Hearth and health

With clean air a priority, officials take aim at fireplaces that go snap, crackle and pop
By Dawn Bonker, Special to The Times
September 23, 2007

IN the model home dubbed "The Pioneer," a rambling house tucked into a Corona subdivision springing up among the last dairy farms of Riverside County, is a fireplace unlike anything the early settlers ever gathered around on a chilly night.

Sleek glass doors front a metal insert that holds ceramic "logs." Built-in gas jets stand ready to send up flickering flames. And, in the most dramatic departure from tradition, a deep transom display shelf and window span the area where a chimney normally would be.

For regional air-quality officials, it's one example of what they may allow in newly built homes and in permanently installed patio versions as part of a stepped-up effort for cleaner air. But to new-home buyer Frances Macias of Chino Hills, the trend away from wood-burning fireplaces is a slightly sad fact of modern life.

"I like the smell of natural wood fires," said Macias, while browsing the John Laing Homes model one recent weekend. "Oh, I guess they have their reasons from a health standpoint. But it's too bad."

Health and air pollution were exactly what the South Coast Air Quality Management District had in mind early this summer when the agency proposed regulations that would have forced no-burn days on the region's smoggiest areas and put wood-burning-fireplace restrictions on remodels and new homes.

After the plan sparked a public outcry, officials last month backed off from any rules that would affect existing homes -- at least for now. A subcommittee is studying options including incentive programs that would cough up cash or utility rebates for homeowners who scrap old wood-burning stoves or modify traditional hearths to include permanent gas fixtures.

The fireplace rules are a small part of a comprehensive plan that tackles all of the region's sources of air pollution -- from restaurant charbroilers to automobiles -- in an aggressive effort to meet a Federal Clean Air Act deadline set for 2014. To help meet that goal, more restrictive rules will likely be imposed on new home construction, AQMD officials said.

But the district is not expecting the new-construction restrictions to be hugely controversial, said Laki Tisopulos, assistant deputy executive officer for planning rule development and area sources.

Indeed, say developers in the South Coast AQMD, whose jurisdiction includes all of Orange and most of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, the proposals largely reflect what homeowners already prefer and what other California air districts have adopted. A fireplace is an amenity desired by 90% of consumers, according to the National Assn. of Home Builders. Whether that fireplace is gas or wood-burning is less of an issue, developers say.



What's in that smoke"The idea of wood-burning fireplaces tends to be a little more romantic in nature than reality," said Les Thomas, president of Shea Homes California.

Most homeowners don't have the inclination to buy and store wood and sweep up ashes, said Colleen Dyck, vice president of sales and marketing for John Laing Homes, which switched to gas-fireplace inserts in almost all of its homes about eight years ago.

Wood-burning fireplaces "are messy, and they make your carpets smell," Dyck added. And there's the spider thing.

"I grew up in Upland, and we kept our wood outside, and I was panicked about having to go out there and bring logs in," Dyck said. "You know, it's California and there are black widows out there."

But it's poisonous air that makes AQMD officials cringe. Wood smoke contains gases and tiny particulates that contribute to poor air quality and are small enough to lodge in lungs and cause a host of respiratory ailments, from asthma to lung cancer, air regulators say.

The fireplace rules were a relatively small part of the massive plan, but they roused considerable attention.

"Anywhere we go to present our plan, people zoom in and we hear, 'Stay away from my fireplace!' or 'Stop the insanity and stop burning wood!' " the AQMD's Tisopulos said. "There's nobody in the middle. It's one extreme or the other."

Kurt Lorig was among those who wanted the district to reconsider the wood-burning rules. Lorig owns Anaheim Patio & Fire and has sold hearth supplies for 51 years. Most people opt for the convenience and ever-increasing variety of gas-fireplace logs available for new and older homes, he said. But why deny a few, maybe 5% of his customers, who love the homey crackle of embers and aroma of wood smoke? The health concerns of wood smoke are overblown, he said, when compared to the pollution spewed out daily on the region's roads and highways.

"What about all the cars?" Lorig asked, pointing toward the busy Santa Ana Freeway near his Irvine store.

Most of the comprehensive plan does address vehicle and industrial sources of air pollution. But the region has just seven years to meet a federal deadline for healthier air, so officials say no source of pollution is too small to chase.

Tisopulos said he is confident the subcommittee can satisfy both camps and craft a compromise plan. It's likely, though, that the final proposals will recommend only EPA-approved fireplace fixtures in new developments, he said.



Rules in effect elsewhereMeanwhile, dedicated gas fireplaces, which typically feature gas flames burning around an arrangement of ceramic, pumice or lava logs housed in a permanent insert, are the norm in most new homes. Models meeting EPA standards are common throughout the San Joaquin Valley, San Luis Obispo County and the Bay Area, where air districts have already adopted burning restrictions. Wood-smoke reduction rules also are in effect in parts of New Mexico, Idaho, Oregon, Washington and Montana.

"In Southern California, we're one of the last ones to get with the program," said Don Bowker, Riverside division manager for Fireside Hearth & Home, a Minnesota-based supplier for home builders. Five years ago, 75% of its business was in wood-burning fireplaces, Bowker said. Now 60% of sales are gas-only products.

Still, Melvin Rosenbaum hasn't noticed a downturn in firewood sales at his lot, Rosenbaum Ranch in San Juan Capistrano. But he does know that new homes are shunning traditional hearths.

"You can't beat a wood fireplace, but it is a lot of work," Rosenbaum said.

With new-style fireplaces not requiring chimneys, architects can get creative. The fireplaces are vented outdoors by small openings similar to those attached to gas dryers, and everything from shelving to big-screen televisions gets popped into the spot above the fireplace.

At "The Pioneer" in the Steeplechase development, the area above the fireplace is dominated by windows. Another model includes a gas fireplace that almost functions as a room divider, with open shelving above. No chimneys dot the neighborhood roof lines.

Frances Macias may be nostalgic for the wood fires of her childhood in San Gabriel, where a fire was a real treat on the occasional chilly night. But she looks forward to using the gas one in her new house, just a few blocks from the model home she was prowling for decorating ideas.

So as wood-burning fireplaces go the way of front-door mail slots, will traditional brick chimneys and fireplaces typical in established neighborhoods take on a certain cachet or become a special selling point? Possibly for some buyers, but not for most, said John Hickey, president of the Pasadena-Foothills Assn. of Realtors and an agent with Dilbeck Realtors in La Cañada Flintridge.

"There really aren't that many consumers that would make that the final deciding point of their decision," Hickey said.

"For some people, the imagined benefits of the roaring fire and the Christmas yule log and the notion that they can't have that is something they couldn't get past. But most people will be able to."