No smoke spying this winter

‘‘Smoke spotters’’ have been put on the backburner in Timaru this winter as Environment Canterbury tries a different approach to air quality monitoring.

But it doesn’t mean a letting up on the tardy burners with ECan revealing it would focus on ‘‘serial offenders’’ who could face abatement notices or even fines if the education-first process fails to work.

In previous years, ECan’s ‘‘no visible smoke’’ programme has seen staff observing smoky chimneys for a two-month period over winter.

Teams would leave educational information in letter boxes where excessive smoke from a chimney was observed.

ECan’s Timaru operations manager Judith Earl-Goulet told the Timaru District Council’s environmental services committee on Tuesday that it had made the decision to not have staff observing smoky chimneys in the evenings this winter.

‘‘We’re focusing on really working with people who have a troubled history.

‘‘Most of the community are doing the right thing, we’re focusing on ongoing issues.’’

Earl-Goulet said Timaru has had some success in bringing the overall trend of high pollution nights in winter down.

Last year, Timaru recorded 12 high pollution nights, slightly above 2018’s total of eight, but well below much of the past decade, where it has recorded anywhere between 27 and 41 high pollution nights at the Anzac Square monitoring station.

‘‘Not only is the number of high pollution nights gradually decreasing, the level of particulate matter is also falling.

‘‘We’re on a journey heading the right way.’’

Earl-Goulet said that as the majority of Timaru’s particulate pollution comes from poor quality heating, there was now the chance to focus on ‘‘serial offenders’’.

The first approach was to be ‘‘educative’’, Earl-Goulet said, as there were often a ‘‘number of issues’’ that led to poor burning.

‘‘It could be financial, it could be using the wrong wood, it could be a lot of things. We want people to stay warm,’’ Earl-Goulet said.

However, she could not rule out these offenders facing abatement notices or even fines if the educative process did not work.

‘‘We are running a regionwide ‘Warmer Cheaper’ campaign, focusing on better burning information and advice – how people burn and what they burn.

‘‘We will continue working with people who have noncompliant burners, so they know what they need to do and what options they have if financial support is needed.’’

Earl-Goulet said all woodburner upgrade deadlines set out in the Canterbury Air Regional Plan have now passed.

However, she said there had also been a reasonable uptake of ECan’s Healthier Homes initiative, which allows eligible Canterbury ratepayers to add the cost of home heating and insulation products’ installation to their rates bills.

Earl-Goulet also acknowledged there was still ‘‘a bit of angst’’ in the community around crop residue burning: ECan’s pollution hotline received 49 complaints between February to May about outdoor burning in South Canterbury, with many of the complaints related to stubble burning.

‘‘It is a permitted activity, but you need a consent. We’re working with a number of groups to ensure burners achieve the best practice.’’

‘‘We’re on a journey heading the right way.’’ Judith Earl-Goulet

Environment Canterbury