‘Clean Air’, new certification for wood and pellet boilers

Providing a suitable instrument to guide consumers easily and transparently in the market to let them choose efficient, from energetic and environmental impact point of view, products.

Creating a standardize and codified valuation’ field to have a consumption level and pollution made performance picture. Stimulating people to understand that protect ambient is not abstract thing, but a topic we can promote starting from easy choices about daily used instruments in our houses.

These are the main targets tied with “Clean Air” creation, first environmental nationwide certification for domestic heating (less than 35kW) stoves, insertion and wood and pellet boiler’s made by Aiel, timber and energy industry’s undertaking association. This certification – shown in these days in Milan – is voluntary and forestalls what art. 290 of D.lgs 152/2006 – in the implementation phase actually – says about the specific environmental certification for woody biomass heat generators. A venture instructed, as underlined by the Aiel president Domenico Brugnoli, from the will of making the consumer mature and promoting technologies’ implementation more and more innovative to “seriously deal with domestic heating impact on the emissions”.

DESIGNATED COMMITTEES FOR CERTIFICATION’S MANAGEMENT

Clean Air certification represents an innovation for consumers that, for the first time, will be able to quantitatively classify this kind of boilers not only for output tied efficiency, but also for pollutants inserted in the atmosphere with their operation. “Valuation – as explained by Annlisa Paniz, domestic devices Group AIEL spokeswomen – will be done in neutral and expert way from independent part going to evaluate heating system’s objective quality for the certification”. “In addition to Aiel – Paniz adds – there are many committees being in charge of certification system’s proper management: a technical committee and a certification committee. We have a complaint committee too, valuating and intervening in case of disagreements”. Notably, in technical committee there are Enea and Etifor (company qualified to offer services about Social and Environmental Responsibility forestry sector adopted), whereas in the certification’s committee there are Legambiente, National Consumers Union, ENEA again and Enama, an agricultural sector certifying body.

How does certification work? What will consumer concretely face with the introduction of this certification?

It’s a simple mechanism: every machinery will receive a number of stars. Only one star means just a device suitable to be sold, a kind of product that doesn’t come under Clean Air certification. Two stars will be appointed to stoves and inserts with 40% powders’ reduced emissions (for pellets) or 46% (for firewood) compared with the one star machineries. Three stars will guarantee powder emission’s drop equal to 60% compared with the one star group, while with the four stars’ assignment reduction will reach 70%.

Any consumer will have, furthermore, a QR code available to consult www.certificazioneariapulita.it website, where all the certified products are listed. Any product has a certification number made in turn by the manufacturing company’s tracking code, from the progressive certified device’ number and from the certificate’s year emission.

A way, so, to make the consumer more and more informed and aware in a context that, like National Consumers Union’s energy Sector managing director Pieraldo Isolani underlined, sees growing in significant way “an ecologist conscience” in the buyers.

“We joined unhesitatingly this certification – explained Isolani – first of all because puts together both performance and emissions’ amount judgment, a cornerstone. We should move on this global certification line for gas heating systems too. It’s an elementary system and allows tangibly the consumer to choose”.