If you’ve got a fireplace, wood stove, pellet stove, or similar device in Metro Vancouver, there’s an important change you need to know about: Bylaw 1303 (2020), the Residential Indoor Wood Burning Bylaw. It aims to reduce wood smoke in our region to protect air quality, health, and the environment. Here’s what you should know — and what you need to do.What does the bylaw cover?
- It covers indoor wood-burning devices: things like fireplaces, fireplace inserts, masonry heaters, wood stoves, pellet stoves, wood-burning furnaces.
- The bylaw targets fine particulate matter emissions, which are harmful to health, especially for children, seniors, and people with lung or heart conditions.
- It includes rules (best practices) about what to burn, how to burn, and when wood-burning is allowed—especially during the warm season.
Key deadlines & requirements
- If you're in an urban area (inside the Urban Containment Boundary), you must register your eligible wood-burning device by September 15, 2025.
- Registration is free and confirms your device is low-emission (or meets eligibility criteria).
- Starting September 15, 2025, only registered devices will be allowed to burn clean wood, wood pellets, or manufactured fire logs (and for regular fireplaces, manufactured fire logs only) in urban areas.
What qualifies as “eligible” and what “best practices” means
Eligible devices are those that:- Meet certain emission/photo-certification standards.
- In some cases, are the only heating source in your home, or use manufactured fire logs exclusively.
- Burning only clean, well-seasoned wood; manufactured fire logs; or wood pellets.
- Never burning garbage, plastic, treated or painted wood.
- Keeping fires small, hot, and avoiding smouldering.
- No visible smoke (except briefly when starting a fire)
- Regular maintenance of your device.
What happens if you don’t register or comply
- After September 15, 2025, unregistered devices in urban areas cannot be used unless they’re eligible and compliant under the bylaw.
- There are fines for non-compliance (municipal ticketing) after education and warning stages.
What you should do now
- Check if your address is within the Urban Containment Boundary. If yes, you likely need to register.
- Check if your device is eligible. Look for certification/emissions info, or whether it meets criteria for manufactured fire logs only, etc.
- Fill out a declaration of compliance with best burning practices.
- Register your device (if it is eligible) before September 15, 2025. It’s free.
- Adjust how you burn: use clean, seasoned fuel; avoid smoky, smouldering fires.
- Register here: metrovancouver.org
By taking these steps, not only do you stay onside legally, you also help improve air quality in our neighbourhoods. Cleaner air = healthier communities.
