Fireplaces and stoves are now the largest single source of primary particle pollution in the UK, greater than traffic and industry. About 40% of the UK’s primary particle pollution comes from just 7% of homes that burn solid fuel. Will the new ban on sales of coal and wet wood in England help the problem or risk making it worse?

In 1950s Britain, replacing coal with so-called smokeless fuel (made from powdered coal and industrial waste coke) was the main solution to our smogs. London’s particle pollution decreased by 66% in just 10 years. A similar ban was implemented in Dublin in 1990 and particle pollution decreased by 70% in one year.

These are dramatic improvements but after the ban the cities were still significantly polluted by solid fuel. In London the gradual rollout of gas central heating played an important role in continuing to improve air pollution through the 1970s.

The Valley air district prioritized the agricultural industry over public health for years

Nearly 20 years ago, California law directed the air district to phase out agricultural burning by 2010 to improve public health. That law included a caveat that the air district “may” postpone action if alternatives to ag burning are “economically unfeasible” to farmers and the burning will not cause a violation of a federal air quality standard. Each time the issue of ag burning came before air regulators, the air district requested it be postponed and the state board agreed. As a result, the air district issued some 250,000 permits to farmers to burn over 6 million tons of organic matter in the last ten years, data show, producing smoke in rural, mostly-Latino farm communities and adding thousands of tons of harmful particulate matter pollution into Valley air.