AGH calls for limited, targeted sell-through of stoves

Residential Wood Heating New Source Performance Standards Testimony of John Ackerly
Alliance for Green Heat
Monday, June 8, 2020

Good morning.  My name is John Ackerly and I am the President of the Alliance for Green Heat.  We are a 501c3, non-partisan, non-profit organization based in Maryland.

Thank you for holding this hearing.  We will add to this testimony in our written remarks.

Let me start by saying that we support a partial, limited sell-through, but not one that will result in more Step 1 units coming from manufacturers into the retail market. That would backfire.

There is a way to do this proposed sell-through in a smarter, more targeted way.  And there is a way to do it that will add too much wood smoke into communities and neighborhoods.

One of the roles of AGH is to bring greater transparency to the wood heating community.  In the next 2 – 3 minutes, we’d like to talk about details that the EPA may not have considered.

We sympathize with many of the small retailers who still have some Step 1 appliances.  Their predicament is partly or in some cases mostly because manufacturers could not or did not get them Step 2 appliances early enough.  

Manufacturers had 5 years and that was enough time.  Now it’s the retailers turn. We do not think manufacturers should be able to sell or ship Step 1 units during a sell-through period unless the manufacturer is also the only retailer and they do not use any other retailers.  

On the EPA’s website, you say that  “the proposed amendments, if finalized, would provide retailers more time to sell Step 1-certified residential wood heating devices.”  Please stick to your word and only consider a sell-through for retailers, and not use this as a back doorway for manufacturers to keep moving Step 1 units into the market.

Many manufacturers held off producing and selling their certified Step 2 products until 2019, thinking or just hoping that there would be a sell-through.  If you happen to be a dealer who sells mostly those lines of stoves, you were put in a bad spot. 

HPBA has been a good partner to EPA insofar as they have helped educate retailers about the EPA regulations.  But their policies are more driven by manufacturers and in 2019 they were still urging retailers to buy Step 1 products to help out manufacturers.  They said, and I quote “Manufacturers need that revenue to complete testing and certification of Step 2 products.  Remember, you still have one full selling season between now and the Step 2 deadline.” (unquote)  

Hundreds of retailers tried to stop buying Step 1 appliances but some of the manufacturers that they sold for, pressured them to keep buying Step 1 units.  

The second way that the EPA can make this a smarter, targeted sell-through is to limit it to stoves and not allow central heaters.  Step 1 units central heaters have the potential to be far more polluting than Step 1 stoves.  If the EPA is concerned with air quality implications of a sell-through, the best way to allay those concerns is to focus on stoves, not on the appliances that have biggest fireboxes and the biggest potential to cause excessive smoke – and the worst reputation in the industry.

In the upper Midwest and great lake states, hundreds or thousands more Step 1 central heaters could be installed in communities that already have too many cheaper, polluting outdoor boilers and warm air furnaces.  Its patently unfair for companies like Lamppa Manufacturing and Fire Chief, who are even smaller than their competitors who did not design a Step 2 unit. They deserve to recoup their investments to design and certify Step 2 furnaces, not to be undercut by the EPA.  They followed your rules and your timelines and now you should not penalize them for that and reward the companies that fought your rules and thought they would not have to comply on May 15.

Out west many communities and valley towns that experience severe weather inversion where wintertime wood smoke get trapped close to the ground.  These are the areas that most needed Step 2 appliances and that don’t need cheaper, more polluting Step 1 stoves to be competing in the marketplace for yet one more heating season.  In anticipation of this likely sell-through, we urge those communities, starting with Fairbanks Alaska to adopt rules, if they haven’t already, that do not allow more Step 1 sales or installs.

AGH also calls on the EPA to publicly recognize states and local jurisdictions that may not allow the sell-through.  

The third way to make this a smarter, more targeted sell-through is to limit the time period to as little as 4 weeks, but no more than 8 weeks.  Retailers lost 2 very slow months due to Covid – 19 and the EPA is proposing to replace that with months during the peak of the selling season.  

Currently, an informal sell-through is already happening as hundreds of retailers use different methods to offload Step 1 stoves.  If anyone wants to go to eBay today or tomorrow, you will find hundreds of new stoves listed. (You need to double check the model numbers to see which ones are Step 1, which can be confusing.)  Craigslist is another outlet used by retailers, some of whom are still listing 4 or 6 new Step 1 units.  You can also find new, completely uncertified stoves online.  

Some may ask, why does the EPA need to propose a sell-through, when EPA enforcement is not tangible enough to stem this informal and illegal sell-through that has been occurring since May 15.  Will there be another informal sell-through after Nov. 31?  If EPA is going to allow a sell-through, it needs to do a much better job at showing that it can and it is willing to do certain types of enforcement.  Otherwise, we will just have a much longer period where some player comply and others are in continual, open non-compliance.

In closing, we want to say that because of EPA testing regulations, America probably makes the best wood stoves in world.  We lag behind in wood boiler technology and we are not the only leaders in pellet stove technology.  But with wood stoves, we probably have the strictest testing standards.  For the next NSPS, we should not be looking at reducing PM levels below 2 grams an hour without first getting a federal test method that requires cord wood fuel and is based on real world burning habits.  Thankfully, we now may be on track to undertake that, now that the 2020 deadline has basically remained intact, despite this likely sell-through window.  

We also urge the Office of Air & Radiation to recognize the carbon benefits of small high efficiency wood and pellet heating.  The Achilles heel of biomass to electricity is the low efficiency leads to more carbon emissions per unit of energy.  The Achilles heal of residential biomass is the particulate matter, not the carbon.  So if we can get better test methods that will lead to redesigned and genuinely cleaner stoves, we will be world leaders in residential wood stove technology.

Related stories

EPA proposal to relax wood stove rules sows division between states and industry – and between industry factions (May 2020)

EPA urges manufacturers to stick to May 2020 compliance deadline (Oct. 2019)

EPA urges manufacturers to stick to May 2020 compliance deadline; says its working towards a cordwood test method rulemaking

On October 15 the EPA provided an update on its wood heater website page urging “affected entities to continue efforts to certify compliance with the NSPS in light of the upcoming May 15, 2020, compliance date.” According to NSPS legal experts, the EPA sometimes issues such updates to provide more transparency when stakeholders need certainty due to an approaching deadline.  

[March 11, 2020 update: The EPA finalized amendments to the 2015 NSPS and did not provide a retailer sell-through.  They did remove pellet fuel minimum requirements but retained the list of prohibited fuels in the 2015 NSPS.]

The October 2019 update is widely interpreted to mean that there will be no sell-through for whole house heaters or any other significant changes in the regulations issued by the EPA in 2015. However, the details of any changes to the 2015 rules will come later this fall when the EPA issues the Final Rule.  

The news was welcomed by the Alliance for Green Heat and many stakeholders, including manufacturers and importers of wood heaters who have invested in R&D and retesting of their heaters that comply with May 2020 emission standards.   Nearly 200 models of wood and pellet heaters are certified to the 2020 standards and virtually all stove companies say they will be ready for May 2020.  Some include innovative designs that achieved emission levels that are six times cleaner than the maximum allowed in 2020.

The sectors of the wood heater industry that most needed a sell-through are the outdoor wood boiler and indoor forced-air furnace makers, both of whom are represented by the trade group Hearth, Patio and Barbecue Association (HPBA).  HPBA’s strategy of seeking relief from Congress and the Administration appear to have fallen through, leaving its litigation against the EPA as the most viable channel for relief.  But that relief will likely not occur before May 2020.

Test methods

 

A Canadian company who never
had an EPA certified heater
saw a new market open up
for their AirBilo Furnace.

Much of the EPA’s update addressed test methods, and the EPA noted that a newly approved broadly applicable alternative test method for furnaces “may facilitate the ability of manufacturers” of furnaces to comply by May 2020.  This is not the type of relief sought by HPBA, and it’s not yet known if many other furnaces will use this test method for certification.  However the EPA puts it in the context of providing some relief.  It was given to a Canadian company mostly known for maple syrup boilers, but who also makes a very affordable forced air furnace.

The EPA used this update to message that it is already moving on to the next proposed rulemaking, which will be on cordwood test methods.  The update said, “in the coming months, the agency is initiating a series of roundtable discussions with states and other stakeholders to inform the agency’s direction toward a cord wood-based compliance test method.”  In March 2016, the EPA laid out a process for developing improved cordwood test methods. By statute, the next NSPS should be in 2023 but the EPA could issue this rule making earlier.  AGH believes the next NSPS should not focus on reducing allowable PM without first modernizing test methods to ensure heaters are designed for real world use.

Part of the HPBA’s litigation focused on an agency decision to set a 2.5 gram an hour emission standard before setting a test method to meet that standard. Subsequently, an industry led ASTM committee developed the E3053 test method which has become a commonly used method along with the standard crib wood method that has been in use since the late 1980s.   The ASTM method is being widely used now but came under scrutiny by the EPA because of lax reporting by labs using the method.

NESCAUM is developing "Integrated
Dute Cycle" protocols based on the
way stoves are used by consumers.

Since the ASTM method became a “broadly acceptable” alternative test method, NESCAUM has dedicated substantial resources on a broad and ambitious effort to develop a range of new test methods for stoves, boilers and furnaces, as well as for pellet heaters.  The NESCAUM effort is partially funded by NYSERDA and the process and data is not fully public but ultimately it could provide the largest database of cordwood testing ever compiled to develop a North American test method.  Since test methods need to be data driven, this process may give these NESCAUM protocols an entry point and will challenge others to develop or make public data that can lead to a better protocol.

HPBA Joins Lawsuit Against EPA

In November, 2013 the Hearth, Patio & Barbecue Association (HPBA) joined a lawsuit brought against the EPA arguing that its members have and are suffered economic injury as a result of the EPA's failure to enact the NSPS in a timely way.

The lawsuit had already been brought by non-profits that are at odds with the HPBA - the American

Lung Association, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Pennsylvania based Clean Air Council and Connecticut based Environment and Human Health Inc.  This lawsuit is is based on the statutory duty of the EPA to conduct a NSPS every 8 years and the parties to the suit gain some control over the timing of the promulgation of the NSPS.

The HPBA complaint, excerpted below, shows how some technology classes, like outdoor wood boilers, saw more benefits in a national standard than having to meet different state standards and the prospect of jurisdictions simply banning devices in the absence of national emission standards.  Currently, outdoor boiler manufacturers who are part of the EPA's voluntary program have to compete with boiler companies who do not meet any emission standards in most states.

There is widespread uncertainty among stove and boiler manufacturers about the timing of the NSPS and how quickly they will be held to the new standards after those standards are announced in 2015.  HPBA is advocating for extended "sell through" periods so manufacturers, distributors and retailers can sell off stock that does not meet the new standards.  

Excerpts of the HPBA’s Complaint in the matter of

American Lung Association et al and HPBA, Plaintiffs vs. Gina McCarthy, Defendant

17. HPBA’s members have suffered and continue to suffer economic injury as a result of EPA’s failure to timely complete its review and revision of the Subpart AAA standards.

18. EPA’s delay impedes HPBA’s members’ ability to meaningfully plan to assure compliance with revised regulatory requirements, and to do so without incurring additional costs due to the resultant regulatory uncertainty. In particular, woodstove manufacturers as well as manufacturers of other appliances are forced to delay specific planning or investment, or do so at the risk that their efforts may be redone in light of requirements ultimately promulgated under a revised Subpart AAA. As long as EPA continues to delay its revision of Subpart AAA standards, the costs of regulatory uncertainty continue to mount.

19. EPA’s delay also uniquely injures HPBA members in the hydronic heater and masonry heater subsets of the industry as a result of the existing NSPS’s inapplicability to these appliances. These members currently face a patchwork of inconsistent state and local regulatory requirements and, in some cases, product bans as a result of EPA’s failure to timely revise the NSPS so as to incorporate these categories of appliances within Subpart AAA.

20. HPBA’s Hydronic Heater Sub-Section wrote EPA six years ago seeking coverage under the Subpart AAA regulations so as to foster greater uniformity in hydronic heater standards, and to mitigate the costs of participation in separate state and local proceedings. EPA’s continued delay in issuing revised standards including hydronic heaters prevents manufacturers from obtaining resolution of the contentious issues surrounding these appliances and from seeking EPA-certification for their appliances. In the meantime, new state and local standards continue to be issued, including, most recently, proposed emission limits for wood heaters, including hydronic heaters, in Alaska. As a result, EPA’s members in the hydronic heater industry continue to face costs as a result of EPA’s delay.