Today, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, sent a letter to the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) requesting documents and information about CPSC’s failure to establish safety standards or provide warnings to consumers on the significant health risks posed by air pollutants emitted from gas stoves despite having knowledge of potential risks as early as 1986.
“[T]he Commission has failed, among other things, to develop standards limiting most types of indoor air pollution from gas stoves, require effective exhaust hoods, or facilitate the introduction of meaningful warning labels to inform consumers about the health risks from gas stoves and the importance of proper ventilation,” Chairman Krishnamoorthi wrote. “CPSC’s Safety Education Materials Library offers only a general, high-level guide about indoor air quality that contains a few cursory mentions of gas stoves.”
Gas stoves, which are used by more than one-third of U.S. households, emit harmful levels of several pollutants, including nitrogen dioxide (NO2). The high levels of these pollutants present significant health risks, particularly to children, who are at a greater risk for asthma if they live in a home with a gas stove. While proper ventilation in the form of an exhaust hood has the potential to reduce this indoor pollution, many homes are not equipped with hoods, others have hoods that do not provide proper ventilation, and many people who do have hoods do not use them.
The CPSC has the authority either to issue mandatory standards and require warning labels or to work with industry to develop voluntary standards and labels that would address indoor air pollution from gas stoves. Despite this authority and the 1986 EPA report, the CPSC has neither issued formal standards to address the safety risks of indoor gas stoves nor facilitated the introduction of warning labels.
In his letter, the Chairman requested information and documents about what steps the CPSC has considered with regards to issuing mandatory or recommending voluntary standards to address the health risks of indoor air pollution from gas stoves.
Click here to read the letter to the CPSC.
Original source can be found here.
