer in dense breast tissue is often harder to detect with standard breast screenings. This can mean that women only realise they have breast cancer when they start experiencing symptoms, which can make it harder to treat. See also: Barbecued and smoked meat tied to risk of death from breast cancer "There are many carcinogens found in grilled or smoked meats," said lead study author Humberto Parada, a researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "One of the most common are polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), which are formed during combustion of organic material." "Women may be exposed to these carcinogens by cigarette smoke or air pollution, which are associated with an increased risk of developing breast cancer, Parada said by email. Some research has suggested exposure to these chemicals through grilled or smoked meat can increase the risk of breast cancer, but the current study offers some of the first evidence suggesting it also influences survival odds." April 2017. Santa Barbara County residents can get cash to help with removal or replacement of wood-burning fireplaces or wood stoves in their homes as part of a new voluntary pilot program encouraging homeowners countywide to "Heat Clean, Save Green."
Applicants who meet program requirements will receive a $1,000 from the APCD to help cover the costs of replacing a wood-burning stove or fireplace or a $500 check to help cover the costs of removing it. ... "It's a change that can make a big difference in your neighborhood."
Devices that will qualify for a rebate include operable woodstoves (conventional, catalytic, noncatalytic and pellet) and operable wood-burning fireplaces (open hearth and fireplace insert). Qualified replacements include natural gas or propane fireplace inserts or free-standing heating stoves and electric heat pumps.
April 2017. Wood Fires Found to Create More Pollution than Previously Thought. Secondary emissions from wood smoke are far more dangerous than we previously thought. A recent study from the University of Eastern Finland has demonstrated that the formation of secondary aerosols is much higher then was estimated. When wood smoke ages in the ambient air, aerosols are created rapidly. In just three hours the aerosols that are formed increase significantly.
April 2017. Replacement rebates are again on offer to reduce wood smoke. “The EPA recognises that wood smoke is a major contributor to poor air quality in the region during the winter months,” Muswellbrook Shire Council sustainability coordinator, Mark Scandrett said. Both Muswellbrook and Singleton councils are offering a $1500 rebate to replace your wood heater with a less smoky form of heating, such as air conditioning.
1. Premature death: Science shows that both short-term and long-term exposure to unhealthy air can shorten your life and lead to premature death. Medical experts have known about this risk for decades —remember our blog about the great smog event depicted in "The Crown"? 2. Asthma attacks: Breathing ozone and particle pollution can lead to increased asthma attacks, which can result in visits to the emergency room and hospital admissions, not to mention missed work and school.
3. Cardiovascular disease: Air pollution can increase the risk of both heart attacks and stroke. 4. Lung cancer: In 2013, the World Health Organization determined that particle pollution can cause lung cancer, which is the leading cause of cancer-related death in the U.S. 5. Developmental damage: Exposure to air pollution can slow and stunt lung development in growing children, harming their health now and reducing their lung function as adults. 6. Susceptibility to infections: Air pollution increases the risk of lung infections, especially in children. 9. Worsened COPD symptoms: Exposure to air pollution can make it even harder for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) to breathe. Severe symptoms can lead to hospitalization and even death. 8. Lung tissue swelling and irritation: Even people with healthy lungs are susceptible to irritation and swelling. For those living with chronic lung diseases, such as asthma and COPD, these effects can be especially harmful. 9. Low infant birth weight: Some studies show exposure to air pollution may increase the risk of low infant birth weight and infant mortality. 10. Wheezing, coughing and shortness of breath: Like many of the other conditions in this list, these can be caused by both long-term exposure and short-term exposure to high levels of air pollutants. April 2017. HEALTH – Heating your home with wood is more dangerous than you likely realize. "IT MAY BE natural, but there’s nothing safe or environmentally sound about heating your home with wood or clearing debris and yard waste in a burn barrel or pile.
....The health impacts of exposure to wood smoke are diverse, and a substantial scientific and medical body of evidence points to short-term (acute) effects and longer-term (chronic) effects. Wood smoke is a cocktail of small, dangerous particles and droplets that easily work their way into our lungs, bloodstream, brain, and other organs. ....Although children and the elderly are at higher risk, wood smoke affects everyone and its cumulative impacts on our health care systems are becoming more evident" April 2017. Heating the leading cause of Franklin County fires ... comes as no surprise to local fire chiefs, who have experienced many heating-related incidents in their time as firefighters. They believe the numbers have to do with wood stoves and pellet stoves being a popular method of heating in the area.
March 2017. Wood Stoves May Spark Heart Trouble. "During cold months, when pollution from wood stoves is highest, there was a 19 percent increase in the risk of heart attack among people 65 and older, the researchers found. "We noticed that the association was stronger when more of the air pollution came from wood burning," Weichenthal said in a university news release.
"Exposure to fumes from biomass combustion, such as those generated by wood-burning indoor stoves, has long been recognized by the medical community as a significant health risk, especially in rural areas of the developing world," said Dr. Irene Galperin. She directs the Pleural Center at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. There's an especially strong connection between wood-burning stoves and an increased risk for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a major killer, Galperin added. "Wood-burning releases small particles into the atmosphere which, when inhaled, can cause direct injury to the lining of the respiratory tract, ultimately leading to inflammation," she explained. "It is likely that this inflammatory process is not limited to the lungs. When inflammation involves the coronary arteries that feed the heart, it may lead to heart attack." Galperin believes more must be done to educate people about the dangers, especially in communities where wood stoves are popular.
Dr. Alan Mensch, chief of pulmonary medicine at Northwell Health's Plainview Hospital, in Plainview, NYagreed with Galperin that the study has an important message."The take-away," he said, "is that what we take into our bodies -- either by ingesting or inhaling -- has the potential to have profound effects on our health."
March 2017. Black carbon found in air pollution can increase the resistance of bacteria that cause respiratory disease. "The four-year investigation focused on how pollution in the air, which is thought to be responsible for millions of deaths each year, affects bacteria in the nose, throat and lungs of humans. It found black carbon, produced when diesel, biomass and biofuels are burned, changes the way bacteria grow, possibly affecting their ability to survive and beat human immune systems. The study concluded that the resistance of communities of Streptococcus pneumoniae – a major cause of respiratory diseases – to penicillin was increased by black carbon. It also caused this pathogen to spread from the nose down the respiratory tract, allowing disease to develop." See also: New study reveals air (black carbon) pollution can alter the effectiveness of antibiotics and increases the potential of disease. March 2017. The choking side of wood burning. Letter to the Cowichan Valley Citizen. "I look out over the smoky haze in my neighbourhood as I gasp for breath, wheezing and coughing and feeling like I am drowning. Eventually my heart is pounding so hard I head for the emergency department. While I am waiting to be seen a mother brings in a child in obvious respiratory distress. When I am seen by the emergency room doctor he gives me a prescription for an inhaler. I get the prescription filled; it costs over $100. It is now evening. While I spent the day at the hospital my neighbours have been happily saving a few bucks burning unseasoned wood they picked up on the side of the road. One neighbour is even burning landscaping wood chips — hey they are even cheaper than wood. The smoke is still billowing from his chimney as the cool fog settles in and holds this toxic mix at ground level.
"The cost: thousands of dollars of taxpayer money towards the cost of health care, thousands of dollars in prescriptions, the cost of watching as your child or loved one drowns in their own mucous.
"Why: so you can save a few bucks on your Hydro bill or not have to go to the dump with your refuse. "Hardly seems fair to me, but hey, this is the Cowichan Valley, where your child is 75 per cent more likely to get asthma and burning wood is your right." P. Vogan. March 2017. Burning old treated and painted timbers poisoning city air. Research by GNS Sciences has found ilevels of substances like arsenic and lead reached up to three times the guideline for human health during winter in some inner-city areas.
The findings were important, study leader Perry Davy said, in light of recently released findings from the Otago Study, which showed lead exposure in childhood could reduce a person's IQ and social standing later in life....
While the toxins had the potential to harm the general population, Davy said the effect could be far worse for the households that were burning them. "We have no idea what the concentration might be inside the home or in the neighbourhood of someone burning this stuff."
'These studies show that air in New Zealand urban centres is not as clean as we would like to think." Davy said councils were responsible for managing air quality and most had banned the burning of timber treated with arsenic compounds. "There is clearly more work to do in this area," Dr Davy said. Wood stoves are the largest single source of PAH in our air. Other research shows that exposure to PAH also reduces children's IQ and increases the risk of behavioural problems such as anxiety and attention deficit. Woodsmoke also increases the risk of Alzheimers and brain damage from strokes in the elderly. February 2017. Wood stoves bad for the heart. Researchers from McGill and Health Canada find that air pollution from wood burning linked to increased risk of heart attacks. The risk of acute myocardial infarction for the elderly living in and around small cities is increased by air pollution caused by biomass burning from woodstoves. By comparing pollution data from three cities in British Columbia (Prince George, Kamloops and Courtenay/Comox) with hospital admissions, researchers from McGill and Health Canada found that rising concentrations of fine particulate air pollution caused by wood burning were associated with increased hospitalization for myocardial infarction. During the cold season, when pollution from woodstoves is at its highest, the risk of heart attacks among subjects of 65 years and older increased by 19%.
“We noticed that the association was stronger when more of the air pollution came from wood burning, says McGill University professor Scott Weichenthal, lead author of a new study published in Epidemiology. This suggests that the source of pollution matters and that all particulate air pollution is perhaps not equally harmful when it comes to cardiovascular disease.”
February 2017. Bonfires and wood burning stoves could be banned in Croydon. "Banning bonfires, restrictions on wood burning stoves and patrols to fine motorists with idling engines are all being considered as measures to tackle Croydon's air pollution problem..."
February 2017. Exposure to PM2.5 pollution above the US EPA standard of 12 ug/m3 nearly doubles the risk of cognitive decline and all-cause dementia; exposure to this level of PM2.5 pollution quadrupled the risk for people with 2 copies of the APOE gene. The LA times reports that before the EPA set new air pollution standards in 2012, some 21% of new cases of dementia and of accelerated cognitive decline could likely have been attributed to air pollution.
February 2017. Air pollution linked to 2.7 million premature births a year. Policymakers should tackle particulates at source to prevent infant deaths and lifelong disabilities, say researchers
Traffic fumes, slash-and-burn farming and open wood stoves are raising the risk of babies being born before they are ready.As many as 2.7 million premature births a year – 18% of the global total – can be linked to outdoor air pollution, a study in Environment International found. Many of the policy options to tackle harmful particulates also reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that drive climate change. For example, replacing old diesel vehicles with cleaner transport or returning agricultural waste to the land instead of burning it. The prospect of children suffering from avoidable disabilities may spur action. January 2017 Wood-burners: London air pollution is just tip of the iceberg. New Scientist.
"The harm far exceeds traffic pollution", said air pollution expert Gary Fuller. "While people are exposed to high levels of traffic pollution mainly when travelling on busy streets, wood burning produces huge amounts of pollution where people live, when they are at home. ..."Burning wood also emits black carbon – soot – that warms the atmosphere during the short time it remains in the air. Most studies ignore this, but Mitchell and Forster calculate that over 20 years - the timescale that matters if we don’t want the world to go too far above 2°C of warming - wood stoves provide little or no benefit". January 2017. As London is put on a 'very high' pollution alert... are trendy wood-burners taking us back to the pea soupers of the 1950s? According to the European Environment Agency, PM2.5s are responsible for 37,800 premature deaths in Britain a year. And while wood-burning stoves may seem like a more eco-friendly option, the single biggest source for these particles is wood-burning — a third of which occurs in our homes.
On Sunday evening, a team led by Dr Gary Fuller, an air pollution scientist at King’s College, London, measured the highest levels of PM2.5s since 2011. Tellingly, it occurred at a time when traffic was relatively light, but a lot of people were at home in front of their wood-burners. Analysis of the air confirmed a high level of wood smoke. The fact is that the makers of wood-burning stoves and boilers have been allowed to circumvent long-standing laws aimed at preventing smog.Even worse, in the case of boilers, taxpayers are subsidising deadly pollution. A study in Tasmania, where new wood-burning stoves are allowed only if they are designed to emit less than 2.5g of PM2.5s per kg of wood burned, found that in real life they emit nearly four times that — with an average of 9.4g per kg. At that level, a single wood stove burning three tonnes of wood a year — the average — will emit as much PM2.5 pollution as 2,000 petrol cars. It’s likely the levels of pollution from wood-burning stoves in Britain are at least as high, however no tests of this kind — that is, in conditions that imitate real life — have been carried out over here yet. London pollution levels sent soaring by wood fires during cold snap "Thousands of Londoners enjoying a wood fire at home on Sunday fuelled the worst toxic air peak for nearly six years, scientists said. Wood-burning was a major contributor to particulate pollution surging to “black”, or “very high”, levels at sites in Westminster, the City, Camden and Kensington very early on Monday." (from the London Evening Standard).
Pollution in London from wood burning on the rise "according to King's College some of the pollution was due to "unusually high levels of domestic wood burning. This is not to underestimate the contribution of traffic emissions but wood burning was making up half of the pollution readings at some monitors at some sites - all exacerbated by low winds not blowing away pollutants. ..."
More than a million homes in Britain now have a wood burning stove with 175,000 new ones installed every year."..according to the Danish Ecological Council which has looked into the use of wooden stoves: "Just 16,000 wood stoves in Copenhagen (600,000 inhabitants) emit as much fine-particles pollution in one winter, as all traffic emit within one year. It also says: "New low-emission stoves cause much higher emissions (above 500.000 part/cm3) than new trucks with particulate filters (below 1.000 part/cm3)." "So far mayoral policies have been aimed at cleaning up traffic in particular NO2, but perhaps some attention should focus on the burning of wood in homes." (from the BBC) London on pollution 'high alert' due to cold air, traffic, and wood burning. “This episode is actually a perfect illustration of all the things that control air pollution,” said Baker. “The weather conditions happened to coincide with the two peaks – one from the traffic, one from the wood burning – and then that was on top of what we had already built up locally over a number of days and a bit coming in from the continent.” Air pollution in London passes levels in Beijing... and wood burners are making problem worse Demand for the stoves, which cost between £400 and £7,000, has tripled in the last five years – partly down to the savings they can make to energy bills. Last year experts at the University of Southampton warned that wood burners 'liberate significant amounts of particulate pollution into the outdoor air’ and said they risked undoing the good work of the Clean Air Act which was brought in following the Great Smog of 1952, which is estimated to have killed 12,000 people. NSW EPA Clean Air for NSW Consultation Submissions due: 20 Jan 2017. "In consultation with stakeholders and the wider community, it is proposed that the EPA will investigate further improvements to the wood heater regulatory framework for consideration by Government, as well as education, training and replacement programs."  January 2017. Smog warning issued for the Montreal area. "According to meteorologists, the leading cause of poor air quality in the province is wood burning — more than industrial activities and transportation." January 2017. Ten air-quality monitors for Valley to keep track of pollution. State-of-the-art equipment to increase the monitoring of the air quality in the Cowichan Valley is soon to be installed. The Ministry of Environment committed to supplying 10 purple air monitors, which cost approximately $200 each, for the Valley, and the private sector is supplying six more of the monitors. January 2017. Heat pump replaces scouts’ fireplace Thanks to the injection of $2000 from the Premier’s Discretionary Fund and $3000 from the Penguin Lions Club, two heat pumps have been installed at the scout hall. Group leader Phil Leaver thanked both for the funding. “We’ve been heating the place with a fireplace so for ease and convenience to heat the place, and safety too more than anything this will help,” he said. December 2016. Protecting kids from wood smoke. British Columbia Lung Association. "These days, BC parents are well aware of the harms of food additives, the dangers of certain toys, and of course, the health risks around cigarettes - yet wood smoke doesn’t seem to be on their radar. While this is largely due to a lack of awareness, it is important that they become educated on both the issue and solutions. The fact is sustained wood smoke exposure can pose health risks to their children." The Canadian Lung Association recommends that you don't burn wood in residential setting.
No wood burning is best. "Sadly, the air we pollute, is the air we breathe. And while I confess some nostalgia for the embrace of a cozy wood fire, I have come to realize through my own experience that health must come first, and no burning is best."
December 2016. Why cutting soot emissions is 'fastest solution' to slowing Arctic ice melt. Reducing wood-burning, gas-flaring and global diesel emissions would be ‘quick win’ in combating irreversible climate change, scientists say
December 2016. Guardian Pollutionwatch. Why logs are twice as dirty as diesel. "Particle pollution from UK wood burning is now estimated to be more than double diesel exhaust."
"Swiss scientists have been investigating what happens to wood smoke once it leaves your chimney. They burnt logs in a stove and collected the smoke in a chamber. UV lights were used to simulate sunlight and they waited. Slowly the particle pollution in the chamber increased, in some cases by up to three times. If this laboratory experiment reflects what happens in our cities; then pollution from wood burning is even greater than we thought." December 2016. Danish Report: Pollution from residential burning by the Danish Ecological Council. "Wood burning is responsible for about 67% of total Danish emissions of harmful fine particles; although wood burning only covers about 3% of the Danish energy consumption." ..."It does not seem logical that an eco-labelled stove is allowed to pollute 25 times more than a 10 year old truck ". Table 2 of the report compares emissions from residential wood burning (RWB) in the 27 EU countries with other sources. RWB is responsible for 654,000 tonnes of PM2.5 emissions (46% of all PM2.5 emissions), over 4 times more than the 149,500 tonnes of PM2.5 from road transport. RWB is also responsible for 56% of black carbon emissions, compared to 23% from road transport. December 2016. New Swedish study: wood smoke kills more than car exhaust. According to the researchers' calculations, air pollution from wood burning cuases approximately 324 persons premature deaths each year in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Umeå region. This is more than the approximately 299 people who die prematurely from air pollution from vehicle exhaust and dubbdäcks- and brake wear in the area.
December 2016. Why Christmas is the most TOXIC day of the year. An air pollution expert has warned families could breathe in as many harmful particles as if they stood all morning on a busy London road.
The danger comes from cooking a roast over several hours, with gas ovens pumping out nitrogen dioxide.
Those roasting chestnuts on an open fire, or even lighting their fire or wood-burner, could inhale wood smoke, which has been linked to premature death. .. Wood burners can cause smoke to be inhaled when lit, while it can also enter from a neighbour's home. In Denmark, emissions from wood-burning stoves are calculated to cause 400 premature deaths every year, while in London it accounts for between seven and nine per cent of winter-time particle pollution. December 2016. Updated air quality guidelines encourage Utah schools to keep children indoors on high pollution days. "New guidelines from the Utah Department of Health lower the bar for when students should be kept indoors due to poor air quality. "Their lungs are still developing," said Brittney Guerra, a specialist with the Utah Asthma Program. "They're a sensitive group." The new recommendations call for all students to be kept indoors when levels of fine particulate matter, or PM 2.5, reach 55.5 micrograms per cubic meter — enough to earn either a "red" or "purple" on the state's air quality color scale. "When particulate matter levels reach 35.5, or an "orange" air day, the department recommends indoor accommodations for students showing respiratory symptoms, like coughing or shortness of breath, and for students with asthma, chronic lung disease or other pre-existing respiratory conditions."
Five surprising ways to improve Utah's inversion pollution. 1. Quit burning things. “Wood burning is a much bigger issue than people realize,” said Brian Moench of Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment. “Most North American cities have as much of an air pollution problem related to wood burning as they do from vehicles.” December 2016. Newer woodstoves not an answer. "A few facts about air pollution, PM 2.5 is very detrimental to health. Woodstove emissions are made up of approximately 80 to 90 per cent PM 2.5.
"Wood burning accounts for 97 per cent of the PM2.5 emissions associated with heating in B.C. and only accounts for 10 per cent of heating needs. The three Purple Air monitors in Parksville have so far shown very high levels of pollution caused entirely from wood stoves. The fact is, even newer wood stoves produce more PM 2.5 per year then 1,000 cars ..." December 2016. Risking wellbeing in smoky Cowichan. "At the end of it all I was forced to sell my home and move away. I now live in Osoyoos and have not experienced a single asthmatic event in one-and-a-half winters.
"The single most responsible source of smoke in my neighborhood was wood burning stoves. I have shared pictures on just how bad the situation was. Persons looking to move into the area must be made aware of the risk they are placing on their wellbeing by moving into the Cowichan Valley."
November 2016. How does poor air quality impact the average person's health? Robert Paine (M.D.), Chief of The University of Utah Health Care Division of Pulmonary, says it all comes down to particulate matter 2.5, a mixture of dust, soot, and other harmful emissions poisoning Utah's air.
"If you were going to make a drug delivery system, you would make the particles 2.5 microns in size... That's the perfect size to get down into the lung, and get out into the part of the lung where oxygen and carbon dioxide are exchanged, and to come very close to the blood, which circulates through the rest of the body," Paine explained. Once inside the lungs, the particulates cause all kinds of problems. Besides the obvious effects like pulmonary complications, Paine says there is evidence poor air quality causes a decline in cognitive functioning. "For every 10 [micrograms per cubic meter] you raise [particulate matter 2.5], we get about 4 percent increase in the rate of heart attacks, so these are very significant numbers," Paine said. Good 4 Utah crews spotted a lot of people in downtown SLC wearing disposable surgical masks, but Paine says those are not very effective at filtering air. November 2016. Inconvenient truth about your wood-burning stove: They can be bad for the environment AND your health "at odds with its perceived green credentials — the wood-burning craze is posing a real danger to the environment, and to our health. Air quality experts say the stoves contribute to an ever-thickening cloud of smog engulfing our towns and cities, which is increasing the risk of cancer, lung disease, heart attack, stroke and even dementia." ...
"Just as the drive towards dirty diesel in the name of battling climate change turns out to have been an environmental disaster for air quality, so does the move towards wood burning. And it seems that only time will tell exactly how serious a toll it takes on our health."
November 2016. American Lung Association in California Cautions Against Wood-Burning and Urges Cleaner Alternatives for Winter Heat. "With the arrival of cooler temperatures, the American Lung Association in California is urging the public to avoid wood burning and to consider cleaner burning alternatives. Burning wood emits harmful toxins and fine particles into the air that can worsen asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)."
November 2016. Smoking a pack per day causes 150 mutations in every lung cell. Ludmil Alexandrov of Los Alamos National Laboratory in the United States explained that it had until now been difficult to explain how smoking increases the risk of cancer in parts of the body that don't come into direct contact with smoke. "Before now, we had a large body of epidemiological evidence linking smoking with cancer, but now we can actually observe and quantify the molecular changes in the DNA," he said.
The study found certain molecular fingerprints of DNA damage - called mutational signatures - in the smokers' DNA, and the scientists counted how many of these were in different tumors.In lung cells, they found that on average, smoking a pack of cigarettes a day led to 150 mutations in each cell every year. Each mutation is a potential start point for a "cascade of genetic damage" that can eventually lead to cancer, they said. The results also showed that a smoking a pack of cigarettes a day led to an average 97 mutations in each cell in the larynx, 39 mutations for the pharynx, 23 for the mouth, 18 for the bladder, and six mutations in every cell of the liver each year. Research paper, published in Science: Mutational signatures associated with tobacco smoking in human cancer. "Only cancers originating in tissues directly exposed to smoke showed a signature characteristic of the known tobacco (and woodsmoke) carcinogen benzo[a]pyrene." November 2016. NSW EPA Clean Air for NSW Consultation Submissions due: 20 Jan 2017. "In consultation with stakeholders and the wider community, it is proposed that the EPA will investigate further improvements to the wood heater regulatory framework for consideration by Government, as well as education, training and replacement programs."
November 2016. Wood smoke under fire in British Columbia. The Cowichan Valley Regional District released an extensive airshed protection strategy late last year, noting that hospital admissions for children with respiratory diseases were on average 70 per cent higher in the valley than the rest of B.C. between 1998 and 2012. Asthma rates were 14 per cent higher and chronic respiratory illness in people over 45 was 50 per cent higher. Officials have taken on the delicate task of encouraging municipalities within its boundaries to bring wood-burning bylaws in line with the City of Duncan, the most densely populated area in the region. Old stoves must be removed when a house is sold in Duncan and only up-to-date wood-burning appliances are allowed in new construction. No burning is allowed during an air quality advisory.
November 2016. PhD research: "Lifetime Evaluation of Biomass Burning Markers in Low Temperature Conditions." Stricter regulations have reduced emissions from cars and trucks, but emissions from residential wood stoves remain relatively uncontrolled. Clarkson University chemical engineering Ph.D. student Vikram Pratap is working to better understand how much pollution is generated by these stoves and how wood smoke evolves chemically and physically in the atmosphere. Pratap won a student poster award at the 2016 American Association for Aerosol Research Conference.
"In order to understand the impact of stoves on air pollution, we need to understand what kind of chemistry happens to the smoke after it is emitted from the chimney and it spends some time in the atmosphere," said Pratap's adviser, Assistant Professor Shunsuke Nakao. "Virtually all the previous studies have been done in room temperature conditions and not in winter conditions, when people are most likely to use stoves."
October 2016. Chile's Environment Minister unveils Air Quality Plan. Included is a total ban on wood heating in the Province of Santiago over the communes of San Bernardo and Puente Alto, standards stricter emission for the industry, a low emission zone for lorries and between May and August, a vehicle restriction permanent for vehicles registered before September 1, 2011 green seal and the vehicular restriction on motorcycles registered before September 1, 2010.
“Wood smoke from the (San Francisco) Bay Area’s 1.4 million fireplaces and wood stoves continues to be the largest source of wintertime air pollution in the region,” said Jack Broadbent, executive officer of the Air District. “The Air District’s more stringent amendments to our wood-burning rule serve to further protect public health from wood smoke pollution.”
1. Anyone whose sole source of heat is a wood-burning device must use an EPA-certified or pellet-fueled device that is registered with the Air District to qualify for an exemption. An open-hearth fireplace will no longer qualify for an exemption. 2. Bay Area residents who begin a chimney or fireplace remodeling project that costs over $15,000 and requires a building permit will be allowed to install only a gas-fueled, electric or EPA-certified device. 3. No wood-burning devices of any kind may be installed in new homes or buildings being constructed in the Bay Area. September 2016. The key to tackling climate change: electrify everything.
"Tackling climate change is a complicated undertaking, to say the least. But here’s a good rule of thumb for how to get started:
Electrify everything. The need for electrification is well understood by climate and energy experts, but I’m not sure it has filtered down to the public yet...We know, or at least have a pretty good idea, how to get electricity down to zero carbon ... The same cannot yet be said of combustion fuels, which are increasingly out of place in the modern world". September 2016. Pollution particles 'get into brain'. New research provides the first evidence that minute particles of what is called magnetite, which can be derived from pollution, can find their way into the brain. The lead author of the research paper, Prof Barbara Maher, has previously identified magnetite particles in samples of air gathered beside a busy road in Lancaster and outside a power station ... While large particles of pollution such as soot can be trapped inside the nose, smaller types can enter the lungs and even smaller ones can cross into the bloodstream. But nanoscale particles of magnetite are believed to be small enough to pass from the nose into the olfactory bulb and then via the nervous system into the frontal cortex of the brain. "These particles are made out of iron and iron is very reactive so it's almost certainly going to do some damage to the brain. It's involved in producing very reactive molecules called reaction oxygen species which produce oxidative damage and that's very well defined.
"We already know oxidative damage contributes to brain damage in Alzheimer's patients so if you've got iron in the brain it's very likely to do some damage. It can't be benign." See also the research paper (published January 2016) showing that increased exposure of just 1 ug/m3 PM2.5 increased the risk of dementia by 8%, Alzheimer's by 15% and the risk of Parkinson’s diseases by 8% Increased exposure of 3.5 ug/m3 reduced the volume of white matter in the brain by 6.2 cubic centimeters. Toxic air pollution particles found in human brains “What this is pointing towards perhaps is there needs to be a major shift in policy and an attempt to reduce the particulate matter burden on human health.” Maher said. “The more you realise the impact this is having, the more urgent and important it is to reduce the concentrations in the atmosphere.”
August 2016. Rebates for non-polluting heating snapped up in a day. Bay Area homeowners are eligible to seek rebates from $750 to $12,000 per home to replace wood-burning fireplaces and stoves with gas or electric heating devices such as fireplace inserts, heat pumps, or gas stoves. The region’s air pollution agency starting taking applications for the rebates at 10 a.m. Friday, and all the money was spoken for by the end of the day as more than 2,000 people applied. August 2016. 1,500 fewer wood heaters in the San Francisco Bay Area. Money will be available starting Friday morning for roughly 1,500 Bay Area homeowners and landlords to help them upgrade their wood-burning heating devices with cleaner ones to reduce winter air pollution, officials with the Bay Area Air Quality Management District said today. “This program is really about removing wood burning devices from our region,” Flannigan said. The cleaner devices are designed to be the home’s chief heating source.
The air district’s board approved $3 million for the program. Funding for a project can range from $750 to $12,000 depending on the type of device, air district officials said. Groups that are considered heavily impacted such as low-income households and people living in rural areas where natural gas is not available are eligible for additional money. August 2016. US EPA - $4.5 Million to help develop low-cost air pollution sensor technology. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced grants to six research organizations to develop and use low-cost air pollution sensor technology, while engaging communities to learn about their local air quality.
“Through these projects, scientists and communities will join together to develop and test new low-cost, portable, easy-to-use ways to measure air pollution,” said Thomas A. Burke, EPA science advisor and deputy assistant administrator of EPA’s Office of Research and Development. “This research will provide tools communities can use to understand air pollution in their neighborhoods and improve public health.” While recent advances in technology have led to the development of low-cost air pollution sensors, they have not been widely tested, especially under field conditions. These grants will help fund research projects that explore how scientific data can be effectively gathered and used by communities to learn about local air quality. August 2016. The dangers of dirty air need to be made much more transparent to city-dwellers.  Official air quality indices focus on the immediate risks to health, which for most people are serious only when the air is almost unbreathable. It is all too easy for people to take the short-term index, which says “low pollution” most of the time, as a proxy for their lifelong risks. Easy, and wrong. A dependable long-term air-quality index, similar in design to existing short-term gauges, is needed in the world’s big cities. That would educate policymakers and voters about the nature of the problem. It would help doctors dispense routine advice to pregnant women, children and other more vulnerable people on how to reduce exposure to pollution. And it would enable the development of apps and products that can deliver practical advice to everyone. Reducing air pollution may take lots of money, time and compromises. But telling people just how bad pollution is for them and how to avoid it is easy, uncontroversial and cheap. Not everyone will heed the advice (for proof, look no further than the sunburnt arms and faces on an English summer day). But even if a minority do, thousands of people in every big city will live longer, healthier lives. August 2016. Pollution may shorten lung cancer patients' lives. Air pollution may shorten the life of people who are suffering from lung cancer, researchers have found. The findings, which add to growing evidence about the health impact of airborne toxins, show that those diagnosed with early-stage lung cancer are most at risk of an early death. That applies in particular to people with adenocarcinoma, the commonest form on non-small cell lung cancer, which accounts for 80% of cases of the disease.
The findings come from US medical research that examined the health outcomes until late 2011 of 352,000 people in California who were diagnosed with lung cancer between 1988 and 2009. Those with early stage lung cancer survived for an average of 3.6 years, but that fell to 2.4 years for those who had been exposed to high levels of particulate matter. August 2016. Tasmanian Government to offer no-interest loans to households & small businesses to improve energy efficiency, and has set aside $10 million to fund the scheme. "We want it to extend to solar including solar hot water, but it will apply to other appliances including for example a heat pump". August 2016. Singleton residents urged to reduce their woodsmoke emissions Singleton Council and Muswellbrook Shire Council are on the lookout for any smoky chimneys in the local area. Emitting excessive smoke from your chimney is unlawful. Residents found to be emitting excessive smoke will be provided with educational material and /or a warning letter.
However, ongoing or serious breaches may result in the issue of a smoke abatement notice or a $200 fine.
August 2016.
Three environmental groups intend to sue the Environmental Protection Agency for not enforcing federal air pollution law in Fairbanks.
Six years after the Fairbanks North Star Borough was designated as non-compliant because of unhealthy fine particulate, federal law requires the EPA to declare the borough a “serious non-attainment area.”
State environmental officials who created cleanup plans for Fairbanks air pollution, now designated as “moderate,” likely would have to consider stronger controls, said Kenta Tsuda, an attorney for Earthjustice, an environmental law firm. .... A Fairbanks pulmonologist who advocates for a cleanup plan, Dr. Owen Hanley, said in the announcement that there are few areas in medicine where the cause of illness is so well established. “It is inexcusable that the vulnerable must repeatedly petition their government for safe air,” he said. The groups in June sued the EPA to force an agency decision on whether to accept a state plan to reduce unhealthy fine particulate produced by wood stoves and other sources. The groups claim the plan is flawed and should be rejected because it anticipates that most homes will transition from wood heat to natural gas in the near future. The current plan also does not include control measures used elsewhere such as firewood dryness certification programs for firewood or taxes and other disincentives to discourage the resale of used, inefficient wood stoves, Tsuda said. A 60-day notice is required before the agency can be sued. August 2016. Utah Air quality advocates push for statewide reform and want grassroots campaign to counter better-funded lobbyists and industry interests. Air quality advocates say their voices are often drowned out at the state Legislature by better-funded lobbyists for industry interests. That’s why they want to see more citizens stepping up ... “There is no safe level of air pollution. Every little bit of air pollution will have an impact,” Moench said. Some of those impacts — like cancer, reduced IQs in children and scarred lungs — sound scary. Residents throughout the state can take charge, improving air quality through their houses and habits. ... And while it’s been a controversial topic in recent years, Griffee said eliminating wood-burning can have drastic impacts on a home’s pollution footprint. “It penetrates really easily into neighbor’s homes, and it’s really toxic,” Griffee said. “It’s about being a good neighbor and making good choices for your community.” August 2016. Missoula satisfies air quality standards. Montana Department of Environmental Quality formally asked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to declare Missoula in compliance with national air quality standards.Over the past two decades, city and county officials passed rules prohibiting installation of wood-burning stoves and heaters in the valley, reduced the amount and kinds of traction sand applied to icy roads and stepped up cleaning efforts to remove sand after the ice had melted. Those sources made up about 92 percent of the PM-10 pollution.
 July 2016. Talk by Dr Fay Johnston 'Interventions to reduce the public health impacts of wood smoke. Stories from Tasmania' presented at the International Wood Smoke Researchers Network. Dr Johnston's talk contrasted the benefits achieved in Launceston - reduced wintertime deaths from respiratory disease by 28% and cardiovascular disease by 20% - with the lack of benefits from more recent initiatives such as education to persuade people to operate heaters correctly and supplying SmartBurn catalysts.
July 2016. Trees home to critically endangered swift parrot illegally cut down for firewood. Illegal firewood collectors in Tasmania have cut down trees that are the home of the critically endangered swift parrot.
Scientists estimate the bird could be wiped out within 16 years. There are fewer than 2,000 parrots left and the trees that have been cut down contain hollows that the swift have been nesting in. July 2016. Did early campfires trigger the emergence of tuberculosis? Fire brought warmth and comfort to early humans but may also have triggered the emergence of deadly tuberculosis, Australian researchers suggest.
Smoke-damaged lungs, as well as the closeness of humans around a campfire, could have created the ideal conditions for tuberculosis to mutate from a harmless soil bacterium into our number one bacterial killer, according to the researchers' data model. The model, published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, showed controlled use of fire would have increased the likelihood of tuberculosis emerging by several orders of magnitude. June 2016. The public health risks of air pollution: Interview with Kirk Smith, director of the Global Health and Environment Program at the School of Public Health at the University of California at Berkeley, discusses wood burning stoves: June 2016. Air pollution major contributor to stroke. “In an unprecedented survey of global risk factors for stroke, air pollution in the form of fine particulate matter ranked seventh in terms of its impact on healthy lifespan, while household air pollution from burning solid fuels ranked eighth.....The most alarming finding was that about a third of the burden of stroke is attributable to air pollution. Although air pollution is known to damage the lungs, heart, and brain, the extent of this threat seems to have been underestimated,” they write. “Air pollution is not just a problem in big cities, but is also a global problem. With the ceaseless air streams across oceans and continents, what happens in Beijing matters in Berlin.” See also the research paper published in the Lancet which shows that in developed countries the increased risk from outdoor air pollution (10.2%) is comparable to that from lack of exercise (11.2%) and much higher than the risk from passive smoking (1.5%). Current standards are nowhere near adequate. In the USA, a Harvard University study showed that the harmful effects of outdoor pollution were observed even in areas where concentrations were less than a third of the current standard set by the US EPA.
June 2016. Research paper investigating what type of air pollution is associated with the greatest increase in visits to hospital emergency departments for lung diseases. "Across four US cities, among the primary PM2.5 sources assessed, biomass burning PM2.5 was most strongly associated with respiratory health."
June 2016. Delta wants more done on wood burning. "It occurred to me we seem to make a great to-do about diesel engines and other industries polluting, and yet, wood smoke, which is originating in the Lower Mainland, is the number one source of particulate in the region," said Mayor Lois Jackson.
June 2016. Father and condo owner wins human rights battle to protect his family from second-hand smoke
“I filed a human rights complaint. They can take months, even years, to process, but luckily just as we were beginning to lose hope, the Human Rights Tribunal contacted me and with their help, we forged a path toward resolution. It began with mediation, and ultimately led to the owners voting to make our complex 100% smoke-free.”
"Since the building has become smoke-free a lot of neighbours have approached me personally and thanked me for speaking up. Some were suffering from second-hand smoke issues in silence, afraid to say anything," added Paulo mentioning how valuable he found the smokefreehousingbc.ca website.
June 2016. 10 MW of wind power might help disperse NZ's woodsmoke - but might be noisy and cost more than a switch to non-polluting heating! If the significant energy inputs (10 MW or more) were instead be used to power 10,000 heat pumps, all the polluting wood burners could be replaced (as recommended by the UN Environment Program and the World Meteorological Organization), resulting in no pollution and substantially less greenhouse gas emissions! Otago Regional Council explored "novel methods" to reduce PM10 concentrations, including wind machines to "modify" the inversion and disperse the polluting particles.A total of 58 machines would need to be installed across the entire area in Alexandra needing intervention, with "moderate" effects, the report says.
"There are several complications to the use of wind machines for PM10 intervention. Wind machines are not able to operate in supercooled fog as there is the potential for severe damage to the machine due to ice buildup on the blades. This could limit operation on cold nights, which typically lead to high PM10 concentrations. In addition, because wind machines have only been investigated for use in agricultural settings, it is uncertain how effective wind machines would be at modifying inversion characteristics in the complex surface environment of an urban area."
The machines were also noisy so could cause a "significant problem" with getting consent. Each of scheme assessed, would require significant energy inputs (on the order of 10 MW or more) and would need to be run continuously during periods of strong inversions and resultant periods of limited dispersion - conditions typical of Alexandra winter nights, he said.
See also: Central Otago’s proposed Plan B is laughable. June 2016. Barbecues make popular London park 'more polluted than city streets'. "Concerned residents and Islington Council both sought the help of experts at King’s College London for monitoring equipment to test levels of PM2.5, fine particulate matter that can increase the risks of heart attacks and strokes in those that inhale it.
In a report, produced using readings taken by residents last summer, experts at the university’s BreatheLondon Project concluded that “residents are experiencing elevated levels of PM2.5 due to barbecues”. There were “extremely high levels” recorded in close proximity of the lit barbeques, but also “some evidence of elevated concentrations” inside nearby homes.
Residents have also obtained an earlier draft of the report, which they say is even more damning. This concluded: “Mean concentrations recorded over the whole monitoring period were higher in Highbury Fields than even at the kerbside of a busy London trunk route.” April 2016. Fairbanks residents notify EPA of intent to sue for further delay in addressing dirty air. Citizens for Clean Air, Alaska Community Action on Toxics, and the Sierra Club sent a letter calling on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to meet its obligation under the law to approve or disapprove a plan submitted last year by the State of Alaska to address air pollution in Fairbanks. The letter, submitted by environmental law firm Earthjustice’s Alaska office, notified EPA of the community groups’ intent to sue if EPA does not act in 60 days. The groups were already forced to sue EPA once, in April 2014, to move the state planning process for cleaning Fairbank’s air forward. This helped prompt the State of Alaska to submit an overdue plan to address air pollution to EPA in the end of January 2015. But EPA has now missed the next deadline required by law—to approve or disapprove the State’s plan. That deadline passed on February 18 of this year. The groups are now seeking to compel the agency to perform its duty under the Clean Air Act to make a decision on the plan, an important next step in addressing air pollution in the Fairbanks North Star Borough.
Dr. Jeanne Olson, North Pole veterinarian: “Heavy smoke chronically inundates a group of area neighborhoods so consistently that it has been nicknamed ‘the Rectangle of Death.’ We are not asking for special treatment. We are merely insisting that our government follows the law established to protect our citizens from poisons in the air we need to breathe.”
Patrice Lee, Citizens for Clean Air: "Bad air affects us; often we only realize once we’re really sick or it’s too late. Fairbanks has needed to clean-up our air for over eight years. The EPA must do its job: enforce the Clean Air Act. One hundred thousand children, women, and men (and too many pets to count) in the Fairbanks North Star Borough Non-Attainment Area are counting on it.” April 2016. Lessons from Los Angeles: Fighting pollution helps children. "Despite doubling its population, Los Angles, Orange, San Bernardino and Riverside counties saw decreases in the following pollutants over 20 years: • 47 percent in PM2.5 • 49 percent in nitrogen oxides • 35 percent in PM10 • 12 percent in ozone
Researchers tracked 4,602 children in eight distinct communities in three groups as they aged from 5 to 18 and looked at children with asthma and those without. They also factored in race, exposure to secondhand smoke, and socio-economic demographics.
What they found is the decrease in fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, was correspondingly accompanied by a 32 percent decrease in bronchitic symptoms experienced by children with asthma. For those without asthma, there was a 21 percent reduction in respiratory problems."
Research paper (JAMA): Association of Changes in Air Quality With Bronchitic Symptoms in Children in California, 1993-2012. April 2016. Clean air advocacy group addresses regional district. Annual State of the Air reports by the BC Lung Association also show that, of 40 communities measured in the province, Courtenay is one of the five worst for fine particulate pollution. BC’s Healthlink states that “particulate matter is considered the air pollutant of greatest concern to human health in B.C.” In the Comox Valley, wood smoke is the source of high particulate readings.
In addition to fine particulates, wood smoke contains many of the same toxic chemicals as cigarettes. BC Lung Association materials note that wood smoke contains volatile organic compounds such as furans, dioxins, benzene, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons that are carcinogenic. It also contains harmful formaldehyde and nitrogen oxides. “Breathing in so many fine particulates can affect the development of children’s lungs, increase respiratory infections, increase the risk of heart attacks and much more. And 50-70 per cent of what’s outside, gets inside a house,” said Ellis. “Additionally, one fireplace burning 10 pounds of wood in an hour will produce almost as many carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) as 3,000 packs of cigarettes.” April 2016. Nobel prizewinner, renowned climate scientist and sustainability expert call for immediate action to reduce greenhouse super-pollutants to stave off climate calamity.
Nobel prize-winning scientist Mario Molina joins discoverer of the greenhouse effect of halocarbons, V. Ramanathan, and the president of the Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development, Durwood Zaelke, in calling for immediate action to cut four super-pollutants, which could make the difference between a reasonably safe climate and one that carries staggering human and financial costs.
"All countries must keep their commitments to pursue aggressive cuts to carbon dioxide under the Paris Agreement. Yet even under full implementation, global temperatures will increase between about 4.5 and 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit, far above the 3.6-degree guard rail. The best and fastest way to prevent immediate climate destabilization lies in cutting back on emissions of super pollutants that make outsize contributions to warming despite the fact that they are produced in much smaller quantities than carbon dioxide. They include ground-level ozone and black carbon soot, from sources such as power plants and diesel engines, as well as methane (often from natural gas systems and agriculture) and hydrofluorocarbon refrigerants (HFCs) in air conditioning and other systems.
"Cutting carbon dioxide emissions remains imperative, and cannot be delayed. Yet the parallel strategy of reducing super pollutants is perhaps even more important to avert disastrous consequences in the near-term." March 2016. Bay Area landlords real estate agents required to disclose the health hazards of wood smoke. "Beginning June 1, anyone selling or leasing residential property within the Bay Area will be required to disclose the health hazards of wood smoke, as part of the signed disclosure documents in real estate purchase or rental transactions."
March 2016. Air pollution not just bad for your lungs. Exposure to air pollution for just a month or two may still be enough to increase the risk of developing diabetes, especially for obese people, a recent U.S. study suggests. ... It’s possible that air pollution causes inflammation in the body, which triggers a chain reaction that makes it harder for people to process blood sugar, said senior study author Dr. Frank Gilliland, director of the Southern California Environmental Health Sciences Center and researcher at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles ... PM 2.5 exposure was significantly associated with diabetes risk factors, with an effect equivalent to that of obesity ... Indoors, people should use what’s known as a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter on furnaces or air conditioning units, or buy stand-alone units for bedrooms, Jerrett said. These mechanical filters force air through a fine mesh that can trap harmful pollutants, but there’s a limit to how much individuals can do, he said. “Air pollution is an involuntary risk factor,” Jerrett said. “We all breathe the air, and this should create a stronger incentive for government to take action to reduce emissions that lead to air pollution.”
March 2016. Every breath we take: the lifelong impact of air pollution. "Each year in the UK, around 40,000 deaths are attributable to exposure to outdoor air pollution which plays a role in many of the major health challenges of our day. It has been linked to cancer, asthma, stroke and heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and changes linked to dementia. The health problems resulting from exposure to air pollution have a high cost to people who suffer from illness and premature death, to our health services and to business. In the UK, these costs add up to more than £20 billion every year.
Extract from the report by the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health:
"The increasing popularity of wood burning for heating, in part due to policies to reduce CO2 emissions, risks undoing some of the air quality improvements that have resulted from widespread adoption of gas for domestic heating. Particles from wood burning can now be found each winter in our urban air, mainly at weekends, with wood burning accounting for between 7 and 9% of London’s wintertime particle pollution.[27] Studies have shown that smoke from wood heating enters neighbouring homes, providing a clear exposure pathway.[28,29]" March 2016. Tacoma's winter pollution: 53% wood smoke, 5% diesel. "our wood smoke study (TNT, 3-4) was focused on the total health risks of fine-particulate matter, of which diesel is not the largest contributor in the winter months. In fact, 53 percent of this pollution comes from wood smoke and only 5 percent comes from diesel.
"Second, contrary to popular belief, wood-burning might be carbon neutral only if replacement trees are planted. In fact, wood-burning might be far more harmful for climate change than the writer thinks. "Burning wood emits more carbon dioxide (per unit of energy) than coal or natural gas. If the climate change goal is to immediately start to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide and particulate matter being emitted, it is better not to burn wood but instead to use it as a carbon sink by letting it quietly rot in the ground." Robin Evans-Agnew, Chris Eberhardt, Tacoma (Lead researchers of the wood smoke study project). March 2016. "Tens of thousands of people are dying every year because repeated warnings about the dangers of diesel cars and wood-burning for heating were ignored by successive governments trying to make Britain ‘greener’, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. "Ironically, the policies have only made our air dirtier. They are accused of triggering a ‘public health disaster’, with the huge shift to diesel vehicles to try to cut greenhouse gas emissions denounced as a ‘con’.
"Last week, a devastating official report said the drive for diesel and wood-burning are directly responsible for needlessly high incidences of a shocking list of conditions including diabetes, autism, lung cancer, cardiovascular disease, learning difficulties, asthma, low birth weight and kidney disease." March 2016. Taxing wood-burning stoves could save lives and money. A tax on wood-burning stoves could save 300 lives a year and save society nearly 6 billion kroner annually in environmental costs, according to research by the environmental economic council Miljøøkonomiske Råd. Measuring stove use would be done by installing a gauge in the chimney that would measure the number of hours the stove was in use. March 2016. Mom calls for ban on outdoor fires in Saskatoon. "Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal all ban outdoor fires in urban areas, generally citing air quality concerns. In those cities, barbecues are still permitted, and there are permits available for fires on special or religious occasions.
"Jill Hubick, a registered nurse with the Lung Association of Saskatchewan, said wood smoke contains many potential irritants and carcinogens. As such, she said the association would like to see outdoor burning banned in residential areas. She said it's generally not good enough to simply expect people with lung conditions to remain indoors. "Smoke doesn't have any boundaries. Even if you close your windows and close your doors and go inside - it's going to seep into the individual's home," she said. "With one-in-three people in Saskatchewan expected to be affected by a lung condition in their lifetime, Hubick said the issue is big enough that the Lung Association has started a coalition to push for a ban." March 2016. Is your football team playing badly? It may be air pollution. "In almost half of the matches covered (44%), the level ranged between 20 and 50 micrograms per cubic metre, the latter figure being the European Union regulation threshold for particulate pollution. This threshold was exceeded in 7% of the matches .... The economists found that player performance was impeded by pollution even at levels well below these health limits. And at high levels – above the EU threshold – there was a significantly noticeable decline equivalent in performance, by as much as 16%."
Feb 2016. Is your wood burner killing you? Smoke from stove linked to deadly cancers, asthma and diabetes. The much loved home wood burners are contributing towards air pollution that is killing around 40,000 people per year. Diseases such as asthma, cancer and diabetes have all been linked to illnesses invoked by the harmful pollution that is released from the burners.
The health impacts of pollutants found outside the home such as those from vehicle exhausts, are widely known to cause at least 40,000 early deaths a year in the UK. Close to 10 per cent of wintertime particle pollution created in London comes from wood burning and the fumes also spread to neighbouring houses. The Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health released the report on air pollution. While experts at the University of Southampton and Queen Mary University of London claimed that wood burning was a 'concern' when looking at future energy demands. They wrote: "[Wood burning in fires and stoves] liberates significant amounts of particulate pollution into the outdoor air." Feb 2016. Bay Area pollution regulators will offer homeowners thousands of dollars to replace old wood fireplaces and stoves with cleaner heating devices such as gas fire logs.
Feb 2016. Recipient of first pollution ticket was using new wood stove obtained under a woodstove replacement program - apt demonstration that new stoves also cause unacceptable pollution and that the only effective way to reduce the health damage from air pollution is to provide subsidies only to people who replace wood stoves (old or new) with non-polluting heating.
Feb 2016. The truth about London's air pollution. "Awareness of the invisible problem is vital, says Barratt: “If you have awareness and concern then people are more likely to accept political strategies which will infringe upon their lives. If politicians come along and say they are going to restrict diesels in their city but the population doesn’t believe there is a problem, they will say no.” ... “The life-shortening effects of air pollution are equivalent if not greater than the risks of inactivity and obesity and alcoholism,” he says. “They should be in that bundle.”
See also: Pollutionwatch: Please don’t keep the home fires burning Between Christmas and New Year traffic pollution declined in the early evening, but airborne particles continued to increase until just before midnight, indicative of smoke from household fires. This was especially apparent across the south in Bristol, Eastbourne, Oxford and Reading and also in Cardiff, Southampton and parts of London. In Eastbourne particle concentrations quadrupled each evening; in Bristol they increased by more than five times. Domestic wood burning takes place where people live, at the times when everyone else is at home. Even modest wood burning in densely populated areas can lead to harmful pollution exposures comparable to those from traffic. Home wood burning needs to be addressed before more people invest in stoves or make open fires a feature in their living rooms. Jan 2016. www.cantechletter.com/2016/01/air-pollution-and-autoimmune-disease-linked-says-canadian-study A new Canadian study suggests a link between air pollution and autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. Researchers analyzed demographic data from Alberta and Quebec over roughly a 20 year period to search for correlations between ambient pollution levels in certain areas of each province and medical records of people in those areas suffering from autoimmune rheumatic diseases. The results confirmed a correlation. “Our data suggest that fine particulate (PM2.5) exposure may be associated with an increased risk of systemic autoimmune diseases (SARDs),” the study’s authors write. Jan 2016.To ease pollution and protect health consider alternatives to burning wood for heat. ... The agency recommends that good neighbors eliminate or limit the amount of wood smoke they produce. “Most wood heaters, such as woodstoves and fireplaces, release far more air pollution, indoors and out, than heaters using other fuels,” it stated. “In winter, when people heat their homes the most, cold nights with little wind cause smoke and air pollutants to remain stagnate at ground level for long periods.” In families where individuals suffer from chronic or repeated respiratory problems, like asthma or emphysema, or have heart disease, wood should not be burned at all. Jan 2016. UK: 2.4 times more PM2.5 pollution from domestic wood burning than traffic. "Revised figures show domestic wood burning to be the UK’s largest single source of PM2.5 emissions, 2.4 times greater than all PM2.5 emissions from traffic ... The sooner policymakers recognize the disproportionate contribution of wood stoves to PM2.5 pollution (a tiny minority of UK households using wood stoves emit over twice as much PM2.5 as all the UK’s cars, trucks and buses), recognize the disproportionate health costs – thousands of pounds per wood stove per year – and consequently heed the UNEP/WMO recommendation to phase our log-burning stoves in developed countries, the better it will be for our health and the health of our planet."
January 2016. Log fires or traffic fumes: what's the real cause of Bergen's air pollution? The air quality in Norway’s second largest city, Bergen, grew so bad earlier this month that the council surprised residents by introducing a week-long, alternate-day plan for private vehicles. But the reality is rather different: new research shows that in Norway, the burning of logs in homes is a far bigger contributor to the problem than traffic – and more damaging to residents’ health. Recently, the Norwegian Institute for Air Research (NILU) published statistics showing that “particulate matter from log burning in cities is more dangerous than pollution from traffic”. Research by Statistics Norway (SSB), meanwhile, concluded that 61% of the particulate matter in Norway’s air stems from its 1.7 million existing log fires, compared to 39% from private vehicles, buses and lorries.
January 2016. Metro Vancouver plans wood burning crackdown. "Wood fireplace owners who smoke up the neighbourhood may be in for a fight with Metro Vancouver. Air quality planners at the regional district will propose to gradually restrict wood burning in the region to reduce the health hazard posed by fine particulate. ...
"Most new fireplaces being installed are natural gas or electric rather than wood, but Metro staff are also contemplating whether to recommend building code and municipal bylaws ban wood ones entirely. "Should there be any wood-burning fireplaces in new construction at all? We feel there shouldn't be," Quan said.
"Public awareness is also part of the strategy. Metro now issues air quality bulletins for wood smoke when cold stagnant air is expected to produce smoky conditions. The first bulletin was issued in late November." 1 January 2016. Summary of PM2.5 measurements in 2015.
 Muswellbrook had 3 exceedances of the PM2.5 standard, all in winter:
14/6/15 31.2, 21/7/15 27.3, 22/7/15 26.7. The highest number of exceedances of the PM2.5 standard in NSW in 2015 was, Armidale, where woodsmoke pollution resulted in 34 days > 25 ug/m3:
24/5/15 35, 25/5/15 27, 3/6/15 33, 4/6/15 27, 6/6/15 26, 8/6/15 33, 21/6/15 49, 22/6/15 50, 23/6/15 36, 24/6/15 38, 25/6/15 26, 28/6/15 28, 16/7/15 26, 28/7/15 31, 29/7/15 28, 1/8/15 33, 2/8/15 30, 11/8/15 28, 15/8/15 35, 16/8/15 46, 17/8/15 31, 26/8/15 34, 27/8/15 26, 28/8/15 51, 29/8/15 64, 30/8/15 59, 31/8/15 35, 1/9/15 26, 4/9/15 26, 5/9/15 28, 6/9/15 31, 7/9/15 30, 12/9/15 26, 15/9/15 26)  Other locations that exceeded the PM2.5 standard were:
Stockton:3 27/6/15 27, 4/7/15 27.4, 5/7/15 30.9
Liverpool 2: 7/6/15 30.2, 21/8/15 32.2
Mayfield 2: 22/8/15 27.7, 20/12/15 30.2
Earlwood 2: 30/6/15 25.1 21/8/15 28.0
Carrington 1: 22/8/15 30.7
Rozelle 1: 21/8/15 33.4
Chullora 1: 21/8/15 37.2
Newcastle 1: 22/8/15 28.4
Beresfield 1: 21/8/15 25.9
Wollongong 1: 21/8/15 31.6
Locations with no measurements above 25 ug/m3: Wyong 0, Wallsend 0, Richmond 0, Singleton 0, Camberwell 0, Wagga 0, Camden 0. January 2016. How Do You Fight The World's 'Largest Environmental Health Problem'? Harness The Sun. Every day, nearly half the people in the world prepare their meals over burning wood, charcoal or animal dung. And every year, more than 4 million people -- most of them women and children -- die prematurely from the resulting household smoke. The practice also contributes to deforestation and climate change. Cooking with energy from the sun could soon put a major dent in what some experts call the world's greatest environmental health issue. January 2016. 1st ‘Spare the Air' alert of the season called; wood-burning prohibited Appeal to Australian Environment Ministers Meeting, 15 Dec 2015: Save 700 lives a year by cleaning up air and woodsmoke pollution Although a 6 ug/m3 standard would avoid the premature deaths of at least 700 Australians per year, the NSW EPA said that much of the pollution they were measuring at the Richmond & Liverpool sites, Sydney was from wood burning and it might be difficult to tighten PM2.5 standards. December 2015. UK domestic wood burning emits 2.3 times more PM2.5 than traffic! The UK's Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs' statistical release 'Emissions of air pollutants in the UK, 1970 to 2014' reports that domestic wood burning emitted 35,900 tonnes of PM2.5 in 2013, 2.4 times as much as all PM2.5 from traffic. Above average winter temperatures in 2014 resulted in a slightly lower at 34,000 tonnes, 2.3 times as much as traffic's PM2.5. Although the report does not explain the massive upward revision in PM2.5 emissions from domestic wood burning, it seems likely that real-life emissions from wood burning stove have been found to be much higher than previously thought. With 38,700 premature deaths attributed to PM2.5 pollution in the UK and domestic wood burning responsible for over twice as many PM2.5 in the UK as all cars, trucks and buses, the best option for UK residents would be to phase out log-burning stoves to improve health, reduce air pollution and reduce global warming. December 2015. Doctor’s Orders: Wood Burning Hazardous to Your Health. "Here is a brief message to share with your wood burning neighbors. If you are not a smoker, burning wood is probably the greatest threat to your own health of anything that you can do. But it is also a threat to your children and your neighbors, as inappropriate and intolerable as blowing cigarette smoke in their faces all winter long. Your neighbors are less than enthusiastic about sacrificing their health for your freedom to burn wood. Living in a civilized society means they shouldn’t have to."
December 2015. Italy: Town bans pizza-making over soaring pollution. An edict issued by the mayor of San Vitaliano, just outside of Naples, bans the use of wood-fired stoves in bakeries and eateries including pizzerias unless their owners install special filters to reduce air pollution. Bad air quality is a longstanding problem for San Vitaliano. According to Il Mattino newspaper, it is more polluted than Beijing, while nearby Naples - usually seen as one of Italy's worst offenders in terms of air quality - seems like "a perfumed garden" in comparison. In 2015, San Vitaliano exceeded the threshold for emissions 114 times, compared to 86 times in Milan, another badly polluted Italian city, the paper says. December 2015. Odd or even? Not trucks, not cars, studies blame wood smoke and power plants as top polluters. NEW DELHI: Less than a fortnight before the odd-even formula for private cars is implemented in Delhi to curb pollution levels in the city, three studies have found that the actual culprit in winters is not vehicular emissions.
Two reports — one by former faculty members of Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, and the other by US, Indian and University of Birmingham researchers — said wood smoke is the prime contributor to the presence of PM 2.5 — fine particles with a width of 2.5 .
December 2015. Agreed Statement, Environment Ministers Meeting. Ministers agreed to measures to reduce air pollution from wood heaters, including the adoption of new emission and efficiency standards for new wood heaters and sharing best management practices across jurisdictions. This approach encourages innovation and sharing of cost effective approaches and allows each jurisdiction to tailor actions for local conditions and priorities.
December 2015. COMMENT: Air pollution is now the invisible killer. Mehreen Faruki, Newcastle Herald. Poor air quality is costing us our lives, health and money. It is responsible for 3000 Australians’ deaths and costs more than $5 billion every year. Some of the worst culprits include wood fire heaters which produce the majority of Sydney’s fine particle pollution during winter
 December 2015. Air quality in Europe — 2015 report, European Environment Agency. Table 9.2 (left, click to enlarge) show an estimated 37,800 premature deaths from PM2.5 pollution in the UK, nearly 3 times as many as the 14,100 from NO2 pollution. UK traffic pollution is decreasing, but wood stove pollution (responsible for 17% of PM2.5 emissions, compared to 18% from traffic) is increasing. Tackling this major source of PM2.5 pollution, e.g. by following the UN Environment Program recommendation to phase out log-burning stoves in developed countries, would be one of quickest and most cost-effective way to prevent deaths from air pollution in the UK.
December 2015. Where there's smoke, there may be bronchitis. Smokers and nonsmokers around wood smoke were 9 percent more likely to have trouble breathing — and specifically 11 percent more likely to suffer bronchitis symptoms. "The effect is all the more worrisome given that COPD is the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S ... The important lesson is that the adverse respiratory effects exist in residences of rural mountainous communities across the United States,” said Dr. Akshay. “Before we thought that COPD was just (from) cigarette smoke, but now we can see that it’s really quite something more.” “We were surprised by the strength of the association, which was largely comparable to the effect size seen in developing countries,” Dr. Akshay added. “Our study was done in Albuquerque and surrounding communities and our suspicion is that wood smoke is higher in rural communities and mountainous locations, such as the Rocky Mountain Belt and Appalachia.
December 2015. Wood smoke presents major health hazard. Jennifer Lawson of the Cowichan Fresh Air Team said, “Wood smoke is like tobacco smoke; there is no safe level for wood smoke.” Later she added, “Breathing wood smoke is smoking, we need legislative change.” She called for bylaws that would disallow fire places or wood stoves in new homes, or from being installed in existing homes, and ban outdoor burning.
Commenting on a suggestion that instead of an exchange program swapping old wood stoves for new units, North Cowichan should look at a program that would encourage switch overs to new, clean technologies like heat pumps, Mayor Jon Lefebure said his stance is changing. “I have come to the point where I agree with Ms. Lawson that I don’t feel good when we exchange an old wood stove for a new wood stove,” he said.
November 2015. $10 stove responds to wood smoke’s risks. In 2013 Carlos Glatt became a first-hand witness to the harmful effects of cooking with firewood. He was part of a group of volunteers distributing food to the victims and survivors of Hurricanes Ingrid and Manuel in the state of Guerrero.
Touched by the case of a 14-year-old teen with “lung pain,” Glatt decided to design a greener alternative to the wood stove. His product, called La Estufita GlattStove, or the Little GlattStove, looks like a large can and is fueled by a liquid, natural gas-based fuel that, Glatt claims, pollutes less than wood and even propane. Glatt plans to sell 50% of his production through supermarkets and convenience stores at US $10; a liter of fuel will sell for $1. The other half will be sold to economically-marginalized communities at a much-reduced price through the collaboration of donors who will pay 90% of the stove’s price; consumers will be able to purchase it for just $1. November 2015. My view: Even a little air pollution harms everyone. Brian Moench, Utah Physicians for A Healthy Environment. Here’s a take-home message. Pollution is not just a problem during our thick winter inversions, as this study clearly showed. Even a little air pollution does a little harm to many, if not all of us, and can do much harm to those at high risk. Air pollution makes people sick in multiple ways. All the major organs are affected. It can be lethal by causing heart attacks, strokes, pneumonia, cancer and multiple other maladies, beginning with intrauterine development and impairment of the basic building blocks of life, the chromosomes.
Most state and federal regulatory schemes assume everyone in the community breathes the same pollution, therefore facing the same health risk. But on a supposedly “green” day for the community at large, there can be pockets of pollution that would make Beijing blush ... As we enter the winter season, many people will also be taking a real “hit from their neighbors,” homeowners who crank up wood stoves and fireplaces. Research has shown that if you are downwind of a neighbor or restaurant that burns wood, you may be inhaling pollution levels up to 100 times greater than what is measured at the nearest monitoring station. Other research shows that most of that pollution can penetrate inside your home and stay there long after a storm cleans out the air in the valley.
Furthermore, not all pollution is created equal. Wood smoke is by far the most toxic type of pollution that most people ever breathe, much more biologically reactive than secondhand cigarette smoke.... November 2015. 15 Advantages of a Natural Gas Fireplace. "We know that a warm fireplace can make your home feel comfortable during the winter. However, wood burning fireplaces present major health risks. If you are a frequent fireplace user, check out these 15 advantages of a natural gas fireplace and consider making the switch!
November 2015. The dangers of the flu. If people use a fireplace or wood stove, those are major irritants to people with lung disease. Even outdoor woodsmoke is an irritant. New Hampshire’s population has one of the highest exposures to outdoor woodsmoke, which can exacerbate breathing issues for those already dealing with respiratory illness.
If you have COPD, emphysema, asthma or any respiratory condition, try to avoid burning wood or being exposed to wood smoke."
Doctors say particles from wood smoke can trigger asthma attacks and heart problems. They also contain cancer causing chemicals. Wood smoke adds to the pollution we see during the winter when we have inversions.
“Every time that you burn wood, it's going to have an impact on the air quality, and if people are outside they actually experience poor health aspects of it,” Spangler said. Petition: STOP NEW WOOD HEATERS EMITTING MORE POLLUTION IN A FEW HOURS THAN THE AVERAGE CAR IN AN ENTIRE YEAR
October 2015. Researcher questions planned burns. University of Tasmania Menzies Institute for Medical Research public health physician and environmental epidemiologist Fay Johnston said if one accepted a higher mortality rate in the Latrobe Valley during and after the months of the blaze, one would also have to accept that planned fuel reduction burning in Australia carried a significant mortality risk for the population.
Dr Johnston said there were numerous examples of planned burn smoke impacts of similar magnitude to the mine fire.
"There is no evidence that concentration-response relationships for particulate matter from landscape fires and mortality are substantially different from particulate matter from background urban sources," Dr Johnston said. October 2015. Reducing global health risks through mitigation of short-lived climate pollutants World Health Organization Report highlights the need to reduce emissions short-lived climate pollutants (SLCP), including black carbon, methane, and ozone. SLCP are responsible for a substantial fraction of climate change as well as for a significant proportion of air-pollution related deaths and diseases that kill some 7 million people per year. The report again highlights the measures recommended by the UNEP report, including clean cookstoves in developing countries, preventing methane leaks from mines, pipelines and landfills, banning open burning of agricultural waste, cleaner transport and phasing out log-burning stoves in developed countries. Dr Flavia Bustreo, assistant director-general at WHO, commented: “Every day, these pollutants threaten the health of men, women and children. For the first time, this report recommends actions that countries, health and environment ministries, and cities can take right now to reduce emissions, protect health and avoid illness and premature deaths, which often take the greatest toll on the most vulnerable.”
October 2015. California: Wood fireplaces and stoves banned in new buildings. "The aim of the regulations ... is to limit emissions of the fine particles in smoke produced by combustion of wood and other solid fuels and wood products, such as pellets. This particulate matter can find its way into a person’s lungs and bloodstream and is linked to greater risk of heart attack, stroke, asthma, respiratory distress and other lung conditions, including cancer, according to the American Lung Association.
“It has a myriad of health impacts, like cigarette smoke,” air district spokeswoman Kristine Roselius said. And it’s the No. 1 source of air pollution during the winter months, the air district said. “It’s nasty,” said Sonoma County Supervisor Shirlee Zane, a member of the air district board of directors, which unanimously approved the rule amendments Wednesday. “And it’s a lot more nasty than most people realize.” The district board also approved a $3 million grant program to help offset the cost to homeowners of swapping out polluting stoves and fireplaces with gas, propane or electric heaters — or at least EPA-certified wood-burning devices, where no other heating option is available. .... Home sales and rental contracts also must include disclosure about the health hazards of fine particulate matter from wood smoke .... Effective Nov. 1, 2018, rental properties in natural gas service areas must have an alternative heating device other than wood burning.... The Lung Association was among more than a dozen health organizations that lauded the new rules, local spokeswoman Jenny Bard said.“We have been involved on this issue for two decades, and we receive calls every winter from residents whose health is impacted by their neighbors’ wood burning,” the association said. “This is a serious health issue, and we appreciate the Air District’s leadership to reduce exposures.” October 2015. WOOD heaters could be banned across Armidale after smoke pollution exceeded national health standards in 13 out of 14 days monitored. We can’t go on living in this filthy air now Armidale’s ‘dirty little secret’ is out,” Armidale Dumaresq councillor Margaret O’Connor said. Together with councillor Peter O’Donohue, she is leading the charge to ban all wood heaters across Armidale by 2030. The councillors want to ban wood heaters installed in all new homes and also ban the installation of any new wood heaters. October 2015. Asthma Australia - wood heaters - a bigger scandal than VW. There is an even bigger air pollution scandal in Australia than the one perpetrated by Volkswagen, according to the Australian Air Quality Group.Air Quality Group spokesperson, Dr Dorothy Robinson, says that household wood heating is the largest single source of fine particle pollution (the most health-hazardous air pollutant) emissions in many towns and cities. Dr Robinson says a wood heater can produce as much toxic air pollution in one day as a car does in a year and, like the VW scandal, laboratory tests on wood burning heaters fail to give a true picture of their emissions under real life operation.
“The true extent of the problem is highlighted by Australian Bureau of Statistics data showing that only 4 per cent of households in Sydney burn wood as the main form of heating. “Yet according to the NSW EPA, residential wood heating is responsible for over half of fine particle emissions in Sydney, every year. Asthma Foundation NSW supports three key recommendations to the NSW Woodsmoke Control Options that would together reduce wood smoke health costs by 75%. These include: Removal of existing heaters that do not meet a health-based standard when houses are offered for sale. Not allowing the installation of new heaters that do not meet a health-based standard and a tax on all wood heaters that do not meet current standards. Licencing fees to cover the cost of wood smoke-reduction programs with assistance for people whose health or lifestyle has been affected by wood smoke. “We need to protect the public from the detrimental health impacts of wood heater pollution. The failure to recall and repair wood heaters found to be up to 10 times more polluting than their certified values, needs to be addressed” Ms Goldman said. A new study by a science team led by Los Alamos National Laboratory shows that he particulates found in urban smoke are especially prone to absorbing sunlight and having a heating effect on the planet. The new analysis demonstrates that wood burning emits organic species that coat soot particles produced by diesel combustion, creating a lens to focus sunlight and increase warming. The study also shows that the magnification is increased as the particles age and are coated with more airborne chemicals.
“This is a double whammy,” said project leader Manvendra Dubey. “The transparent organics amplify soot’s warming by lensing, and then we have this very stable brown carbon that causes additional warming. We clearly elucidate the detailed processes that makes the carbon particle much more potent warming agents and provide a framework to capture them in climate models.” The researchers used state-of-the-art instruments in field studies near London tracking an urban plume as it moved across Europe. The observed lensing effect was successfully reproduced by theoretical calculations and laboratory measurements.
The paper also underscored the need for multiple field studies in more diverse environments with mixed carbon sources. Dubey noted that a similar study published in the journal Science in 2012 saw no enhanced light absorption in soot particles in California in the summer. He said that the key difference is that the sampled region did not have the solid wood combustion that was pervasive in the United Kingdom during wintertime. October 2015 Hoosier, Indiana: new grant program to encourage replacement of dirty Outdoor Wood Boilers with clean, renewable energy. The Hoosier Environmental Council and the American Lung Association of the Upper Midwest — with the support of the Environmental Law & Policy Center, Citizens Action Coalition, Indiana Wildlife Federation, and Sierra Club — launched an innovative, new grant program to financially encourage owners of dirty Outdoor Wood Boilers to replace their systems with clean, renewable energy. Selected awardees could receive up to 100% funding for replacing their old OWBs with new solar, geothermal, or geothermal/solar combination systems. Learn more — and apply — at this dedicated microsite, “It’s Doable, Go Renewable”!
–Public Health Toxicologist David Brown, Sc.D., an expert in wood smoke: “Some of the health effects reported…include awakening at night with coughing, headaches, inability to catch breath, continual sore throats, bronchitis and colds requiring children to stay home from school. In some cases the breathing difficulty has gone into asthma attacks requiring emergency-room treatment. Even episodes of short-term exposures to extreme levels of fine particulates from wood smoke and other sources, for periods as short as two hours, can produce significant adverse effects.” -Oncologist D. Barry Boyd, MD: “In addition to the fine particulate matter, wood smoke contains a number of organic compounds that are potential or recognized carcinogens. Exposure over time may raise the risk not only of chronic lung disease but also of lung cancer. As well, wood smoke interferes with normal lung development in infants and children. It increases children’s risk of lower respiratory infections such as bronchitis and pneumonia. Wood smoke exposure can depress the immune system and damage the layer of cells in the lungs that protect and cleanse the airways.” Other Struggles Facing Victims of OWB Wood Smoke: • People boarding up their homes to try to keep out smoke.
• Working class families spending money that could have been used to buy food or clothing are forced to buy expensive air filtration systems to protect their families from the plumes of smoke coming at them, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. One HEPA replacement filter can alone cost $90. September 2015. New Brunswick Power, Canada, launches heat pump rebate program. NB Power is starting a new program that is expected to help people save on electricity costs. The utility is offering a $500 rebate on the purchase of a high-efficiency heat pump.
"The heat pumps [in this campaign] are going to stand the test of our crazy temperatures. Everyone has seen a day in the winter where it hits –20 C, especially the last two or three years we've had weird winters where temperatures have gone lower than normal," said Mudge. "We wanted to make sure the heat pumps homeowners in New Brunswick are purchasing are going to make sense for them to use in our type of climate." September 2015. David Attenborough and Professor Brian Cox call for Major Program to Combat Climate Change
In a 2-minute video, David Attenborough explains that our world and its wildlife are in danger because of climate change. In the 1960s, scientists overcame immense odds to put men on the moon. A similar effort is now needed to combat climate change. If we make renewable energy cheaper than coal, fossil fuels will stay in the ground.
David Attenborough, Professor Cox, and many other leaders of business, science and industry have put their names to a call for an investment of $15 billion a year over 10 years to make this happen. For much less than the $100 billion per year currently spent on defence, we could save our planet from climate change. The money invested in research would not only pay for itself, but provide significant economic benefits. Leaders of the world are urged to commit, by the Paris climate conference in December, to the positive, practical initiative, named the Global Apollo Program, in honour of the 1960s program that saw men walking on the moon. It's a short, but very powerful message that needs to be heard. September 2015. More people die from air pollution than Malaria and HIV/Aids. A new study shows that more than 3 million people a year are killed prematurely by outdoor air pollution, more than malaria and HIV/Aids combined. Details published in the prestigious journal 'Nature' reveal that The 1,002,370 from residential energy (presumably wood and coal smoke), more than double the 464,748 premature deaths from power generation and much higher than the 226,137 from industry, 179,268 from biomass burning and 163,852 from land traffic. See also Heating, Cooking Are Top Contributors to Air-Pollution Deaths Worldwide.
September 2015. Scotland’s environment minister has praised “significant progress” on reducing air pollution since 1990, with a new report showing emissions of most pollutants continued to fall in 2013. However, the report also shows that in more recent years the rate of reduction for several pollutants – such as NMVOCs, PM10 and ammonia – has slowed. The report highlights increasing quantities of domestic wood burning as a factor in flatlining PM10 emission levels.
Launched alongside Defra’s consultation on draft air quality plans for the UK which also started this week (see AirQualityNews.com story), the Scottish Government’s six-week consultation runs until November 9 2015. September 2015. Outdoor gas and propane gas fireplaces to be allowed in Port Colborne, but not wood. Many councillors said that they received more comments from residents that were against allowing open-air burning, and that many of those residents cited health and safety issues ... overruling idea that health and safety ought to come first prevailed, and council noted it is difficult to create a bylaw that would deal with people who are simply inconsiderate.
September 2015. Despite Stricter Air Standards, US residents still dying from air pollution. The survey of more than 500,000 Americans shows that as air pollution levels rise in the areas where they live, rates of death rise ... Every extra 10 ug/m3 PM2.5 raised the risk of heart death by 10% and overall death by 3%, according to the study published in the government journal Environmental Health Perspectives. "We need to better inform policymakers about the types and sources of particulate pollution so they know where to focus regulations," said Richard Hayes, a professor of population health and environmental medicine at NYU Langone.
September 2015. Are cheap sensors and concerned citizens leading to a shift in air monitoring? Responding to an explosion of low-cost, easy-to-use sensors to monitor air quality in recent years, US EPA scientists are studying the accuracy of these “next-generation air monitors,” and how the data collected might be used to improve communities and, eventually, affect how air quality is monitored and regulated
September 2015. Guest editorial: Wood burning -- it's time to let it go. Article by Dr. Brian Moench, President, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment. "Recently Summit County took a bite out of tradition and a bite out of air pollution and approved a bold new ordinance that would prohibit solid fuel burning devices (think wood and coal in stoves and fireplaces) in new construction. This is an important step forward to cleaning our air, and we will all be better off for it. ... If you don't smoke, burning wood is probably the worst thing you can do to your own health. As Elsa sings in the movie Frozen, it's time to "Let it go." September 2015. Sacramento Metropolitan AQMD Receives Federal Grant to Study Toxic Pollutants From Wood Smoke in Sacramento. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has awarded the Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District (SMAQMD) a $360,000 grant to study toxic pollutants from wood smoke in Sacramento.
Residential wood smoke is Sacramento’s main source of wintertime air pollution and it is suspected to be the main source of some hazardous air pollutants (HAPs), including acetaldehyde, acrolein, acetonitrile, and naphthalene. This study, to be conducted during one winter season beginning in November 2016, will provide a better understanding of air toxics from wood smoke and wood burning behavior in select environmental justice communities based on federal environmental justice data. September 2015. Rebates boosted to get more wood-fuelled heaters replaced in Canberra. "The Government has increased the rebate from $800 for a gas-ducted system to $1,100, so it's quite a sizeable inducement to remove those old wood heaters ..."And for a single gas appliance replacing a wood heater it is $600." ... Wood smoke is a serious health problem for people with lung or heart conditions, particularly in the Tuggeranong Valley where the smoke becomes trapped under an inversion layer on cold nights."
Shane Rattenbury called for the scheme to be extended to electric heating. "Mr Rattenbury cited research from Melbourne University's Melbourne Energy Institute released last week, showing how the use of electric split-systems for heating was cheaper than using gas. The savings come as gas prices rise in eastern Australia. By encouraging people to get onto gas now, we are ensuring that they will be the victim of predicted high gas price over the next five years," he said. "But by encouraging people to go electric now, we know they will be running on renewables in five years."
August 2015.
Switching off gas - An examination of declining gas demand in Eastern Australia. Report by Tim Forcey - Energy Advisor, Melbourne Energy Institute (MEI). The second page of the Executive summary (page 5) states: " Space-heating cost savings of $1,733/year (a savings of 77%) were modeled for a large home in Canberra and $658/year (63%) for a large home in Melbourne." Details are provided in Table 7 (page 24) showing gas heating for a large house in Canberra $2,255 compared to $522 for an efficient reverse cycle heater-air-conditioner. Expected costs for a medium-sized house in Orange, NSW are $1370 for gas and $949 for an efficient heater-air-conditioner.August 2015.
Mummies know best: the pharaohs giving up their secrets about heart disease. "Thomas and Finch suspect that pre-modern heart disease was caused not simply by genes or ageing, but by another risk factor, one that modern societies no longer face: widespread chronic infection. .... Such infections can significantly increase levels of inflammation in the body – and, in recent years, researchers have increasingly realised that inflammation can damage the cardiovascular system. In fact, inflammation appears to be the same mechanism through which obesity, unhealthy diet, and sedentary living also cause heart problems. On top of this, pre-modern people probably faced another serious trigger for inflammation: smoke from wood fires used for cooking, heating and lighting. So it is possible that ancient Egyptians, Peruvians, and others had the same illness as modern people – inflammation-induced heart disease – but with different root causes."
August 2015.
Wood stoves: Health risks from pollution outweigh ambiance. The Summit County Council has drawn a line in the smoke. Last week four of the board's five members voted in favor of banning wood stoves in new construction.August 2015. American Lung Association in California.
An important message from the National Blood, Lung and Heart Institute. "Even being next to a fireplace or fire pit this summer can aggravate your COPD."
August 2015. Limited moratorium on beach fires passed. "wood smoke is worse than cigarette smoke on a person’s health. Wood smoke particulates, Burnett said, can become embedded deep in the lungs and get into the blood stream, which can cause life-threatening diseases." "Carmel, in imposing the ban, becomes the last city on the Monterey Peninsula to ban or severely limit beach fires. Statewide, Mayor Pro Tempore Ken Talmage pointed out, only 38 of 435 beaches allow fires."
July 2015. Fine Hunter valley mine fined over toxic blast plume - money will be used fund wood smoke reduction "The penalty will be paid to Muswellbrook Council to fund its Wood Smoke Reduction program aimed at improving local air quality."
July 2015. Pollution from wood heaters has prompted dozens of complaints in Monash in the past five years. Mt Waverley father-of-two Douglas Crosher wants wood heaters banned after putting up with smoke from a nearby property for the past eight years. Mr Crosher said he was concerned about the health effects of smoke on his family and bothered by the sheer nuisance of smoke permeating his house.Mr Crosher has urged other residents concerned by pollution from wood heaters to register their complaint with the council and contact him via his website at woodsmokefree.com July 2015. In-principle agreement to move to 7 µg/m3 and 20 µg/m3 PM2.5 in the longer term "In recognising the health impacts of airborne particles, it is our intent to strengthen the reporting standards for particles (PM2.5 and PM10) in the National Environment Protection (Ambient Air Quality) Measure. We agreed in-principle to adopt annual average and daily PM2.5 reporting standards of 8 µg/m3 and 25 µg/m3, respectively, with a move to 7 µg/m3 and 20 µg/m3 in the longer term."
July 2015. Summit County proposes to prohibit wood-burning stoves. The Snyderville Basin Planning Commission recommended last week to permanently ban all wood-burning appliances from any new construction or remodeling. "Unlike most other sources of pollution, home wood-burning emissions are released directly into the area where people spend most of their time at an elevation that does not promote dispersion," he wrote the commission, adding that it is almost impossible to prevent wood-smoke pollution from seeping into nearby homes." "The common belief is it's from cars. But it's not. It's wood burning." Statistics from state and federal environmental studies submitted to the commission last week paint a grim picture. Monitoring stations can miss that a neighbor burning wood might increase pollution by 100 times in the house next door. One fireplace burning 10 pounds of wood for an hour fouls the air worse than 120,000 cigarettes. July 2015. Letter published in the British Medical Journal. Wood burning stoves produce PM2.5 particles in amounts similar to traffic and increase global warming. "London’s annual mean PM10 from wood burning (1.1 μg/m3) far exceeds the predicted city-wide reduction of 0.17 μg/m3 from phases 1 and 2 of the Low Emission Zone to reduce traffic pollution.5 Solving the wood burning problem could generate more benefits for less cost than additional measures to reduce traffic emissions.
Health professionals must explain this to policymakers, so that—instead of repeating past mistakes—future policies use the best, most cost effective ways to minimise damage to public health from air pollution."
July 2015. Lisa Neville: Please Help Stop Wood-smoke Impacting on My Already Inflamed Airways.
Michellina van Loder, Professional Writer, Author, Journalist, Blogger "Each winter, my health is impacted on by my neighbours’ wood-smoke from their wood heaters. Not only does the woodsmoke make me ill for days at a time but it also makes my life and that of my family’s difficult: we have to seal our windows with masking tape to keep the smoke out; we can’t run the exhausts fans in the bathroom unless someone outside the bathroom can tape up and seal cracks around the door due to the backdraft of woodsmoke that comes in; some nights, I have to sleep with a 3M filter mask over my face to protect my airways; we can’t leave our washing outside, nor can we go outside for long—most days, I can’t go outside at all—because the wood-smoke particles permeate into our hair and clothing, effecting my airways when we come in .... "
July 2015. Interview with Dr. Brian Moench, President, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, who has been speaking out on the connection between pollution and health since 2007. Dr. Brian Moench says we can get worked up all we want when it comes to big polluters, but the trend of backyard fire pits is just as worrisome: July 2015. Smoke from open cooking fires kill 4 million people each year. One organization that's trying to make a difference in this issue is Dazin, which is a cooperative in Bhutan (though the same model could work in many other regions), a country with one of the highest rates of per capita firewood consumption in the world.
June 2015. PM2.5 pollution linked to reduced white matter in the brain: “Our study provides convincing evidence that several parts of the aging brain, especially the white matter, are an important target of neurotoxic effects induced by long-term exposures to fine particles in the air,” said the study’s lead author, Jiu-Chiuan Chen, an associate professor of at the USC Keck medical school.
June 2015. New York City Council approves legislation to update the city’s air code and help control pollution.
The bill will regulate the use of charbroilers in restaurants, end the use of all future fireplaces and wood-burning stoves, and prohibit new buildings from using wood as a source of heat except in the case of emergencies. Buildings with fireplaces and wood stoves would be required to use a specially treated type of wood that does not release as much ash into the air. The bill was approved by a vote of 48-2. See also City Council passes regulations for cleaner air. June 2015. The Clean Air Society of Australia & NZ (CASANZ), one of the few independent representatives on the Standards Australia Committee calls for a new wood heater standards, including modifying the current test procedure so that heater performance is measured under test conditions that more closely reflects actual operating performance, and to include the need for automatic controls of heater combustion to minimise smoke emissions. Because of the excessive pollution and health costs of from current wood heater models, CASANZ believes that "that action to ban domestic solid fuel burning for domestic heating should be seriously considered".
June 2015. Outdoor particulate air pollution results in 3.2 million premature deaths annually, more than the combined impact of HIV-AIDS and malaria. Improving air quality could potentially avoid millions of pollution-related deaths each year. That finding comes from a team of environmental engineering and public health researchers who developed a global model of how changes in outdoor air pollution could lead to changes in the rates of health problems such as heart attack, stroke and lung cancer. One of the study’s unexpected findings is that cleaning air in less polluted parts of the world, including in North America and Western Europe, can have as much health benefit as similar measures taken in the most polluted areas. June 2015. Climate Spectator: Australia is suffering a spate of solar-related fires, hundreds of them. The cause of these fires isn’t the solar panels themselves but, rather, a device installed next to solar panels called a rooftop DC isolator (or disconnect) switch – a uniquely Australian requirement. ... Despite the lack of fires or any demonstrable harm from solar panels themselves, and in spite of the evidence showing the fire risk from DC switches, Standards Australia moved to mandate the rooftop DC switch nationwide in 2012, in the name of fire safety.
During the standards-drafting process, Standards New Zealand sought an exemption from the rooftop DC isolator requirement, calling it a stupid idea. The rift eventually led to Australia-only and New Zealand-only sections of the standard.
Germany, itself a world leader in solar electricity, once required a practice similar to Australia’s rooftop DC isolator requirement but eventually stopped, because it was causing too many fires. The Germans found that placing DC switches in exposed places creates a degenerative process that, without regular maintenance, causes the switches to heat up, and eventually, to catch fire – even the high-quality German ones. ... Now Australia has become a new kind of leader in the solar PV industry. As of November 2014, there have been more than 167 fires in Queensland alone – all related to the rooftop DC isolator.
The solution is simple. Some solar PV industry experts – those most concerned with safety and quality – are asking Standards Australia to issue an amendment to the technical standard for installing solar panels, eliminating the requirement for a rooftop DC isolator. Petition: Please remove the need to install a DC Isolator on the roof alongside a Solar PV Array. Please mandate that all DC Isolators are removed from current installations before we have more fires or worse a solar fire related fatality.
June 2015. Fine Particulate Air Pollution Associated with Increased Risk of Childhood Autism. University of Pittsburgh research: "Based on the child’s exposure to concentrations of PM2.5 during the mother’s pregnancy and the first two years of life, the Pitt Public Health team found that children who fell into higher exposure groups were at an approximate 1.5-fold greater risk of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) after accounting for other factors associated with the child’s risk for ASD – such as the mother’s age, education and smoking during pregnancy. This risk estimate is in agreement with several other recent investigations of PM2.5 and autism." Peer-reviewed scientific paper.
May 2015. New research on the health problems caused by PM2.5 exposure:
| Air pollution is an invisible killer that lurks all around us, preying on the young and old. Learn how it slips unnoticed past our body's defenses causing deaths from heart attack, strokes, lung disease and cancer. Help breathe life back into our cities and take action to protect our health and climate. Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment - 30-sec video - essential viewing! Woodsmoke Pollution and your health - video of woodsmoke pollution in Canberra and Armidale and advice from Dr Jim Markos, Australian Lung Foundation
CSIRO Study: Impacts of smoke from regeneration burning on air quality in the Huon Valley, Tasmania The study measured PM2.5 pollution in Grove, a rural area, exposed only to forestry burns and Geeveston, a small town with 277 houses, exposed to smoke from domestic wood heaters as well as forestry burns. The difference is shown in the graph below. Although there is some pollution from forestry burns in Grove, the vast majority of the pollution in Geeveston is woodsmoke from domestic heating. The graph below compares the two - Grove (light green) has relatively low pollution. The 277 houses in Geeveston create a massive, unhealthy pollution problem every winter. The PM2.5 standard was exceeded in Geeveston on 99 occasions.  Because most people live in towns, people shop there children go to school there, people are exposed to high levels of toxic smoke pollution. As in Launceston, funds should be made available as a matter of urgency to replace wood heaters with gas or reverse cycle electric heating to protect residents' health. General News 90 Scientists urge US Congress to improve carbon accounting of biofuels and bioenergy "Clearing or cutting forests for energy, either to burn trees directly in power plants or to replace forests with bioenergy crops, has the net effect of releasing otherwise sequestered carbon into the atmosphere, just like the extraction and burning of fossil fuels." A Burning Issue: The experts speak about wood smoke.. Oroville Mercury-Register: 14 May 2010 In December 2009, after 33 breaches of the air quality standard, the US EPA set a three-year deadline for Chico, a small town in Butte County, to clean up its woodsmoke pollution. A local reported asked physicians, research scientists and other experts in Chico and nationwide how tiny particles and other ingredients of wood smoke may affect people's health. "Wood smoke definitely has a negative health impact." Mark Lundberg, MD, Butte County public health officer and president, Butte-Glenn Medical Society "I'm convinced that it causes potentially serious health effects in some people, particularly asthmatics ... If you're immediately downwind from someone who's burning, you can really get a significant exposure." Michael Lipsett, MD, chief, Environmental Health Investigations Branch, California Department of Public Health. Dr Lipsett developed public health and medical guidelines for state's outdoor air quality standards. "Your lung function at seven years of age predicts your lung function at 35 years of age. So factors that might impact the growth and development of your lungs early in your life are relevant to problems in your natural lung function as adults." Mark Miller, MD, MPH, director, UC San Francisco Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Unit and former Chico pediatrician "Studies have shown that if you expose people to air pollution particles, you can see that it changes heart rate. We've also shown that it can cause clotting. In one of these susceptible populations, that can be a problem." Robert Devlin, Ph.D., senior scientist and former chief, Clinical Research Branch, Environmental Public Health Division, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency "There are nationwide and local epidemiological studies showing that when particulate matter (in air pollution) goes up, premature deaths go up." Matthew Lakin, Ph.D., scientist, risk assessment, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency "I think it's a fair comparison to look at wood smoke similar to burning vegetable matter such as tobacco." Melanie Marty, Ph.D., chief, Air Toxicology and Epidemiology Branch, Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, California Environmental Protection Agency "I think we need to educate the public ... I don't think they realize how toxic wood smoke is. I don't think we've done a very good job about that." L. Gretchen Wooding, MD. Proposed amendments to the NZ National Environmental Standard (NES) on air quality Green Party spokesperson on Resource Management, David Clendon, commented: Instead, the air quality standards standards should be upgraded by the introduction of a much-needed PM2.5 standard, allowing NZ to aim for the greatest reduction in the pollutant that most affects our health for the least possible cost. This cannot be achieved if the pollutant most closely linked to adverse health outcomes is not even considered. See our draft submission for more ideas and information. |
