Mr A talked to his neighbour about the unwanted smoke and odour, and while the neighbour initially seemed sympathetic, he did nothing to change his habits. At times the smoke caused irritation to Mr A’s eyes and a tightness in his throat, causing him to cough whenever he went outside, and the smell made him feel nauseous. By the end of winter, Mr A found that he had to stay inside for most of the day and was unable to enjoy his usual pastimes of tending his garden or working in his carport restoring his car.

The problem smoke returned in autumn 2019, as it has done every year since. Mr A believes that now his neighbour has found a cheap or free source of fuel, he habitually uses this to supplement his purchased firewood and may have stopped buying firewood altogether.

Increasingly forced to stay indoors, Mr A found that the smoke was making its way into his home even when he kept all doors and windows tightly closed. To try to remedy this, he had his windows and doors sealed with rubber and has fitted plastic sheets over the inside of his windows in an effort to keep the smoke from seeping in. His reverse cycle air conditioner has been sealed off to prevent smoke and odour being drawn into his main living area. He has also stopped up the internal floor vents of his ducted heating system to reduce the circulation of smoke through the house. Unable to use his central heating, Mr A has spent thousands of dollars on portable oil heaters and an expensive new split system with a double air filter, which is installed on the wall of his house furthest away from his neighbour’s house. These measures allow him to heat only a few rooms at a time.

When Mr A’s attempts to talk to his neighbour about the problem were ignored, he began reporting the smoke problem to the EPA via the Access Canberra call centre. He did this consistently through the winters of 2019 and 2020, spending many hours on the phone. Although EPA staff visited the house on several occasions and collected photo and video evidence from Mr A, their process for determining environmental harm from wood heater smoke (refer to Figure 4) meant that they were unable to conclude that any harm was being caused. Mr A believes his neighbour realised that EPA staff did not attend callouts after dark and subsequently changed his habits, now only lighting his wood heater at dusk. When the burning started again in 2021, Mr A was informed that his case had been closed and the evidence he had submitted in previous years could no longer be considered. He would have to start the process again each year.

Mr A suffers from a chronic respiratory condition which he has managed since 2013 through medication and careful monitoring. Since 2020 he has been admitted to hospital on several occasions due to severe lung infections. He is now supplied with oxygen by ACT Health due to his breathing difficulties. In spite of his efforts to talk to his neighbour and work with the EPA, Mr A is still being impacted by the problem of wood heater smoke. Within the current policy setting, it appears that the right of a citizen to use a wood heater is held more highly than the right of a citizen to clean air in their own home.

On some occasions, the air quality in the children’s bedrooms was so poor that their parents sent them to stay at their grandparents’ house to protect them. Mr B’s eldest child has asthma, and he and his wife worry constantly about the health consequences of their exposure to the polluted air inside their home. While Mr B does not have asthma himself, he developed a persistent cough during the wood burning season, which lasted until around December in 2021 and returned again in autumn 2022. He believes this is caused by being regularly forced to inhale smoke. 

In addition to having to live with persistent concerns about their family’s health, Mr B and his wife have spent a considerable amount of money trying to mitigate the problem smoke inside their home. They report that they have spent around $50,000 on new windows in the hope that sturdy frames and double glazing would help to prevent smoke from getting into their home. They also say they’ve spent several thousand dollars on air purifiers to try to reduce the smoke pollution inside the house. In addition to these upfront costs, they now have to pay higher energy bills as a result of running five air purifiers for 12+ hours per day for most of the year, and for replacement filters. Mr B recognises that he is in a very fortunate position in being able to afford these expensive measures. Many Canberrans would not be able to do this and would have to live with unmoderated smoke pollution in their homes.

Mr B has written to the ACT Health Minister and Environment Minister, as well as his MLAs. He reports that he has received almost unanimous agreement from them that wood heater pollution is a serious problem in Tuggeranong. However, within the current policy settings there is no action that can be taken to address wood heater smoke at the neighbourhood level. From Mr B’s perspective, ACT Government education campaigns and heater removal programs are not making any difference to his family’s situation and experiences of wood heater smoke pollution. 

The report notes that while ACT Government is committed to strengthening wood heater emissions standards and phasing out older wood heaters that do not meet standards, but this has not gone far enough for improving air quality. 

The report makes eight recommendations for improving air quality and minimising the environmental impacts of wood heaters. These are summarised here:

Phase out of wood heaters

01. Phase out wood heaters from ACT suburbs 

02. Ban the installation of new wood heaters in all ACT suburbs (excluding rural areas)

03. Establish a register of wood heaters in the ACT so that we know the number and age of wood heaters

04. Require the removal of wood heaters before a property in any ACT suburb (excluding rural areas) can be sold