For Clean Air Day we are highlighting the large number of expired wood burners in Waitaha/Canterbury, and the help available for homeowners to upgrade.
Clean air
We are regulating and supporting initiatives to ensure air quality improves and does not impact on the wellbeing of communities. We also work to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants from our region’s transport network and urban environments.
This work includes:
- air quality monitoring (including real-time data) and advice and air quality trends. Our data is also available from the Land, Air, Water Aotearoa website
- air quality investigations, with reports available from our document library
- air quality planning
- air quality implementation and compliance. This includes advice on home heating
- cleaner home heating assistance (note, currently we have paused receipt of applications under the Healthier Homes Canterbury scheme pending a review)
- burner authorisations.
How are we tracking on our Levels of Service?
To achieve this Level of Service we will:
- 28.1: Provide up-to-date information, advice, tools and resources which enable the community to understand air quality issues and take action.
- 28.2: Provide air quality monitoring and investigation services.
- 28.3: Provide assistance to low-income households in Clean Air Zones with expiring burners to transition to cleaner forms of home heating.
How are we doing: The Warmer Cheaper media education campaign was successfully delivered and completed in quarter one. Campaign engagement saw an 8 per cent increase on the previous year. Mailouts to households with expiring wood burners commenced in October 2023. Social and print media will be ongoing throughout the year to educate the public about air quality issues and raise awareness of burner expiry.
Our spring mailout campaign covered properties with expiring burners to encourage burner upgrades and received positive engagement results. This work will continue with planning underway for an autumn mailout to around 700 properties in Timaru and Christchurch. Communication campaigns are ongoing and staff are developing a compliance education approach for Washdyke.
Our website provides real-time air quality monitoring data, collected across eight airsheds. Data is also available on the Land, Air, Water Aotearoa (LAWA) website. We have begun investigations on air quality monitoring in Rolleston.
Twelve applications for assistance to transition to cleaner forms of home heating were received and processed within the time frame during quarters one and two.