"You couldn’t live without a fire. Getting up on a rainy, grey day and no fire I mean it’s not a life. It’s not right."

That's the attitude of a professional middle-aged woman from the west of Ireland and the 'lived experience' of having a solid fuel fire and is the barrier that represents the greatest obstacle for policymakers, a new report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) by UCC and published last month found.

The report, Residential Solid Fuel Use in Ireland and the Transition Away from Solid Fuels, carried out a series of interviews with solid fuel users found that for most, having a real fire was just part and parcel of not only how they lived their lives, but also how they saw their lives.

Seán, a farmer with a young family from Cork, talked about the decision process when building their house. Although they considered a number of heating options, they went with an oil burner with secondary heating from solid fuel not only for reliability, but also for a related attribute, its familiarity.

"I like the open fire, but comfort really is what it means. I suppose, tradition. It’s nice to have the fire burning in the room, I do like it! I like the fact that we have an open fire, the same as I would have had in my own house when I was a child."

A common refrain was a variation on the phrase “you can’t beat a good fire”. This attachment was summed up one person from Mayo, who said of having a fire: "It’s the hearth. It’s the home."

Also, the report found that for many retired men, the tasks associated with the fire appear almost to be a substitute for their daily work. There appears to be a sense of feeling useful, a way perhaps of still playing the traditional male role of provider, by taking over tasks they perhaps would see as fitting with their view of themselves.

Padraic, a retired man from Laois, spoke joyfully of lighting a fire in wintertime, saying: "Yeah, you can go out there on a very cold day, snow, frost or anything, and get your fuel and come in and light a good fire."

According to the EPA report, the pride taken by Padraic in saving his winter’s fuel is obvious. "Here is a man who has worked with his hands all his life and who visibly takes pleasure from the fact that he is still able to provide and contribute to the household."

Although other respondents were not as open about their energy vulnerability, there was a good deal of discussion about how

harvested non-traded fuels were very important to a lot of households.

One woman in Mayo said "… an awful lot of people are underemployed and this is contributing to the household without having to pay any money."

Further, for many, the ability to heat their home adequately is down to, in no small part, the opportunity of saving turf and harvesting some wind-blown timber in their locality.

Without access to these fuels, householders believe that they would suffer energy poverty, with all the social and health implications of being energy poor, which includes exposure to air pollution from solid fuels.

For many respondents the practice of saving their own fuels is seen as an integral part of providing for their household.

"Ah yeah, it’s great relief when it comes to October to have your turf home and saved and dry, and a small amount of timber there," an elderly man said.