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Author Topic: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?  (Read 57721 times)

Simon

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #100 on: September 20, 2019, 04:36:27 PM »
According to this Finnish study, log burning is not good for the climate. Pellet burning is far better. The best method of home heating is heat pumps powered by zero carbon electricity. Trouble is, heat pumps only work well in well insulated houses.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421519304161


Pmt111500

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #101 on: September 20, 2019, 04:58:32 PM »
According to this Finnish study, log burning is not good for the climate. Pellet burning is far better. The best method of home heating is heat pumps powered by zero carbon electricity. Trouble is, heat pumps only work well in well insulated houses.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421519304161



Thanks Simon, I've got a friend using the pellet system, he can probably summarize more of that. On this house it isn't an option. What could work is the ground heat pump, but the lowest floors should be ripped off for installation and the owners of those parts aren't going to approve. I guess some of them would rather let the house rot than to lose rent.

VaughnAn

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #102 on: September 20, 2019, 07:38:10 PM »
My grandfather and my greatgrandfather built my house in 1909.  Needless to say, I have done major improvements including residing and insulation.  I have one section that was built in 1950 that I moved from another house.

I heat with a wood stove and have no need for air conditioning.  The wood stove I have is a Waterford 103 and needs to replaced this year as it has seen better days.  I will be afraid to use it before too long(Parts appear to be no longer available either per various stove people).  I had the chimney replaced in 1978 when I got the Waterford.  The chimney is in excellent condition. 

I live near suburbia and semi-forested land.  I am able to get all the free wood I need.  All I have to do is get it so I do use fossil fuels in my chainsaw and a pickup so that part isn't free.  Sometimes people even pay me to haul it off but I don't ask to be paid because I use it to heat my house and for other projects.  Otherwise most of this wood would either end up in a landfill or left to rot. 

Incidentally electric rates have been falling in this area as well due to renewable energy sources.  The rate of the decrease has been increasing of late as well. 

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #103 on: September 20, 2019, 09:00:06 PM »
According to this Finnish study, log burning is not good for the climate. Pellet burning is far better. The best method of home heating is heat pumps powered by zero carbon electricity. Trouble is, heat pumps only work well in well insulated houses.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421519304161



Thanks Simon, I've got a friend using the pellet system, he can probably summarize more of that. On this house it isn't an option. What could work is the ground heat pump, but the lowest floors should be ripped off for installation and the owners of those parts aren't going to approve. I guess some of them would rather let the house rot than to lose rent.
I believe that the study is not fair for woodburning. Most emissions come from sauna stove and open fire places. Looking at that study, my conclusion would be that investments in efficient systems is urgent. There was also a Goddard Institute study making the difference between black carbon (fossil fuels) and brown carbon (when burning biomas). Brown carbon was found to be less climate heating. I don't have the reference here but will try to find it.
Of course burning wood produces CO2 and, like I always say, using renewable energy doesn't allow you to waste it.
 

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #104 on: September 20, 2019, 09:11:20 PM »
What makes the difference with a wood or pellets stoves is heat on demand, or a very short time between starting the fire and enjoying heat. Infra red heaters also provide that possibility. So you can let the temperature go much lower when you leave your home.

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #105 on: October 03, 2019, 05:45:48 PM »
Here is the study comparing the impact of black and brown carbon as aerosols.
https://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/bauer_01/

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #106 on: October 07, 2019, 03:04:48 PM »
Had to keep the bathroom battery on though at low temperature, but otherwise the four hour cycle I described seems to work. I'll of course have to lengthen the on-time once the freezing temperatures start kicking in. Very nice to wake up to a warm kitchen. On couple of days with north winds I had to run the heat pump a bit on the days too, since I just don't manage well in under 18.

But of course the real measure would be the next electric bill.

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #107 on: January 26, 2020, 06:59:48 PM »
I also tried wood briquettes in my new stove, and it also provides a much more regular heat compared to normal wood.

I guess this is due to the form and to the regularity of the material.

If somebody wonders what I bought, here is a link https://www.hark.de/produkte/kaminoefen/kaminofen-hark-44-53-gt-ecoplus-detailinformationen.html

I get much more heat per kg of wood, but high efficiency requires high burning temperature, so when temperatures are normal outside, we let it go out and start it again when we are cold. Otherwise we overheat the rooms.

Briquettes are technically great, but I want to use local wood.

nanning

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #108 on: January 27, 2020, 06:26:17 AM »
Air heat pump:
If you're living by yourself, an air heat pump (electric warm air blower) powered by solar/wind /battery can keep you warm at the place where you sit/work/cook. Put on som extra clothes (I wear woolen socks+pantoffels, insulated hiking trousers, shirt+sweater+light coat+bathrobe,warm collar+woolen hat (muts)) and your house can be as low as 5°C. Now your house resembles the centuries milennia-old situation that almost all humans in a cold climate had: Only 1 hot spot in the house. But you'll have: NO EMISSIONS and NO AIR POLLUTION and low modern technology so it's something you can repair.

At temperatures below 10°C it is nice to have some warm air over your hands (I sit in the cold draft from outside and hands can get very cold). I've done 2 winters with room temperatures <7°C and had to wear gloves which is not easy when typing or operating the mouse. Just keeping warm is a lot of hassle but it is doable. Not recommended though if not necessary.

Candles at temperatures <10°C:
Your candles only melt a small cylinder down trough the candle. The candles I have used don't work properly at low temperatures.

Some random thought: Try to make and knead dough with hard butter at 5°C. :)
"It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly" - Bertrand Russell
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etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #109 on: January 27, 2020, 06:42:20 AM »
With low temperature in the house (like 5-10°C) you have to be careful if you have water pipes in the outside walls. They might freeze.

Pmt111500

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #110 on: February 07, 2020, 02:13:00 PM »
Just a short note, the coldest night this winter up until now was last night, even got to double digits -10,7°C. Never been a winter like this in my life time, and likely not after 536AD. either. The heat pump didn't have any trouble in keeping the place warm. Temperatures are expected to again rise above 0 in two days so the third snows will be gone as fast as the previous two. Nothing to write abroad about.

Another short note, the worst place to install the internal unit is the toilet. Luckily I wasn't so stupid, but I've learnt to close the door and keep the electric battery on in there.

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #111 on: March 17, 2020, 08:54:45 PM »
Hello,
I just want to inform you that my wife isn't too happy with our new wood stove. Too much infra red. She feels like on the grill.
Etienne

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #112 on: October 03, 2020, 08:30:33 PM »
We found a solution to the excess of infra red radiation of our wood stove.

There is a German company producing shield for stoves. You can see the model in the middle of this page https://www.metallwaren-schuerer.de/ofenzubehör.html

Even if the window of our stove goes like 20 cm above the shield, it works fine because enough infra red radiation is captured by the shield.

It gets quite hot, you have to be careful with kids, but I don't think that it could be hot enough to burn dangerously. 

It is very light, you can put it between the Stove and the wall when you don't need it. It is 100% Iron, it won't burn. You can even place it to protect just some people if others want to enjoy the infra red.

If somebody is interested, you have to look for "Schürer Metallwaren Ofenschirm", but the cheapest reseller I found has a web-site that is only in German.

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #113 on: October 17, 2020, 09:52:32 AM »
Here a picture

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #114 on: January 02, 2021, 10:41:45 AM »
Is there a lobby against wood heating ? The Guardian has a new article about how dangerous it is because each time you refuel the stove, particles enter in the room.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/18/wood-burners-triple-harmful-indoor-air-pollution-study-finds
Quote
Wood burners triple the level of harmful pollution particles inside homes and should be sold with a health warning, says scientists, who also advise that they should not be used around elderly people or children.

The tiny particles flood into the room when the burner doors are opened for refuelling, a study found. Furthermore, people who load in wood twice or more in an evening are exposed to pollution spikes two to four times higher than those who refuel once or not at all.

The particles can pass through the lungs and into the body and have been linked to a wide range of health damage, particularly in younger and older people.
Advertisement

The research was conducted in 19 homes in Sheffield over the course of a month at the start of 2020. The wood burners used were all models certified by the government as “smoke exempt appliances”, meaning they produce less smoke. But this and the new EcoDesign standard, due to become compulsory by 2022, only assess outdoor pollution.

If you follow the link and read the original article
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4433/11/12/1326
you also can read that :
Quote
All participants used dried and seasoned logs, but the sizes varied. There was also a diversity of kindling used, taking the form of firelighters, newspapers, balls of paper, twigs, sawdust, packing cardboard, greeting cards, and even empty egg boxes. Echoing the findings of existing studies [20,35,52]. This means that the same wood burner may emit different levels of indoor air pollution depending on the quantity and type of fuel and kindling used.

and

Quote
While the findings point to the opening of the stove door as the origin for indoor PM emissions, further lab-based research is required into how this might relate to duration, timings, and the point in the burn cycle at which the opening occurs.

So they clearly didn't try to explain to the people how to reduce the quantities of PM when using the stove. When I bought my new stove, the salesman clearly told me that I should never open it when there still are flames. I should wait until there are only embers left to refuel it. By the way it is also what is said when you're doing a Barbecue, wait for the embers before putting the meat on the grill.

There is also the top down kindling that greatly reduce fine particles. I guess impossible with egg boxes.


There is also a point that is never discussed, I'm sure that biomass smoke particles are less harmful than the ones from fossil fuels combustion (at least petrol), otherwise nobody would have survived going to a pub before smoking was forbidden inside. 

Another aspect with new modern stove is that the air is often taken outside, so you loose the effect that the stove renews the air in the room. Maybe it is a good concept regarding safety (the smoke can't enter in the room in case of pressure problems) and heat conservation (no cold air enters in the room), but I couldn't install such a system and am happy I didn't because I find that it provides a good ventilation in the house, so it probably helps to brings the concentration of fine particles down.

Of course there is more dust in the house when we heat with the stove, but dust is not fine particles, it is much bigger.
« Last Edit: January 02, 2021, 11:02:30 AM by etienne »

etienne

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #115 on: January 02, 2021, 10:59:46 AM »
And what about candles, incense... I also read that churches had a very unhealthy air, but priests don't die younger that the rest of the population.

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #116 on: May 18, 2021, 08:46:36 PM »
Wax candles are practically obsolete as LED-candles are emission-free and the nicer models even have a moving wick and the flicker looks very natural.

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Re: Heating with wood or pellets ? and air heat pump ?
« Reply #117 on: May 19, 2021, 05:12:21 AM »
Lots of people with asthma and the like suffer when a neighbor uses wood for heat. It is a source of local air pollution even if burning biomass is carbon neutral.
Quote
There is also a point that is never discussed, I'm sure that biomass smoke particles are less harmful than the ones from fossil fuels combustion (at least petrol), otherwise nobody would have survived going to a pub before smoking was forbidden inside.
This sounds like wishful thinking to me.