i have a coal stove that also takes 18" logs...
Posted on 06/22/2008 7:15:57 PM PDT by Kevin J waldroup
“I bet there is a LOT of energy in the wax coated paper cups and containers that most fast food places use.”
Sounds like the start of a business plan. I bet that recycling depots would love to find a market for those things.
I suspect a refrigerator could be assisted with the pellet heat. I doubt there would be enough gain to make it worth the expense however.
I bought a pellet fireplace insert a few weeks ago, and I went back to the store and bought three tons of pellets. I hope to get delivery next week. I agree—even if they don’t run out, the price will surely go up by next fall.
I hesitated a week before buying the insert, and I almost missed out. I got one of the last ones that our stove store could locate anywhere.
We have a wood burning stove at the other end of the house, but lugging firewood for two stoves just seemed like too much to get into, so I decided on the pellet insert for our second oil saver.
$285. a ton??????
I was a dealer for pellet stoves back in the late 80’s and early 90’s. Pellets were $120. a ton, my cost, and I had a very small markup hoping to make up some profit on stove sales. didn’t work. Quit selling them. I see absolutely no advantage economically using pellets for heat. But they are green and save the environment.
The heat is nice. The stoves operate by themselves virtually. I even had one myself. After quitting business I had to pay retail for the pellets and at that time the breaking point economically compared to propane was $180 a ton. When I moved, my new home had a wood furnace and I sold the pellet stove. I can still cut my own wood and heat the whole house for under $200 a year.
compared to oil heat the pellets may be feasable. But a $1000 low emissions wood stove and wood at $150 a cord if you buy it is the way to go. Keep the part of the house you spend the most time in warm, and the ambient heat will keep the chill off the rest of the house.
CO2 emissions from decomposing wood are equal to burning wood. The only difference is that burning wood releases the energy concentration rapidly, while the decomposition process is a very slow release of energy.
And wood is a renewable resource. An acre of forest will have a natural turn over of approximately a cord of wood from downed limbs etc. Selective harvesting of wood improves the forest stand. And a good forest cancels out the CO2 emissions because it converts the CO2 into O2.
with the clean burn technology available, an EPA Certified wood stove will provide many years of economical heat with very little environmental impact. And a wood stove is a great backup for when the power is out. I know I really appreciated mine when we were out of power for 3 days after an ice storm last winter. A pellet stove is worthless without power.
Sounds like the start of a business plan. I bet that recycling depots would love to find a market for those things.
I have suggested it a few times in discussions with friends and coworkers. I also bet it would take less energy to create the pellets because of the wax. I think the containers wouldn't even need to be washed. The food material left in the mix also contains a reasonable amount of energy (a heck of a lot more than peanut shells).
Now if we can get a fast food chain to set up separate bins for the paper trash we're in. We'll buy the trash from them before it gets to the landfill.
I got my stove in 91, one of the original Whitfields. I remember pellets for 2.50 a bag.
Those days are long gone. Plus, it’s been quite spotty for pellet availabilty last few years, they keep saying “we don’t have the material....”
I’ve been thinking about a second stove for my bedroom. A small, straight, plain old fashioned wood stove.
A bit shy of three tons of pellets last winter. But I burned my stove all the way through May because it’s basically been the pits in the PNW this spring.
The price for wood pellets has skyrocketed over the past couple of years. Now that all these yahoos are buying them, they’ll be charging way more this winter. Soon, it won’t make sense to use this as an alternative.
I feel for the yankees. It's going to be a cold, bitter, expensive winter this year.
/johnny
I paid about $5 a bag last year, so at a bag a day, $150 per month plus the electricity to run the auger. If the electricity goes out, there is no heat. I have one pellet stove in the living room and one in the bedroom, but I keep the second one off because I can’t control the heat and it gets too warm.
Personally, I find the whole thing a pain, but I have no central heat, gas or propane, so I have little choice at the moment. It needs to be filled about twice a day, so you can’t leave for a couple of days and keep the heat on low.
More than three quarters of the homes in my area use wood stoves to heat, and we have some of the cleanest, clearest air in the country.
i have a coal stove that also takes 18" logs...
I’ve been seeing woollie bullie caterpillars this year like they’re going out of style.
If all the old rumors are true, that means we’ll really have to hunker down this winter!!
I found my pellet stove was good supplemental heat when outside temps were not too cold. But the stove couldn’t keep up when the temps were below 15 degrees.
My stove held 40# of pellets. I could turn it down real low, but a the high rate it had the tendency to push off unburnt pellets and fill the ash pan.
$150 a month heat bill is not too bad all things considered.
But having to fill it twice a day is very inconvenient. Mine could go all day set on medium heat, on one load.
/johnny
HINT! Move south.
/johnny
I can pick up enough wood for my stove behind my house. But the pellets have to be trucked hundreds of miles, adding to the expense. Plus the energy used trucking the pellets has to be factored in. I got enough wood from my neighbors, after the ice storm last year, to almost supply half a season of heat for my wood furnace.
My cost? A few hours labor and some gas and oil for the chain saw. I call it sweat equity.
My mom/dad have a wood stove insert in the central mass fireplace. It gets so hot they only burn it when it drops into the teens at night. It will run you out of the house at higher outside temps.
There are simple things a person can do.
I have bunches of old gatorade bottles filled with water in case the water goes out, which I admit it very rarely does around here, I’m near Seattle.
Take a quart of water before you go to bed, put it on the burner, get it up to about 150 degrees and dump it in a gatorade bottle.
You could turn the heat in your house OFF for the night and that’s enough to keep you warm till about 3 in the afternoon next day.
Simple stuff.
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