Wood Pellet Stove Blog

A wood pellet stove is now a viable alternative to modern methods of heating your home, and is itself a surprisingly recent innovation. During the 1980’s this form of heating became quite popular, and has recently enjoyed a resurgence in interest. But what are the advantages of a wood pellet stove, and why should you consider one for your home?

Firstly what exactly is a wood pellet stove? Generally free standing but also available in fireplace insert form, a pellet burning stove simply uses special hardwood pellets and is designed to offer the same convenience and cleanliness expected of modern appliances, including safe and clean operation, thermostatic controls, and most importantly it is self feeding so constant attention is not required as with traditional wood burning stoves. Simply fill with pellets switch on and set your thermostat and the stove will burn for hours or days at a constant regulated temperature with no intervention from you.

An important distinction between wood pellet stoves and traditional wood burning stoves is that due to the construction and burn properties of the wood pellets they are consumed at a steady and predictable rate with virtually no creosote buildup. In addition they are incredibly safe, posing much less risk to the surrounding environment such as walls and furniture than traditional stoves.

Wood pellet materials and construction are integral to the safety and predictability that exemplify modern wood pellet stoves. Wood pellets are constructed from timber and other timber by-products often unused for other purposes, making them inherently environmentally friendly. They burn with almost no smoke and critically do not contribute to greenhouse effects and consequently global warming. Just as importantly no wood chopping is required making the process of heating a home much easier and certainly more pleasant.

Another huge advantage is that the wood pellet stove outlet at the back or top of the unit does not become hot anywhere near to the same degree as a traditional wood stove, which means a masonry chimney is not necessarily required in your home. If you have one then it can of course be used, but if not the stove can be installed wherever a metal liner or flue can be positioned through a wall or out of the roof. This is often impossible using a wood burning stove.

It must be noted however that a wood pellet stove is not as useful for remote locations where a traditional stove may be the better choice. In remote homes with no electricity for example a stove which burns chopped wood may be the only available option as most pellet stoves require electricity to run, in particular to power the electronic thermostatic controls. Remember this is a modern appliance designed for modern convenient living, but with the advantage of being particularly clean and environmentally friendly, it is not designed for rugged outdoor living.

Interestingly the fuel costs associated with a wood pellet stove are comparable with oil and natural gas, much lower on average than electricity prices. So to answer our question, is a wood pellet stove a viable and practical alternative for heating your home, the answer would appear to be yes.

http://www.woodpelletgrill.info provides additional information about wood pellet appliances of all kinds, including wood pellet stoves for heating and wood pellet grills for cooking.

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Wood, pellet stove sales heating up

Published Wednesday August 12th, 2009 A6 By CHRIS FOX
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It’s hard to top a record summer, but those selling wood and pellet stoves in Fredericton say they’re at least going to be close.

Helped in part by skyrocketing home-heating oil prices, wood and pellet stoves flew of the shelves last summer and were practically impossible to find by mid-August.

Demand is down slightly this summer, but most in the industry say sales have been steady and will only pick up as August moves on and fall nears.

“Things are rolling right along. We aren’t getting the backlog that we were last year. Last year we were selling stoves in June and weren’t receiving them till November, but it has been busy,” said Steve Buckingham, owner of Sunpoke Energy Systems.

“We have four seasons here. Start of winter, winter, end of winter and getting ready for winter, and I suppose everybody is getting ready for winter now.”

At this time last summer the maximum price for furnace oil including delivery was capped at $1.29 per litre by the Energy and Utilities Board. The maximum price now is 83 cents.

Buckingham said the decrease in price hasn’t had a major effect on sales. He said an increased number of federal and provincial programs providing financial incentives to those purchasing EPA-approved stoves are the major factor for his customers.

“There are an awful lot of government incentives at the present to go green and that has helped,” he said.

“If you do it right, you can put a new EPA-approved wood stove or a pellet stove in and if the math works out, you can spend $2,000 on a new wood stove and eventually all it will cost you will be $575, so that is pretty big savings there.”

Gene Cavanaugh, owner of the Chimney Sweeps on Union Street, said he has been surprised with how strong business has been recently, especially when compared to a record summer for his store in 2008.

“I don’t think there is any change. From my end everything has been pretty much on pace. I mean last year it did take a boom especially with pellet stoves, but so far our sales have been pretty much the same,” he said.

“I suppose people are just more and more wanting the alternative and I think they do think environmentally.”

Cavanaugh, who noted that pellet stoves have been his most popular product this summer, said the only significant change from 2008 he has seen is in the number of stoves stores such as his have in stock. He said because of that he doesn’t expect retailers to run out of stoves, as they did in 2008.

“You never can tell for sure, but I expect it (a shortage) won’t be a problem,” he said.

While a stove shortage or a pellet shortage similar to last summer is unlikely, Bill Goss, a supervisor at Home Hardware on Main Street, said wood might be in short supply, especially if wood stoves continue to be a hot ticket.

“I think there will be a shortage of wood, not necessarily pellets, but wood,” he said. “A friend of mine cuts wood for a living and he says he has lost at least four weeks this summer due to the wet woods.

“Everybody is going to buy their wood stoves, but if they don’t have a source of wood, they are going to have a rather expensive ornament sitting in their family room.” Please Log In or Register FREE

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Continuing on from Harman Pellet stove is the Harman PC 45 Corn Stove the state of art corn burning stove, the PC 45 stove has been designed to burn shelled corn but with a quick change of a burn pot can be used to burn pellet fuel too, all without tools.

After careful research the Harman team found that some form of agitator was required if there corn stove was to break the magic 40,000 BTU. Typically corn melt and fuses and forms partly burnt clinkers, but if the burning corn is agitated these ‘clinkes’ will be broken up and allowed to burn further. The corn ash ejected into the ash pan of the Harman Corn Stove is more completely burned than others stoves in the market.

The PC 45 Corn Stove is designed to be one of the longest between cleaning interval around, where other stoves need to be cleaned every few days at best , the PC 45 corn stove can last upto 2 weeks before the ash pan needs to be cleaned. The PC 45 is the first practical auto-ignition corn stove available. The igniter is designed to light corn in less than five minutes.

Harman’s automatic temperature control eliminates “hot/cold” cycles. The real advantage of this system is efficiency by means of eliminating the 3 degree “overshooting” of a set temperature, fuel is not wasted by making the room warmer than is actually desired.

The Harman PC 45 has a large swing open ash door which is great for removing the over sized ash pan and includes carrying handles for easy transportation.

The Harman PC 45 is easily converted to burning pellets. An optional grate kit can be purchased if the customer desires to alternate between fuels. The corn igniter can ignite pellets in less than one minute after the initial feed stops.

Essential Guide to Harman Corn Stoves FAQ and Reviews on Corn Stoves.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Simon_Hemmings
http://EzineArticles.com/?Harman-PC-45-Corn-Stove&id=1551083

Since the fuel prices are rocketing worldwide, we try to invent new cheaper ways to heat our homes. It is very expensive to install such advanced heating devices as solar systems and heat pumps. We need something more down to earth. Fortunately cheaper alternatives to heating are available. Corn stove is one of the alternatives. Under certain circumstances you might be able to grow what you burn.

A corn stove is a heating appliance that provides heat by burning shelled corn. Corn stove, if bought from an established company, has to come with a certificate of safety. Regrettably, many customers are buying fake stoves or burners made by private craftsmen. To add to their problems they use corn stove with an unsuitable burning material. To avoid extra outlay and keep your home safe, always buy from a trustworthy dealer and ask to see the certificate. Lately it has become a problem that many people are burning wood pellets or other materials in a corn stove, especially in countries where wood pellets are cheaper than shelled corn.

You have to be aware that with a particular type of corn stoves, burning wood pellets is very dangerous. Before deciding to switch from shelled corn to wood pellets you need to check back with your dealer and ask him if the corn stove model you use is fit for burning wood pellets. Without going into too much detail, there are two types of corn stove – a positive pressure and negative pressure. Positive pressure feeds from the shelled corn stock kept in the hopper. The hopper is also used as a seal to keep poisonous gases from escaping. As the amount of shelled corn in the hopper decreases, some poisonous gases can get out. It wouldn’t be a problem if you were to burn shelled corn because it produces only carbon dioxide, which is relatively harmless. Wood pellets are a different story. When burnt, they also generate carbon monoxide – a potentially lethal gas.

Negative pressure corn stove can burn wood pellets, but again, you have to check with your dealer. It is also possible to convert a positive pressure corn stove to negative pressure with a DIY kit. Gases are not the only issue. To form wood pellets a bonding agent is added. If it is wax-based, it can produce sticky residue and jam some narrower parts of the corn stove.

Corn stove is designed to supply homes with cheaper and greener energy. From the environmental point of view, converting from shelled corn to wood pellets woudn’t be environmentally friendly any more as pellets would generate considerable amount of carbon monoxide and add to pollution.

Terence Green is an environmental activist campaigning for green energy. Learn more about corn stove models and the latest developments in shelled corn production.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Terence_Green
http://EzineArticles.com/?Dangers-of-Burning-Wood-Pellets-in-a-Corn-Stove&id=1787494