# EPA to ban wood heat



## blacksmithden (Oct 29, 2017)

Ok...everybody calm down. A friend of mine just sent me a link to this. Hopefully some of the more knowledgeable people here can shed some light on how much truth (if any) there is in this story....or is it just more fire alarm pulling ? Is this referring to the 2020 regs which some stoves are already meeting ?

http://www.cabinlifeideas.com/epa-ban-wood-heat/

*EPA to ban wood heat*
Justi | October 26, 2017 | Cabins, Homesteading, Off Grid Living | No Comments

The EPA has recently banned the production and sale of 80 percent of America’s current wood-burning stoves, the oldest heating method known to mankind and mainstay of rural homes and many of our nation’s poorest residents.

The agency’s stringent one-size-fits-all rules apply equally to heavily air-polluted cities and far cleaner plus typically colder off-grid wilderness areas such as large regions of Alaska and the American West.

EPA moved ahead with sweeping new regulations on wood stoves, wood-fired furnaces and outdoor boilers. Some states say they won’t abide by the rule.

Regulations will be put into place over the course of five years. There is a grandfather clause that quells resistance but it does ban any reselling or trading of non-compliant wood stoves.

Wood stoves will become very expensive because these rules will ban 80% of the current wood stoves and fireplace inserts. Old ones will become more and more expensive to repair.

Is this for real?

*EPA to ban wood heat*
The Environmental Protection Agency is set to finalize a set of regulations in February that critics say will effectively ban production of 80 percent of the wood- and pellet-burning stoves in America.

The EPA had published a set of proposed regulations more than a year ago, and since then had accepted public comments.

But the regulations already are having an impact. An advertisement for the Central Boiler Company says that company’s classic outdoor wood furnaces will be outlawed by the new regulations and will not be available later this spring.

The EPA has argued that the new regulations would improve air quality. The regulations require new stoves to burn up to 70 percent cleaner.

“Residential wood smoke causes many counties in the U.S. to either exceed the EPA’s health-based national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for fine particles or places them on the cusp of exceeding those standards,” the EPA previously said. “To the degree that older, higher emitting, less efficient wood heaters are replaced by newer heaters that meet the requirements of this rule, or better, the emissions would be reduced, the efficiencies would be increased and fewer health impacts should occur.”

It would be the first new standards on stoves since the 1980s.

Critics say it is government overreach lacking common sense – and note that people have heated their home with wood for thousands of years.

“It seems that even wood isn’t green or renewable enough anymore,” columnist Larry Bell wrote on Forbes.com “… [It’s] the oldest heating method known to mankind and mainstay of rural homes and many of our nation’s poorest residents. The agency’s stringent one-size-fits-all rules apply equally to heavily air-polluted cities and far cleaner plus typically colder off-grid wilderness areas such as large regions of Alaska and the American West.”

While EPA’s most recent regulations aren’t altogether new, their impacts will nonetheless be severe. Whereas restrictions had previously banned wood-burning stoves that didn’t limit fine airborne particulate emissions to 15 micrograms per cubic meter of air, the change will impose a maximum 12 microgram limit. To put this amount in context, EPA estimates that secondhand tobacco smoke in a closed car can expose a person to 3,000-4,000 micrograms of particulates per cubic meter.

Most wood stoves that warm cabin and home residents from coast-to-coast can’t meet that standard. Older stoves that don’t cannot be traded in for updated types, but instead must be rendered inoperable, destroyed, or recycled as scrap metal.

*A response to EPA…*


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## branchburner (Oct 30, 2017)

“To the degree that older, higher emitting, less efficient wood heaters are replaced by newer heaters that meet the requirements of this rule, or better, the emissions would be reduced, the efficiencies would be increased and fewer health impacts should occur.”

That is not a ban on wood heat... it is a limit on the harmful particulates legally allowed as a by-product of wood heat.

"Whereas restrictions had previously banned wood-burning stoves that didn’t limit fine airborne particulate emissions to 15 micrograms per cubic meter of air, the change will impose a maximum 12 microgram limit."

Is that a drastic change? I don't really know, but the numbers "15" and "12" don't seem all that far apart.

There is no getting around the fact that smoke is toxic. That government wants us to actually BURN that smoke and extract heat from it is, frankly, one of the few useful things that government has pursued in the past few thousand years... so long as the goal is not OVER-pursued, which is of course very likely.


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## jetsam (Oct 30, 2017)

Spam spam spam, spam!

The EPA regulations are real; the stupid headlines about them are fearmongering by large corporations who stand to profit if enough people with poor reading comprehension hate and fear the EPA.

If you seriously think the EPA, whose main job these days is to count staples and be very quiet, is about to start kicking in doors and confiscating wood stoves.... I can't help you.  

https://www.mediamatters.org/resear...-media-myths-about-epas-move-to-cut-wo/203667


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## blacksmithden (Oct 30, 2017)

jetsam said:


> Spam spam spam, spam!
> 
> The EPA regulations are real; the stupid headlines about them are fearmongering by large corporations who stand to profit if enough people with poor reading comprehension hate and fear the EPA.
> 
> ...



Well....I kind of figured it was just more fear mongering but I wanted to make sure that they hadnt come up with some new nonsense. It is the government after all. Putting people in charge who got their education from facebook is kind of their thing now. Sadly, the Canadian government doesnt do any thinking for themselves because that would require effort and learning in order to not look like complete idiots (I mean, even more than they do now). Instead, they just let the US government do all the work and then copy and paste it to our laws 99 percent of the time. Except when it comes to guns. Here in Kanadastan, gunz is American and gunz is eeeevil and thats why we'z terrified of gunz cuz guns is baaaaaad.....idiots.


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## Sodbuster (Oct 30, 2017)

Like others have said, probably BS, but part of me still want's to buy a NC30 to put in cold storage in the basement so I'm grand fathered in. Not only that, but my best friend is a union metalworker and welder. He can make my PE Summit last forever.


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## begreen (Oct 30, 2017)

Much ado over nothing. Justi is just stirring the pot.


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## zig (Oct 30, 2017)

If there's anything to it , probably another unnecessary and unenforceable ruling by another government agency with no teeth.


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## peakbagger (Oct 30, 2017)

How about "EPA to ban the production of wood burners that consume excessive amounts of wood and are creosote producers who foul the local air quality?


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## maple1 (Oct 30, 2017)

The fear mongering was evident in the very first sentence - and repeated throughout.


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## Oday450 (Oct 31, 2017)

[QUOTE="branchburner, post: 2201029, member: 6844". Is that a drastic change? I don't really know, but the numbers "15" and "12" don't seem all that far apart.[/QUOTE]


Reducing from 15 to 12 is a 20% reduction!  That’s quite a lot it would seem.


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## iamlucky13 (Oct 31, 2017)

begreen said:


> Much ado over nothing. Justi is just stirring the pot.



Certainly the quoted article is exaggerated, but the new rule is more than nothing. If I remember right, the rulemaking analysis estimated a cost impact of several hundred dollars per average stove, and it's hardly like stoves complying with the existing rule were dirty. The increased cost has to at least moderately disincentivize replacing stoves that predate even the current rule.

The final standard is 2 g/hour. I'd have rather seen the EPA standard go from the old 7.5 g/hour standard to the Step 1 4.5g per hour that went into effect a year or two ago, if I remember right, and left it up to individual states, counties, or cities to enact their own stricter rules. The latter two are the scope I think would have been most appropriate, as the significance of the concern is linked to density, which in turn is related to the number of people burning in a given area, and the number of people exposed.

Meanwhile, open fireplaces are unaffected.


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## EatenByLimestone (Nov 14, 2017)

Oday450 said:


> [QUOTE="branchburner, post: 2201029, member: 6844". Is that a drastic change? I don't really know, but the numbers "15" and "12" don't seem all that far apart.




Reducing from 15 to 12 is a 20% reduction!  That’s quite a lot it would seem.[/QUOTE]


And much harder to go from 15 to 12 than 18 to 15.


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