California Enacts New Wildfire Smoke-Damage Rules: What AB 1642 and AB 1795 Change

AB 1642 focuses primarily on environmental and public-health standards.

The law directs the Department of Toxic Substances Control, working with the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment and other state agencies, to develop regulations governing lead and asbestos testing, remediation, and restoration after wildfires by December 31, 2028.

Additional guidance for specified contaminants is due by December 31, 2029. The California Air Resources Board must also develop guidance by December 31, 2028 addressing indoor-air contaminants following residential wildfire smoke damage.

Until the new lead and asbestos rules are completed, AB 1642 supplies interim standards for determining whether residential properties within a wildfire impact zone are cleared for human occupancy with respect to wildfire-caused lead and asbestos contamination.

The law therefore creates both interim rules and a longer-term regulatory system that will continue developing through 2028 and 2029.

AB 1795 creates several insurance rules for qualifying residential wildfire smoke-damage claims.

One of the most important is a new rebuttable presumption. If wildfire smoke, ash, soot, char, or combustion byproducts are present in a surviving residential property located within the statutory wildfire impact zone after a wildfire, the law presumes that resulting smoke damage was caused by that wildfire.

“Rebuttable” matters. The law creates a starting presumption concerning causation; it does not make coverage automatic, establish that every claimed item is damaged, require payment for every requested remediation measure, or prevent an insurer from presenting contrary evidence.

Coverage and the amount owed still depend on the applicable statute, policy, facts, and claim.

AB 1795 defines a wildfire impact zone using geography. For these provisions, it generally means a ZIP Code that is wholly or partially within the wildfire’s mapped fire perimeter.

That definition matters because several protections are specifically tied to surviving residential properties within the zone. The law should not be described as applying identically to every property that experiences distant smoke anywhere in California.

For a covered residential smoke-damage claim within the wildfire impact zone, AB 1795 provides that an insurer may not terminate additional-living-expense coverage until the property has been restored to preloss condition and cleared for human occupancy under the applicable standards.

That protection remains subject to the applicable policy limit.

The statute defines restoration to preloss condition as returning the residential property to the condition that existed before the wildfire smoke exposure. It does not require improvements, upgrades, or betterments beyond that prior condition.

For claims governed by the statute, the insurer is responsible for the cost of sampling and testing necessary to restore the damaged property to preloss condition and clear it for human occupancy.

The testing must follow the applicable regulatory standards and remains subject to the terms and provisions of the insurance policy.

This is narrower than saying an insurer must pay for any testing a homeowner requests. The testing must be necessary within the framework established by the law.

If an insurer chooses to exercise its right to inspect the smoke-damaged property, AB 1795 requires the inspection as soon as practicable and generally no later than 30 calendar days after notice of the claim.

If government restrictions prevent access, the 30-day period generally runs from when access becomes available.

The statute also establishes payment deadlines for specified undisputed amounts involving personal-property restoration, total-loss personal property, and replacement-cost payments. Payments not made within the applicable statutory timeframes accrue interest under Insurance Code section 2057.

The precise deadline depends on the category of payment; the law does not create one universal 30-day payment rule for every aspect of a claim.

No automatic retroactive application should be implied.

The January 2025 fires helped shape the legislation. But Insurance Code section 2060.2 states that its residential claims provisions apply to claims occurring on or after that section’s operative date.

Eaton or Palisades survivors therefore should not be told that the newly enacted claims rules automatically govern their existing 2025 losses. Those claims may still involve other California insurance statutes, regulations, policy terms, and legal remedies.

The legislation is better understood as a framework informed by the 2025 experience and intended to govern qualifying claims prospectively according to its operative provisions.

AB 1795 also addresses a separate insurance issue following the June 2026 Lineage Logistics warehouse fire in Boyle Heights.

The statute directs the California Department of Insurance to study gaps in coverage where residents or businesses suffer smoke-related losses but no mandatory evacuation order exists.³

The study must examine possible future triggers for residential additional-living-expense coverage and commercial business-interruption coverage. Concepts for study include air-quality thresholds, public-health advisories, and voluntary evacuation.

These are possible future coverage triggers, not changes enacted by AB 1795. The Department must conduct the study by July 1, 2027 and issue its final written report by December 1, 2027.

Businesses evaluating smoke-related losses may also face separate questions involving business and commercial disputes, policy wording, causation, and proof of loss.

Smoke-damage disputes can become highly technical.

Potentially important evidence may include photographs and video taken after the fire; insurer communications; inspection reports; laboratory results; sampling plans; remediation scopes; contractor estimates; invoices; receipts; contents inventories; additional-living-expense documentation; air-quality information; and records showing the property’s preloss condition.

The applicable framework will continue developing as California agencies implement the new testing and remediation standards. Preserving contemporaneous evidence can be important when a property’s condition or the scope of necessary remediation later becomes disputed.

Mahrouyan Law handles selected property damage and restoration claims involving technical evidence, loss of use, and related insurance issues where appropriate.

AB 1642 and AB 1795 address a problem that became particularly visible after the Los Angeles wildfires: a building may remain standing while the extent of smoke-related contamination remains disputed.

The new laws attempt to make that process more structured through environmental testing standards, defined clearance requirements, a causation presumption in qualifying residential cases, claims-handling rules, and future regulatory deadlines.

But they do not eliminate ordinary insurance questions. Policy language, coverage, limits, causation evidence, property location, claim timing, and the actual scope of damage can still matter.