New York City's coal- and wood-fired pizza ovens may have to slice carbon emissions by up to 75% under new rules proposed by the city's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).
"All New Yorkers deserve to breathe healthy air, and wood and coal-fired stoves are among the largest contributors of harmful pollutants in neighborhoods with poor air quality," DEP spokesman Ted Timbers said in a statement on Sunday. "This common-sense rule, developed with restaurant and environmental justice groups, requires a professional review of whether installing emission controls is feasible."
The rule could require pizzerias with such ovens that were installed before May 2016 to purchase expensive emissions-control technology.
One pizza restaurant owner, who has a coal-fired oven, said that city politicians and bureaucrats should stop messing with their livelihoods.
"This is an unfunded mandate, and it's going to cost us a fortune; not to mention ruining the taste of the pizza totally destroying the product," the restaurateur, who requested anonymity from the New York Post, said.
"If you f*** around with the temperature in the oven you change the taste," he said. "That pipe, that chimney, it's that size to create the perfect updraft, keeps the temp perfect. It's an art as much as a science. You take away the char, the thing that makes the pizza taste great, you kill it."
"And for what? You really think that you're changing the environment with these eight or nine pizza ovens?" the restaurateur added.
He also said that sensitive negotiations with DEP officials are currently underway on whether coal- and wood-fired-oven pizza places can be grandfathered in or exempted from the new rule.
Less than 100 restaurants would be affected by the proposed rule, a city official told the Post.
Under the mandate, pizzerias with coal- and wood-fired ovens must hire an architect or engineer to evaluate the feasibility of installing emissions control devices to cut their particulate emissions by 75%.
If it is determined that a 75% reduction cannot be achieved, or that no emissions controls can be installed, the report must identify any controls that could reduce emissions by 25% or provide an explanation as to why no controls can be installed.
The restaurant can apply for a variance or waiver, but must prove hardship by providing evidence.
One Brooklyn pizza restauranteur said he's already spent $20,000 on an air filtration system to prepare for the new rule.
"Oh yeah, it's a big expense!" Paul Giannone, the owner of Paulie Gee's, told the Post. "It's not just the expense of having it installed, it's the maintenance. I got to pay somebody to do it, to go up there every couple of weeks and hose it down and do the maintenance."
While the air filter is "expensive" and "a huge hassle," Giannone added that there has been a silver lining.
"My neighbors are much happier," he said. "I had a guy coming in for years complaining that the smoke was, you know, going right into his apartment and I haven't seen him since I got the scrubber installed."
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