Advantages of Wood Stoves

Whether you heat your home exclusively with wood or light just an occasional fire to take the chill off, you are among the one-third of the U.S. that uses alternative fuels. Wood stove advances now provide air washed glass to see the flames, cast iron, steel or soapstone construction, and designs that will complement any décor. Dull black as the mandatory color has given way to enamels such as ivory, hunter green, crimson red and even sapphire blue along with matching enamel stove pipe. It is an exciting new world of wood stoves, with prices that range from $300 to over $3,000, depending on size and style.

Power Outage

If you live in a city, where 30 or 40 other people share your building, then the heating aspect of day-to-day life is taken care of for you. Pay your rent and the property owner provides you with heat. However, if you own your own home and depend on electricity to power your heating system, then a power outage of any considerable length during the winter becomes a major concern, possibly life threatening. A wood stove provides a homeowner with peace of mind. The necessities of heat, light, the ability to cook and heat water to bathe with are all welcomed by-products of this independence.

Fuel Cost

Many people in the U.S. have access to an unlimited supply of free wood, which puts their fuel cost expenditure for heating their home at almost zero. Of course, there are costs involved, perhaps for a new chain saw blade or a tarp to cover the woodpile, plus your labor, but compared to full seasonal heating bills, the cost is insignificant. Seasoned wood that has been dried in a wood shed for a year or two is available from local entrepreneurs for a price.

Tailor Made

There are numerous choices for a person to select from when it comes to purchasing a wood stove. The stoves built after 1992 have all been EPA certified to be more efficient and less polluting. These newer stoves provide more heat than the older stoves did by re-burning the harmful gases from the wood that would normally go up the chimney. Manufacturers such as Jotul, Hearthstone, Lopi, Vermont Castings and Vogelzang provide different models and styles that will meet the specific square-footage requirements a homeowner has. If at all possible, a wood stove should provide more BTUs than are required to heat the home, so that it does not have to operate at maximum capacity all the time.

Go Green

The EPA forced manufacturers to comply with their specifications by reducing the amount of particulate matter that enters the atmosphere as a result of burning wood to 4.1 grams an hour. The stoves with catalytic converters were required to be 72% efficient, while the non-catalytic stoves were required to be 63% efficient. The older stoves prior to the regulations were as low as 40% - 50% efficient. So today's wood stoves are burning cleaner and more efficiently than ever. Saving electricity, natural gas or propane gas by burning wood helps to reduce the carbon footprint that humanity is leaving. It is still up to the wood stove owner to act responsibly and always use seasoned wood instead of green wood that will produce more smoke and drop the efficiency of the stove. It actually uses some of the BTU's that it produces to help dry it out as it is burning, so the net result is less heat in the home and more creosote buildup in the chimney.

Control

The user can control how the wood burns just by what type of wood he selects. Different types of wood have different burning effects--for example, hardwoods like hickory or white oak provide high BTU's and long burn times, as opposed to soft woods like maple and poplar that burn hot, but very fast.

Resources

• Wood Stove