The draft NSPS appears to treat all biomass stoves, pellet
or wood, catalytic or non-catalytic, the same and require that they emit no
more than 4.5 grams of fine particulate emissions (PM2.5) per hour, a standard
that has been in place in Washington State since 1995. The average pellet stove today emits about 2
grams per hour, already less than half of the proposed standards.
Hydronic heaters, commonly known as outdoor wood boilers,
would also be held to existing standards that were developed about 5 years ago. However, the new NSPS would regulate
sales and installations of these appliances across the entire country, instead
of just the approximately 10 states that have adopted the voluntary EPA
standard.
While the new NSPS may reflect the status quo in many states
in the near future, it could become far stricter for both stoves and
boilers. In 2019, the test method for measuring
stove emissions could change, for example, from averaging four burn rates to using
only the highest or lowest burn rate (depending on which one the stove has the
hardest time passing). Some in the
industry think this standard will be a death-blow for stove manufacturers. Other experts say it will be achievable, but the
stoves that will be made may not be as appealing to consumers.
The written document EPA released this month did not contain
any numerical limits that industry would have to meet in the future, but Gil
Wood, EPA’s lead official on this NSPS verbally shared numbers with roomful of
stove and boiler manufacturers who had gathered in Orlando Florida for the
annual HBPA Expo. The Alliance for
Green Heat requested a copy to make available to the public, which the EPA
provided.
The EPA has backed off of creating a required minimum
efficiency standard, which all other HVAC technology has, in favor of testing
and publicly reporting efficiency to the consumer. The industry position is that reporting
efficiency is sufficient and enables the consumer to decide if they want the
equivalent of a gas guzzler or a gas miser as their home heating appliance.
There is much speculation about how the new EPA
Administrator, Gina McCarthy, will impact the NSPS. Administrator McCarthy had been head of the
air quality division at EPA and has a good working knowledge of solid fuel
appliances. And, McCarthy has already
reportedly asked tough questions about why fireplaces are not covered in this
NSPS.
Many in industry are simply tired of an agency that appears
to keep changing its mind about how strictly wood heating appliances should be
regulated. As of last fall, EPA appeared
to have something close to a final draft of the new NSPS that was more
acceptable to industry but considered far too weak by many states.
States now appear to have strengthened their hand. By adopting a stepped approach, the new NSPS
may do little to make stoves or boilers any cleaner before 2019 in the Northeast
and Northwest, where states have already adopted standards that are as strict
as or even stricter than what the EPA is proposing.
The most immediate impact upon promulgation, which could be
in 2014, is that unregulated outdoor wood boilers would go off the market in
all states. But there is a growing
movement that feels even Test Method 28 WHH and standards for EPA qualified
outdoor boilers still are deeply flawed, even after Method 28 OHH was improved
to Method 28 WHH. It is still unclear how boilers will be tested for 2014
compliance and how existing voluntary tests will be validated.
Brookhaven National Laboratory recently completed a study
that resulted in a new test method being created for both outdoor
wood boilers and indoor boilers that have partial thermal storage. Funded mainly by NYSERDA with some support
from EPA, this method draws upon the
ASTM method and Method 28 WHH. It can be
used instead of Method 28 WHH for any boiler with partial thermal storage. New York State has already accepted the test
method which will help open up the state up to European and American boilers
with thermal storage.
The Brookhaven
Method is also similar to the ASTM Method 2618 and could replace that method as
well, but has it has not yet been introduced into the ASTM process. The test
method is more stringent than Method 28 and the European EN 303-5 but it may be
a quicker and cheaper test for manufacturers to undertake. It is still unclear if the Brookhaven method
could be part of this NSPS or not. That
will likely depend on how much the states push for it and whether industry pushes
back.
The EPA’s latest timetable suggests it will have a final
draft of the new NSPS ready for internal review in April and the agency will
publish the standard in the Federal Register this summer. Industry, states, non-profits and the public
will then have 90 days within which to submit comments. The final rule would be promulgated and go
into effect in the summer of 2014.
The EPA has yet to meet any of their timetables for this
NSPS. There is always the chance that
someone will sue the EPA simply to get a court-ordered timetable that it would
have to adhere to. And, lawsuits based
on substantive regulations are also possible, if not likely, from a variety of
fronts, if acceptable compromises cannot
be reached.
