Did you grow up with wood heating? Your kids might.

The popularity of heating with wood is increasing along with the price of gas.

Wood (as in seasoned, split logs) is sold in cords. Demand is skyrocketing in places like New England, where much of the home heating is done through oil. Also, many homes still have wood burning stoves that have been dormant since oil became cheap in the 90s.

Pellet stoves are a new wood burning concept. The pellets are compressed sawdust with no additives. Simple high compression turns them into neat little pellets that can be poured into a stove. Burning pellets instead of burying sawdust is a good way to cut down on construction industry waste.

The great thing about burning wood is that it's renewable. The amount of gas emissions is equal to gas pulled into the wood while it was in a living tree. Wood stoves are very efficient forms of heating, especially if a house is well-insulated. A high-efficiency stove can be stoked once in the morning and once or twice in the evening and keep burning all day.

Wood burning had a popularity boost during the last fuel crunch, and it looks like that boost is coming back. It's a good example of how market forces overcome energy problems in a free economy.

Good points. However, I think you will find that many larger metropolitan areas do not permit wood buring stoves due to polution concerns. You don't find many wood stoves in housing built since the 80's or earlier. Most opted for natural gas stoves which of course just contributes to the dependance on the apparently fragile centralized supply chain.

If the crunch actually does come and oil products become unavailable, it's going to get really ugly. There aren't enough woodstoves for everyone.

Smoke from wood heaters is a major cause of air pollution. In fact, during winter, wood heaters can produce two to three times as much particle pollution as cars. Not only is a smoking fire wasting your money, but the air pollution it causes can also affect our health.don't like the sound of that .can you image what would happen if we all had would heating

I agree with eggman here, but even so Ive noticed a huge spike in stove sales at the co-op that I work at, and they cost 2 grand at least, and the cost of finding wood is probably not that cheaper than gas in the long term. Because the fir pellets arent all that cheap, especially since the stoves go through alot of those things fairly quickly.
I would rather just put more insulation in my attic and seal or re-seal my windows to prevent heat escaping. No stoves for me.

[edit on 21-9-2005 by patient810]

In fact I will be cutting 2 cords or more for the winter this weekend to put into my earth stove. I still don't pay more than $100.00 a month in heat bills as I refuse to give the crooks my money. Growing up my father used to burn about 5 to 6 cords a winter to heat our home, it's 5k square feet and in Grand Lake, CO. USA. In Denver you can get buy easily on 2 cords. The problem is there aren't enough trees in the world to support the population..

Actually a properly set up wood stove produces very little contaminaints due to modern catalitic combustion chambers being installed on them. Now as to wether or not people actual service those chambers and make sure they are working properly thats another story. Plus you have those that burn green wood which doesnt get hot enough and produces tons of smoke and cresote, but never fear those that do that will soon have a chimney fire. Personally i burn wood and this year ill be using wood in my homemade out door wood boiler .

If HFH keeps on with their massive clear-cutting we will be treeless very soon..

We burn wood, and we have a few years supply ready. Always have.

Originally posted by GrndLkNatv
In Denver you can get buy easily on 2 cords.

No, you can't. You will get arrested first. Due to Denver's really bad smog problem, buring wood to heat your home is against the law within the city limits, or at least it was about 5 years ago. I can't imagine the air is any cleaner there now.

Wood burning was a thing of our past. I'm not sure there's a whole lot of wood left -- I could and hopefully be wrong about it but either way we use more wood than grown. That I'm very sure about.

So -- Oil and Gas is gone then what? It's scary to me, not for me but my Son and his offspring to come.

Dallas

dallas you obviously havent read anyone elses posts in this thread, wood buring is not the past it is commonly used in current days. Just at a glance i see two individuals in this thread stating they use wood heat and thats including me. Personally i know more people that use wood heat then i do that use gas or oil heat.

"No, you can't. You will get arrested first. Due to Denver's really bad smog problem, buring wood to heat your home is against the law within the city limits, or at least it was about 5 years ago. I can't imagine the air is any cleaner there now. "

You obviously have no clue. With a second stage wood stove, all wood burning is legal anywhere in the US at any time, just ask the EPA. I haven't been arrested yet, nor will I ever be for burning wood and my family has been burning wood for heat on this continent since 1609.
Watch my house be warm all winter long with my wood stove, I am cutting two cords this Saturday which I will enjoy burning this winter.

Yeah, no clue at all...

From www.denvergov.org...

The Division of Environmental Quality is responsible for enforcing Denver’s ban on wood burning on “red” pollution days, reviewing permits for variances to the wood burning ordinance, and responding to complaints. The use of chimineas, fire pits, patio or outdoor "fireplace" devices or structures are all restricted under either the open burning or wood burning ordinances.

High pollution season runs from November 1 through March 31 of every year. During this time, it is unlawful to burn any solid fuel (including firelogs) in a fireplace or stove on high pollution "RED" days, unless an exemption has been granted in the form of a permit.

The reused Municipal Code, Chapter 4, "Air Pollution Control", Article III, "Stationary Sources", Section 4-24, "Combustion", states:
"(c) Solid fuel burning.
(1) High-pollution day prohibition. It shall be unlawful for any person to operate a solid-fuel-fired device during a high-pollution day unless a permit has been granted by the manager pursuant to this section. It shall be the responsibility of all persons owning or operating a solid-fuel-fired device to be aware of any declaration of a high-pollution day by the Colorado Department of Health."

However I was partially wrong. It's just on "Red" days. Of course, most days in the Winter are "Red" days due to the inversion layer trapping the smog and vehicle exhaust below 7000 ft.

Ya know, I used to have to drive down into that mess everyday from 9000 ft. for 7 years. Then I lived in downtown Denver for a while. Oh, but I don't have a clue...

Originally posted by eggman
Smoke from wood heaters is a major cause of air pollution.

My wood stove has a catalytic converter that lowers its grams of soot per hour from 10 to 1.5. The stove also heats my household water via a black iron pipe that wraps around the top of it (in the summer I use passive solar). As far as fire wood goes... I live in a small city area and there are always people throwing out green trash, branches, etc. I collect from curbs in sept w/ my pickup and chainsaw and have enough for every winter without buying cords. City folk in America will throw away perfectly good firewood (probably because they have no where to burn it).

Sri Oracle

Originally posted by minniescar
Actually a properly set up wood stove produces very little contaminaints due to modern catalitic combustion chambers being installed on them. Now as to wether or not people actual service those chambers and make sure they are working properly thats another story. Plus you have those that burn green wood which doesnt get hot enough and produces tons of smoke and cresote, but never fear those that do that will soon have a chimney fire. Personally i burn wood and this year ill be using wood in my homemade out door wood boiler .

That's what I want. I'd like to use it to heat my house and my barn both. Aer they hard to get, hard to install, expensive? I already have a boiler system set up for the house, so it would be easy to convert it from gas to the outdoor woodstove.

Originally posted by Dallas

Wood burning was a thing of our past. I'm not sure there's a whole lot of wood left -- I could and hopefully be wrong about it but either way we use more wood than grown. That I'm very sure about.

So -- Oil and Gas is gone then what? It's scary to me, not for me but my Son and his offspring to come.

Dallas

Don't worry, Dallas. Wood may be short supply in Texax but believe me there's plenty of it most every place else. Drive through Pennsylvania or NYS some time. All you see is trees, trees, trees. No people, just mountains covered with trees. If you went up in a plane, flew over the country, you'd see most of the country is nothing but trees, with here and there a cluster of houses and cities. Look on a map of the US and notice that the cities and towns are just pinpricks. In between are mostly trees. Also even in the pinpricks themselves it's mostly trees, but there are some houses at least located in the pinpricks.

The whole population of the world would fit in the state of Texas with room for houses, schools, stores, parks, you name it. Everyone could live comfortably. That leaves the entire rest of the world for trees. So I'd stop worrying about that if I were you.

The whole population of the world would fit in the state of Texas with room for houses, schools, stores, parks, you name it. Everyone could live comfortably. That leaves the entire rest of the world for trees. So I'd stop worrying about that if I were you.

Huh?

I doubt the entire world could fit in Texas. And if even so, it wouldn't be comfortable.. Think of the traffic!



[edit on 2-10-2005 by Thatoneguy]

Originally posted by Thatoneguy

The whole population of the world would fit in the state of Texas with room for houses, schools, stores, parks, you name it. Everyone could live comfortably. That leaves the entire rest of the world for trees. So I'd stop worrying about that if I were you.

Huh?

I doubt the entire world could fit in Texas. And if even so, it wouldn't be comfortable.. Think of the traffic!

[edit on 2-10-2005 by Thatoneguy]

If you went up in a plane over the entire state of Texas you'd see most of it is
wide open spaces, no houses or people to be seen for miles and miles. Plenty of room for the entire world's population to live comfortably.

if every one went into texas the population density would be about 31 000 people per squre kilometer. the most space you could possibly have is about 30 sq metres, like an average bedroom. you might think that is enough, but then move around some people for walla, roads, shops and stuff, it be very very crowded.

any way my family uses a wood fire, and we cut wood that has fallen on the side of the road from trees.
how much is a cord?
i know we burn about 4 or so good ute loads through the year.

there would be enough wood for every one if it was managed properly, lots of people live in places where heating isnt neccesary.

Originally posted by tiddly54
if every one went into texas the population density would be about 31 000 people per squre kilometer. the most space you could possibly have is about 30 sq metres, like an average bedroom. you might think that is enough, but then move around some people for walla, roads, shops and stuff, it be very very crowded.

any way my family uses a wood fire, and we cut wood that has fallen on the side of the road from trees.
how much is a cord?
i know we burn about 4 or so good ute loads through the year.

there would be enough wood for every one if it was managed properly, lots of people live in places where heating isnt neccesary.

You can put a lot of people in a highrise. How'd you calculate that? Are you sure you're right? I read the calculations awahile back on that, and I can't remember what they were, and I know the population has grown some, but I'm just wondering how you came up with your figure.

Thanks.