For some reason this forum came to mind.
"Only 24 fines were issued for air pollution caused by potentially illegal levels of wood-burning smoke from homes in a year, despite more than 15,000 complaints."
"New wood-burning stoves are billed as more environmentally friendly, but still emit six times as much PM2.5 as a modern diesel-burning heavy goods vehicle. "
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/environment/article/wood-burning-stoves-fine-councils-tws59x3lr
I was just thinking the annual woodburner thread must be due!
Yet contrast to this story today - woman fined 150 quid for pouring the last of her coffee down a road drain (due to the supposed environment harm). That's local government for you, thoroughly inept.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg435gg66gpo
Yet contrast to this story today - woman fined 150 quid for pouring the last of her coffee down a road drain (due to the supposed environment harm). That's local government for you, thoroughly inept.
I saw that, it did seem a bit heavy handed. Yes, it's illegal to pour anything other than rainwater down those drains, but for some coffee dregs an "excuse me madam, you're not supposed to do that" conversation would seem more appropriate than a £150 fine.
Yet contrast to this story today - woman fined 150 quid for pouring the last of her coffee down a road drain
I just read that, absolute bonkers! It's petty, disproportionate nonsense like that just fuels contempt for local government. By all means, hammer someone for chucking used engine oil or other contaminants down the drain, but coffee dregs? Really?
Are you allowed to pour your coffee or drink into the gutter or onto soil/grass?
i honestly had no idea you couldn’t pour a drink down the drain. Oil and things like that I understand, but TIL.
News to me about the drain thing too….just thinking about when I snowfoam my car…where does that all go…in the drain. Better start cleaning the car incognito overnight. What about all these hand car wash places where all the chemicals just run into the road? Are they breaking the law?
What about all these hand car wash places where all the chemicals just run into the road? Are they breaking the law?
I reported a foamy chemical discharge into a local river, quite a while ago, and the person I was talking to said that it might be from the hand carwash nearby. I'm not sure what steps they have to take, but I got the impression that you can't just dump a load of detergent into your watercourse.
but I got the impression that you can't just dump a load of detergent into your watercourse.
The chemical labs I used to work at got fined a lot of money for putting too much tap water into sewage (partly because loads of tap water can be used to hide significant chemical pollution by diluting it enough and partly cos it's just wasteful).
They'd built a new wing of labs and within all that, you obviously have tap water which is used as a coolant. Ideally, you have a recirculation system (the first lab I worked in had exactly that, kind of like a heating system in reverse). It wasn't entirely problem free but it had cut their water bill dramatically when it was installed. I'd suggested such a thing when they were designing the labs and in classic "we haven't got time or money for all that nonsense", they'd rejected it.
Then they got fined £50,000 for excessive water disposal which was a couple of multiples more than a water recirculating system would have cost. ****wits.
Stab in the dark but if the majority of offenders subsequently changed to an approved fuel/appliance, then that's a success and better than fines? Granted it would appear very low and it's unlikely that 99.9984% of offenders stopped causing a smoke nuisance! I bet it's just one or two councils that have followed through with fines!
We've had our woodburner for 17 years. This replaced an open fire. After walking out in the evenings a few times, we've decided to stop using it (only used once in 3 years) as the smoke pollution locally was really horrid, the air stank and far too many people have them now on our housing estate, whereas a decade ago only a few properties were running a wood burning stove.
Richmond Council have now reversed/rescinded the fine for the coffee incident.
Richmond Council U-turn on £150 fine for coffee poured in drain - BBC News https://share.google/vPFQ1WGWOFxgrVoZU
Sorry, yes. Sweden.Not even allowed to clean your car at home here if you are within 500m of a watercourse. Used to be 100m when i moved here.Would form an interesting and informative part of the thread if anyone else knew where ‘here’ was. 🤷♂️
They've also tightened up the rules on burning stuff in built up areas. Think it's related to housing stock density. So i'm ok (20 odd houses spread out over a couple of km of roads winding through the forest) in the village itself you need to have an approved burner and meet different rules about what to burn, and have many more hoops to jump through to get a new one installed, chimney height, agreement from neighbours etc.
In the nearest town, it's pretty much impossible unless your house is deemed too expensive/complicated to add sufficient electrical heating. So only houses that are (at least) 50 years old.
Not even allowed to clean your car at home here if you are within 500m of a watercourse. Used to be 100m when i moved here.
TBH, its totally absurd that you can wash your car here. The crap people spray all over them. I guess in many locations the land drains end up in combined sewers, but thats part of the whole "discharge to the beach " issue, and for many years new builds have had surface drainage to ground (effectively).
I wasnt wildy impressed by one bike company promoting snow foam for your mobile pressure washer. Snow foam your bike in the trail centre car park or layby, and then rinse it all to the ground! great stuff!
we have a woodburner, but we never use it cause its filthy and i cant be bothered!
I wasnt wildy impressed by one bike company promoting snow foam for your mobile pressure washer. Snow foam your bike in the trail centre car park or layby, and then rinse it all to the ground! great stuff!
I remember querying that back when one of the tree infections was rampant in Afan, and they were asking people to wash their bikes before going home. The detergents being used were washing straight into the river below the trail centre, which is one way of dealing with tree diseases!
After walking out in the evenings a few times, we've decided to stop using it (only used once in 3 years) as the smoke pollution locally was really horrid
Giving up something you've used once in 3 years isn't much of a hardship! 🙂
Depends, it has maybe only been lit once and never allowed to go out!
Was in Italy last week and from the sea the layer of unclean air is very apparent...then watching some of the ferries leaving and belching out massive black clouds of diesel fumes that hung in the air for 10 minutes before dispersing kind of showed why the air wasn't clean.
Giving up something you've used once in 3 years isn't much of a hardship!
This is why we've only used it once in 3 years, because of the pollution. The once was an extremely cold night for our part of the NW.
Our other issue is living by 2 canals, both of which have narrow boats moored up, belching out green wood smoke (the boater collect wood from the places they stop at along the way and mostly is has not been seasoned.
I've often seen people throwing their cigarette ends down drains. These butts have plastic in them. One old chap was swearing at me, when I asked him to pick up his butt from the gutter next to the drain. People moan about water charges and rates and don't think that they cause some of the issues eg, fat balls and wet wipes.
And breath (if there's any fresh air left).
My neighbour fitted a wood burner to his modern, well insulated house. Must have looked lovely inside, but given the houses aren't designed with a chimney, he fitted a glorious stainless steel chimney to the side of his house. Oh, and there were no building regs for it.
I've no problem with people having them if needed, or in our case, a properly approved one, as we are in a clean air zone, so you need to use the right fuel.
as we are in a clean air zone, so you need to use the right fuel.
Or what? The point of the article is that there is basically no enforcement.
We used to live in a clean air zone and people burned all manner of rubbish. Some days, and the coldest tend to be still, it was pretty awful.
No point in regulations if they aren't backed up by enforcement.
I've often seen people throwing their cigarette ends down drains. These butts have plastic in them. One old chap was swearing at me, when I asked him to pick up his butt from the gutter next to the drain. People moan about water charges and rates and don't think that they cause some of the issues eg, fat balls and wet wipes.
Australia has had a reasonably successful and long-running campaign painting the words "the sea starts here ---->" next to drain covers. Most Aussies like the sea, most Aussies live in a coastal town so reminding them that whatever they're putting down the drain could be what they are surfing / swimming in the next day seems to have been fairly well received.
I suppose in the UK anyone being told not to pour coffee or anything else down a drain will (not unreasonably) shrug and point to the millions of litres of untreated sewage poured into most of our rivers and seas by water companies.
Haven't read the article, but lack of fines doesn't mean lack of enforcement. "Educating" with the threat of a fine if behaviour not changed is better than jumping straight to fines. Of course, that probably isn't happening either... but lack of fines isn't necessarily a bad sign in itself.
Think my record was 16 or 18 days straight running the log burner continually. "Restarted" it every morning from the still glowing embers from the last load before bed. Didn't get about about -8 or -10 during that period (and below -20 most nights).Depends, it has maybe only been lit once and never allowed to go out!
Getting the fresh wood from the log store was exciting with the snow and the cold.
Haven't read the article, but lack of fines doesn't mean lack of enforcement. "Educating" with the threat of a fine if behaviour not changed is better than jumping straight to fines. Of course, that probably isn't happening either... but lack of fines isn't necessarily a bad sign in itself.
I hadn't noticed the OP linked to a paywalled article, I assumed it was the Guardian one I had already read - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/22/only-one-prosecution-wood-burning-complaints-year-england
It very much does sound like there is little enforcement.
Thought of this thread today, Aldi had electric log splitters in the middle aisle.
"Depends, it has maybe only been lit once and never allowed to go out!"
In the 70s my great aunt in Lewis preferred cooked on her peat fire. It never went out. At night it was banked. Allowed to burn low then the embers smothered with peats. In the morning a blast with the bellows got it going.
Being Free Church obviously enough peat had to be brought into the house on Saturday so it didn't need to be done on the Sabbath.
The smell of turf burning is beautiful. We haven’t lit any this autumn but the turf shed is still banked with last years.