Stoves are good!

Defra has included wood burning stoves in their Clean Air Strategy, and they are recommending installing SIA Ecodesign Ready stoves and using Ready to Burn wood fuel.

I’ve heard that wood-burning stoves give off a lot of air pollution and particles.
All wood combustion will give off some particles but a modern stove burning the right fuel has very low levels of emissions.

A modern SIA Ecodesign Ready stove will produce 80% less emissions than an average 10 year old stove. This is based on independent test results from an accredited laboratory.

I’ve heard that 38% of particulate emissions (PM’s) come from wood stoves?
This figure has been in the press, but is based on the proportion of additional particulates from all wood burning over and above the normal level of particulates that exists in the urban environment from normal activities throughout the year including transport. If all particulates are considered then the figure comes down to around 16%, which covers all wood combustion including open fires, incinerators, bonfires and stoves.

Best estimates of the particulates attributable to stoves only are around 3%. Furthermore as much of this will be from older stoves, by replacing these with modern SIA Ecodesign Ready stoves, the emissions could be reduced by a further 80% to less than 1%.