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Page added on March 18, 2014
Northeasterners turn to burning wood for power
Americans living in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic U.S. are increasingly turning to a source of heat favored by humans for thousands of years: wood.
More and more people are using wood as their main source of heat as opposed to heating oil and kerosene.
The Energy Information Administration reports that, “All nine states in the New England and the Middle Atlantic Census divisions saw at least a 50% jump from 2005 to 2012 in the number of households that rely on wood as the main heating source.”
Those who switched to wood burning were spared high fuel oil and kerosene prices during this year’s harsh winter.
About 2.5 million households across the country now use wood as the main source of heat in their homes, up from 1.9 million households in 2005. And another 9 million households burn wood as a secondary fuel source for heating.
Millions of families faced skyrocketing energy prices as record low temperatures and snowfall hit much of the country. The U.S.’s constrained pipeline system could not keep up with the demand for propane and natural gas, causing prices to surge and utilities to burn oil and coal for power.
Midwesterners are expected to pay 54 percent more this winter on propane than last, reports EIA, and Northeasterners are expected to spend 7 percent more. Those who live in areas fueled by natural gas will pay 10 percent more this year and five percent more for electricity.
“Cold temperatures have continued to tighten heating oil supplies and helped drive up retail prices,” according to EIA. “Weekly U.S. residential heating oil prices increased by $0.20/gal during January and have averaged near $4.24/gal since the beginning of February.”
But EIA adds that heating oil prices will probably average about one percent lower this winter than last because of lower crude oil prices. Though natural gas spot prices hit record levels during periods of extreme cold.
But what this winter’s severe price swings demonstrate is the danger of over-reliance on one fuel source, says the coal industry. While low-priced natural gas is a good source of fuel overall, gas-fired plants have trouble operating in cold weather — which coal plants have make up.
This winter, gas-fired power plants failed due to cold weather and federal regulations that make it nearly impossible to burn coal.
“This year’s historically cold winter has served as a crystal ball into our future, revealing the energy cost and electric reliability threats posed by the Obama Administration’s overreliance on a more narrow fuel source portfolio that excludes the use of coal,” said Laura Sheehan, spokeswoman for the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity.
If the Northeast’s natural gas infrastructure is not improved and prices remain volatile during the winter, it might not be such a bad idea to burn wood for heat. But even that may become harder thanks to federal environmental regulators.
The Environmental Protection Agency recently updated its wood stove emissions standards that would effectively ban The EPA’s new action bans 80 percent of the wood-burning stoves in America, “the oldest heating method known to mankind and mainstay of rural homes and many of our nation’s poorest residents,” reports Forbes.
EIA notes that: “Most households still burn split logs, although wood pellet use has risen in recent years. And while households in higher income brackets are more likely to use wood, those at lower income levels who burn wood consume more on average.”
15 Comments on "Northeasterners turn to burning wood for power"
ghung on Tue, 18th Mar 2014 10:25 pm
“…the oldest heating method known to mankind…” would be the sun.
Not every structure can be passively heated with solar, but many could that don’t. I’ll do a quick, hot burn in the wood stove tonight (lows in the upper 30’s), not so much to heat the structure, but to make/store hot water for the next couple of days, expected to be mostly cloudy. Good insulation and thermal mass will keep the home plenty warm. Wood and passive solar are wonderfully complementary if one isn’t addicted to a push-button lifestyle.
ghung on Tue, 18th Mar 2014 10:56 pm
BTW: I recommend folks avoid the Daily Caller link. Besides being highly partisan and clearly biased, I had to clear my cache after going there; all sorts of nasties incoming.
MrEnergyCzar on Tue, 18th Mar 2014 11:49 pm
My pellet stove exhaust is so clean you can’t even see it… $1,000 a year to heat my home exclusively with pellets… (3-4 tons) includes the small electric costs…
MrEnergyCzar
James on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 12:41 am
As a forester, I would recommend that if we are going to include wood in the energy mix, that we replant the trees faster than we use it. If we don’t, we will experience a shortage of wood at a time when the price of oil and NG skyrocket. Then the price of wood will skyrocket as well. Wood is a renewable resource, oil and gas are not. There should be a lot of trees growing since they clean and cool the air, absorb excess water that would cause flooding, absorb carbon dioxide which is causing global warming, and offer a pleasant view.
Davy, Hermann, MO on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 1:01 am
G, I have a Rais Topas wood stove at my house in Hermann and a Morso 3112 at the cabin. The Topas has 200 lbs of soap stone bricks above the fire box. These soap stone bricks heat up and let off heat slowly over the night. I love wood. I use only white oak. I only cut dead or dying trees. Wood has to be properly managed for peak btu’s. I have 3 years stock built up. The wood must be split then aged at least 2 years. When one considers the effort and time wood is expensive to have cut, split, stacked, and transported. Yet, if you have your own woods and the time it is a great way to draw value from your land. I love wood heat. I love coming in from a cold winter day of work on the farm and warming my backside at the wood stove. There is nothing like wood heat period!
rollin on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 1:36 am
I can attest to the increased use of wood burning for heat. Trees disappearing fast out here in the countryside and the air is more polluted in the cold weather than the cities or industrial areas.
That’s what happens when propane and fuel oil costs skyrocket.
DC on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 1:44 am
Hey Mr Czar, the exhaust from the thousands of gas burning cars that drive along the highways every single day is (mostly) invisible too. So is radiation from nuclear plants. So are pretty much all off the chemicals and toxins in the food we eat and the water we drink. But they are there just the same. Our inability to ‘see’ some problems, hardly means they don’t exist. In fact, some our biggest ongoing problems, are ones that invisible to the naked eye. Im sorry, but both your metrics, both in dollar terms, and your ‘invisible’ smoke-dont add up to much. By all means, keep doing what your doing, no one will stop you, I certainly cant or wouldn’t try to in any event. And I have to ask, when was last time you cut wood by hand? I used to stack and cut firewood by hand when I was younger, not for some time now. We certainly didnt even think to drive to a corporate big box store(they didn’t exist really at that time) to buy plasti-wrap pellets to take home to put into an ‘eco-friendly’ fireplace.
Makati1 on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 1:56 am
Lol…nothing new here. When I designed and built my sister’s house in the mountains of PA, it is total electric, as electric cost is regulated in PA and if there is no electric there is no other form of heat either as they all require electric in one way or another.
BUT, I did include a wood burning fireplace that was made in Sweden, I think. Very efficient, and adequately heats their extra insulated home. It was basically for emergencies, when the power is off, but they use it to also lower their electric bills. If you use Google Earth and look at PA, you will see that it is about 1/3 mountains and trees.
Not a sustainable heat source though, as a good heating wood takes many decades to grow to a usable size. Then there is a lot of muscle energy expended to get it through the felling, sawing, splitting and drying stages and relocated to your home. Not to mention the manufacturing and care of the metal tools you use. A lot different than turning up the thermostat…lol.
rollin on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 2:20 am
That’s right, wood heats you at least three times. Two happen when you cut the tree up and then split the wood. The third happens when you burn it.
No need for subscriptions to a gym.
Maybe the next animal horror film “The Squirrels” instead of “The Birds”. That will make them think twice about cutting down all those trees.
Kevin Cobley on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 2:40 am
Europe in the middle ages ran into severe wood shortages with much smaller populations than exist now, royal families and barons restricted the public’s access to the remaining forests. Coal was then used and when that wasn’t enough people moved to the USA.
It’s been postulated that wood is “renewable”.
It’s only renewable if the amounts used are equal to the amounts grown.
If wood were the only heating source in the US only a few percent of the population would be heated, the rulers.
Davy, Hermann, MO on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 3:10 am
Kevin, if we have the energy crisis like we talk about here wood will be scarce. Around here just like the deer, turkey, and every other small critter. I collect local history and the old photos. In the 1860’s around towns here in Missouri you see a clear cut environment. Today it is very wooded with pasture on the good ground. With the size of the population wood will be used up quick. Well, that is, if there is not a quick die off.
Norm on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 6:52 am
Wood stove is awesome. I got one.
Burn up old pallets, junk mail, banana peels coffee grounds, old blue jeans, trimmed branches, and garbage. Works everytime. Free heat.
Davy, Hermann, MO on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 10:41 am
Norm, on my previous farm closer to the Missouri River I had a Hardy outdoor wood stove. This stove was stainless steel with an automatic blower. It had a very large firebox. So you added material at the top and it was ineffect carbonized by heat. The temp would go down and the blower fire up to maintain the heat and burn. This stove heated water and circulated it into my farm house. I had heated floors and a heated unit in the forced air system. It was very polluting though. This farm house was in a valley and on cold winter days with air inversions it would fill the valley with smoke. My friend called it smokey valley. It would burn anything. I mostly burned green wood. I did not like the smell of trash. It would burn coal too. Due to the lower efficiency it burn a hell of allot of wood but it had know problem with green wood or soft wood.
ghung on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 1:59 pm
Davy- We have a 30 years-old Hearthstone, pre-EPA, soapstone unit inherited from my parents. I never considered it to be very efficient, but the main causes were a rather poor (‘professional’) installation and the way they used it; low and slow burn. When I decided to take it after my folks died, I decided to make some modifications to increase its efficiencey. I re-thought the combustion process, modified the secondary combustion air pipe for better pre-heat, and added a water heating exchanger at the top of the rather high fire box. I also placed it near the center of our great room, built a masonry hearth and a ‘trombe’ wall behind it, and ran the stove pipe straight up. The primary change I made was how it’s fired; hotter, more intense fires instead of constant low and slow. I split my wood smaller for better combustion and do faster incremental burns in the evening. By bedtime, there’s a nice bank of coals that last until morning.
These changes made a huge difference. More complete burning is indicated by the clear smoke and that I virtually never really need to clean the stove pipe; just inspect and brush it out a bit. Very little accumulation of soot and creosote, even when using less than perfect wood. It’s also a good incinerator for junk mail and stuff. The hot water system that certain ‘experts’ said was a bad idea, has performed remarkably well. It’s unpressurized and simply recirculates hot water from the tank, through the stove and back to the tank, controlled by a differential temperature switch. I designed it to thermo-syphon in case of pump failure using flapper style check valves (water can only move in one direction). A bit noisy (thump click thump click) but moves quite a bit of water without the pump. More of a safety feature, but nice to know it works. Virtually all of our domestic hot water is now solar or wood. Good to have lots of hot water as we get older and bones get creaky.
We burn mostly yellow locust supplemented with other hardwoods. We have over 20 acres of forest and the locust grows quickly and dies after 30-40 years. Traditionally used for fence posts (we still do), the dead locusts will stand for several years until I come along and use them. We never cut live trees for fuel, and I see hundreds of tons of potential firewood going to waste in the area. Even on our own property, likely 99% of the naturally dead fuel never gets used; for our purposes, a virtually inexhaustible supply. Best of all, this stove happily, efficiently consumes any wood that will burn (poplar, pine, oak, hickory, sourwood, etc.). Poplar is great for coppicing and could easily be utilized for a sustainable supply. Partnered with passive solar, I never worry about how our home will be heated in the future.
Some good woodburning info at woodburning.org
Rusty Baker on Wed, 19th Mar 2014 2:19 pm
From my vast experience with wood burning, I can say that the best wood to heat the home(more specifically, the bedroom) is Morning Wood. It’s an efficient and renewable Hardwood, which packs a load of BTUs if used properly.