Gas heaters raising health concerns

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With more than one million gas heaters in households and classrooms across Australia, concerns are being raised about dangerous emissions.

Unflued gas heaters push gases directly into living rooms, compared to flued heaters which move the emissions out of the house via a flue that goes up through to the roof.

Environmental Consultant Len Ferrari was enlisted by the Federal Department of Environment and heritage four years ago to report on unflued gas heaters, he looked at new and old heaters.

"Some of the newer heaters heat very well and they warm up the room very quickly and that means they burn a lot of gas," he said.

"That means the more gas you burn the more likely it is to cause nitrogen oxide."

He handed over his report to the government in June 2004.

"What we found was that in two-thirds of the houses tested, the concentrations of nitrogen dioxide, the toxic gas, was above the level set by the World Health Organisations."

The World Health Organisation safety guidelines are set at 110 parts per billion. The numbers Len recorded in the study were astonishing.

"We found levels several hundred, 300-400, we had one house that had levels of 800 parts per billion," Len said.

Leading public health medicine expert, Professor Louis Pillotto, studied the effects of unflued gas heaters on 118 asthmatic children in 18 different schools over three months.

He replaced unflued gas heaters in half the schools with electric heaters or vented gas.

"The asthma symptoms in these children were reduced, in those children in which we'd taken unflued gas heaters out of the classrooms and replaced them with electrical flued gas heaters," Professor Pillotto said.

With growing discontent around schools, particularly ones situated in colder regions, Richard Kalina set up a group and website called Campaign Opposing Unflued Gas Heating (COUGH).

"The Department of Education is avoidant in its responsibility there is a massive failure in the duty of care here, they're refusing to look at the science," Richard said.

The NSW Education Department has a policy of warning teachers in classrooms to open windows and doors to counteract the nitrogen dioxide emissions.

The only state government to do anything about Len's findings was Victoria.

They introduced regulations banning unflued gas heaters in areas where underground gas is available.

But Len is now calling on the new Federal Labor Government to take action.

Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon has only recently become aware of the problem but told Today Tonight it was a matter of concern.

"I would like to see a statement from the Federal Health Department that says they should be phased out in a number of years," Len said.

Related info

For more information about Campaign Opposing Unflued Gas Heating, visit Len's website at www.cough.org.au.

The website for the Clean Air Society is www.casanz.org.au.

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