With the first
Wood Stove Decathlon
only a few months away, the
Alliance
for Green Heat is doing a weekly blog to showcase the Decathlon
competitors. Take this opportunity to learn more about the teams and
their stove’s innovative features.
Rod Zander of
New
England Hearth and Soapstone, has worked with masonry stoves for decades.
He gained experienced in the interior mechanics of masonry stoves through
several international apprenticeships.
Among
the nation’s foremost experts on masonry heat, Zander has taken this
knowledge to develop a very unique stove that will compete in the Wood Stove
Decathlon.
Perhaps aspiring to reach the international marketplace, the
competing stove has been named Intercontinental 2B4W. Surely, its innovative
features make the stove appealing regardless of which continent you’re on. The
stove is an exciting new type of masonry stove that can be created from
recycled materials. The recycled materials not only help reduce waste, but save
both the manufacturer and consumer money. These readily available materials can
easily be assembled with local labor cutting costs even more. It is hoped that
these stoves will have a real application in developing countries, where other
fuel sources are too expensive and current stoves are too polluting.
The form of the stove is composed of two used steel oil
drums stacked on top of each other. The symbolism of the oil drums is not lost
on the stove designers. The use of an antiquated fuel source’s
containers expresses the continual shift towards renewable energy.
The heat is stored in high-density firebrick, which then radiates
from 12-24 hours from 22 pounds of wood, fired two times a day at a high burn
rate. This slow radiating heat follows the design concept of many masonry
stoves.
With a computer combustion control system from sponsor
ClearStak LLC and an oxygen lambda sensor
from
ETAS, operator error decreases so that the owner uses
less wood for more heat. This increase in efficiency helps lower the emissions
of smoke particulates.
