Coup for Kent locally and in U.S.

Press, 30 March 1989, Page 25

Coup for Kent locally and in U.S.

Two new low emission wood heaters from Kent Heating, Ltd, have been approved for sale in the Christchurch clean air zone for winter 1989.

Both freestanding, the Tile Fire and the Sherwood models have passed the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s Phase 1 programme.

This year, however, Kent has launched the Series 2000, a new product range which includes the world’s first inbuilt non-catalytic wood heater to meet the E.P.A.’s even more stringent Phase 2 criteria.

The company also hopes to obtain approval for this model, known as the Log Fire Series 2000, to be sold within the

Christchurch clean air zone this winter. The result of three years intensive product development at the company’s high-tech Mangere laboratory, the Series 2000 represents a significant breakthrough in technology and is protected by world-wide patent applications. Along with other new design elements, it features a ceramic lining which enables the heaters to burn cleaner, hotter and more efficiently.

The E.P.A.’s Phase 2 programme is widely regarded as the most demanding emission test in the world.

To pass the test, Kent’s new heater had to undergo 15 months testing and development in conjunction with an inde-

pendent laboratory in Portland, Oregon.

Results showed that compared with existing standards, the new wood heater substantially improved heat output and significantly reduced smoke emissions.

Under the tough new E.P.A. regulations, no manufacturer, after 1992, will be able to sell a wood heater in the United States that does not comply with the Phase 2 criteria.

To enable it to meet the standards, Kent commissioned one of the most sophisticated computer controlled testing laboratories in the world. The facility is used to test all new Kent heaters before they are released on the market.

Kent entered the wood heating industry during the energy crisis in the late 1970 s and quickly became an industry leader.

After establishing itself as market leader in Australia, the company turned to the tough United Stalest market, regarded as the biggest wood heater market in the world. At the time about 400 manufacturers were operating there. With its highly efficient, clean burning heaters, Kent soon became recognised as a major force.

Less than 12 months after it entered the United States market the industry experienced the biggest shake-up in its history and today only a fraction of the original 400 manufacturers remain.

In spite of this Kent has climbed into the top 10 in terms of market share and is acknowledged as an industry innovator in efficiency, pollution control and design. The company’s general manager, Bruce Watson, said now a wood heater could meet the world’s strictest anti-pollution laws, wood had an exciting future in terms of world energy requirements.

“Wood is the world’s only renewable energy source,” he said. “What we have now is a clean burning wood heater which will allow us to use this energy source well into the twenty-first century and beyond. “In developing a technology which will allow us

to do this we have also developed a product which has single fingertip control like any other heating appliance — a major benefit as far as the consumer is concerned.

“The open fire, which still heats many New Zealand homes, has an efficiency level as low as 10 per cent. With the glass (clear ceramic) fronted heaters we have today, we have an appliance which not only has the romance of an open fire but a combustion efficiency of almost 100 per cent. "Apart from that, we have a heater that gives eight times the usable heat from the same amount of wood, and a heat source that is totally acceptable environmentally.”