Outdoor furnaces harmful

Heating your home with an outside furnace could harm your neighbours and yourself - and the government can’t do anything about it.

Outdoor wood-fired boilers produce more smoke than other wood burning appliances and can emit more than four times the particulate matter of a heavy duty diesel truck. Particulate matter is a complex mixture of extremely small solids and liquid droplets, much smaller than the cross-section of a human hair.

They are the primary pollutant of concern in most of B.C.

Outdoor boilers are promoted as a form of reducing heating costs. They also keep smoke and mess out of the house and are easy to use, since they are controlled by a thermostat inside the house.

Ministry of Environment air quality meteorologist Earle Plain said complaints about smoke from the boilers are increasing every year.

He made a power-point presentation to the District of 100 Mile House council meeting on May 27, with Cariboo Regional directors Al Richmond and Art Dumaresq in attendance, pointing to the need to restrict the use and installation of the outdoor boilers.

Plain said there are a number of problems with the units, starting with the design, which produces more smoke than other wood burning appliances.

That smoke is the result of sporadic combustion; no combustion controls, such as a catalytic or secondary converter; and the short stack height, which fails to disperse smoke.

The boilers have a low efficiency of 45 to 60 per cent and if used to heat water are used all year long, not just during the winter home heating season.

Plain said another problem is the units can burn anything, which can create even more pollution.

The provincial government has no regulations covering outdoor wood-fired boilers so a number of regional districts are enacting bylaws to deal with the units.

Fire Chief Darrell Blades said there are none within the municipality.

Al Richmond said the environment ministry can control burn piles when there are air quality issues but has no ability to control smoke from the boilers.

Plain said he expects the ministry will restrict the sale of the

boilers without an emissions certification similar to wood stoves.

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