The air pollution from wood burning in homes is responsible for more than £1bn a year in health-related damages in the UK and €10bn (£8.5bn) across the EU, according to a report.

The analysis from the European Public Health Alliance found the total costs of early deaths, illness and lost work resulting from outdoor air pollution produced by all home heating was €29bn a year.

Wood burning was the biggest single cause of these costs, accounting for 54% of the total in the UK and 40% in the EU. This is despite wood stoves producing only 11% of heat in UK homes and 14% in the EU. The report combines burning wood in stoves and on open fires: in the UK two-thirds of people use stoves.

The researchers said their cost estimates were conservative because lack of data prevented them from including the impact of indoor air pollution from heating.

Compared with transport, regulators have largely neglected heating and cooking as sources of air pollution, the EPHA said. The report found that heat pumps and solar water heaters produced no air pollution at homes using them.

“It is clearer than ever that burning biomass and fossil fuels at home is not only an environmental problem, but also a major health problem,” said Milka Sokolović, the EPHA director general. “The solution, obviously, lies in ensuring that homes are powered by clean renewables. As people are grappling with high energy prices, we must avoid quick and dirty solutions.”

Air pollution is the single biggest environmental risk to health, causing millions of early deaths a year globally. In the EU, just one of pollutants, small particles under 2.5 microns in size (PM2.5), is blamed for 300,000 deaths a year. A comprehensive global review in 2019 found that air pollution may be damaging every organ in the human body.

Water companies spilled raw sewage into coastal bathing waters used by holidaymakers and families 5,517 times in the last year, an increase of more than 87%, new data reveals.

The discharges, through storm overflows, went on to beaches that were supposed to be the cleanest and safest in England and Wales, used by children, tourists, surfers and swimmers.

“We are in the midst of a new wave of sewage pollution,” said the 2021 Water Quality report by Surfers Against Sewage. “There are hundreds of thousands of sewage discharges polluting rivers and coastlines, all of which could impact the overall health of aquatic ecosystems.”

The data is gathered from water company alerts of spills via storm overflows across 308 locations. During the bathing water season – 15 May to the end of September – water companies issued alerts 3,328 times. The rest of the spills took place outside those months.

Action is needed to stop pollution of English rivers by road run-off, an environmental campaigner warned.

The call came as more people have started swimming in rivers during the Covid-19 lockdown.

Jo Bradley, who worked at the Environment Agency for 20 years, said more funding was needed for measures to prevent contamination of waterways.

A government spokeswoman said it was working on a “range of interventions to tackle the sources of pollution”.

In 2016, when Environment Agency figures were last published, only 16% of rivers, lakes and streams were classed as good.

Ms Bradley, of the Stormwater Shepherds group, said tiny bits of tyre rubber, metals from brake pads and a group of hydrocarbons from emissions wash off the tarmac and into rivers.

She added that as well as hitting wildlife some hydrocarbons, such as benzo[a]pyrene, may cause cancer, and she said more needed to be done, such as introducing roadside filter drains, grit separators and storm-water filters.

“We need a funding mechanism to allow local authorities and highways authorities to introduce treatment systems,” she said.

“There are a number of recognised and proven treatment devices to capture a proportion of the pollution in road run-off.

“So government should set meaningful targets for Highways England to install these devices at polluting outfalls more quickly.”

She said the money could be raised by putting a levy on tyre sales or an extra charge on council tax.

Public Health England estimates that the health impact from long-term exposure to particulate pollution is equivalent to 29,000 deaths each year. Not only does air pollution make people unwell and cause suffering, but it increases costs and puts pressure on the NHS too. Public Health England warns that the costs of air pollution to society could exceed £5.1bn by 2035 if nothing is done. 

Through the groundbreaking Environment Bill, which has started its passage through Parliament earlier this week, the Government will set a new legally-binding target for PM2.5, recognising its uniquely dangerous effect on our health. But the easy part is setting the target. The hard part is taking action to cut emissions. 

There are a number of ways in which particulate emissions from solid fuel burning can be reduced. Upgrading an open fire or an old stove to a modern, efficient stove is one option.

Owners of wood burners, stoves and open fires will no longer be able to buy house coal or wet wood, under a ban to be rolled out from next year.

Sales of the two most polluting fuels will be phased out in England to help cut air pollution, the government says.

Bags of logs sold in DIY stores, garden centres and petrol stations often contain wet wood – a type of wood which produces more pollution and smoke.

The public should move to “cleaner alternatives”, the government says.

Plans for the ban were first announced 18 months ago, but the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has now confirmed it is going ahead.

The government said wood burning stoves and coal fires are the largest source of fine particulate matter (PM2.5), small particles of air pollution which find their way into the body’s lungs and blood.

Particulate matter is one of several pollutants caused by industrial, domestic and traffic sources.

The government is monitoring a river in Somerset after it turned a bright, electric blue.

The Environment Agency said the drastic colour change affecting a tributary of the River Frome was a “pollution incident”.

There are no reports of wildlife in distress or dead, a spokesperson for the agency’s southwest contingent said on Friday. 

Government experts will continue to monitor the stream over the weekend and samples have been taken for testing.

Residents have previously feared for the state of the river.

The mysterious event creates something of a pattern in Somerset, after thousands of dead fish washed up in the River Sheppey one week earlier.

A pollution spill was blamed for the deaths of around 6,000 trout, bullheads and other species.

The Environment Agency sprayed the river with hydrogen peroxide in order to boost oxygen levels in the water.

Coal, oil and gas industries in the UK cause at least £44 billion pounds of damage each year, according to a new estimate by environmental campaigners.

Friends of the Earth have called for the “polluter pays” principle to be applied, with a new carbon tax levied on companies so they can contribute to a green transition.

They argue the fossil fuel industry has long been aware of the harmful effects of climate change, such as its impact on extreme weather.

“If you pollute, you pay. It’s a simple fix to help avoid catastrophic climate breakdown. For decades the oil, coal and gas industry has extracted, processed, sold and profited from fossil fuels,” said Mike Childs, head of policy for Friends of the Earth.

“The costs of this industry are being felt by people and nature across the world through more extreme weather, such as floods, droughts and wildfires. 

At least a quarter of local authorities in England and Wales have put a brake on the expansion of charging networks for electric vehicles.

More than 100 local councils say they have no plans to increase the number of charging points they offer. Campaigners and politicians fear this could hinder the expansion of the UK’s electric fleet.

Electric vehicles are seen as key to government plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and also have a role in cutting air pollution. This week Public Health England called for vastly more electric vehicles to replace petrol and diesel types, to tackle the problem of toxic air in cities.

The findings come from freedom of information requests submitted by the Liberal Democrats, and were shared with the Guardian. They follow more than a decade of efforts to upgrade the UK’s infrastructure to encourage drivers to switch to electric.

The government’s clean air strategy, which was published on Monday, describes reducing pollution from nitrogen oxides (NOx) as its most immediate challenge.

NOx emissions come mainly from diesel vehicles. Much of the strategy on road transport had been announced previously, including the pledge from July to stop all sales of new conventional petrol or diesel powered cars and vans by 2040. 

But it devolves responsibility for reducing NOx emissions mainly to a local level….

I assume this means some process of beating local government for a failure to deliver on a poorly thought through national policy stance. Some things never change!!!

Regular exposure to even low levels of air pollution may cause changes to the heart similar to those in the early stages of heart failure, experts say.

 A study of 4,000 people in the UK found those who lived by loud, busy roads had larger hearts on average than those living in less polluted areas.

This was despite the fact people in the study were exposed to pollution levels below the UK guidelines.

Researchers called on the government to reduce air pollution more quickly.

A team of scientists, led from Queen Mary University of London, analysed health data of people who had no underlying heart problems and were part of the UK Biobank study, including the size, weight and function of their hearts.