U.S. Forest Service to Support Project to Redesign the Wood Stove

The U.S. Forest Service is known mostly for managing forests, but they are branching out to help focus on how cleanly wood can be burned to heat homes.  The Forest Service’s “Rural Revitalization Through Forestry” program is providing a 2-year $25,000 grant to support the “Next Generation Wood Stove Design Challenge,” that aims to find cost-effective ways to reduce smoke from wood stoves through automation. 

The Challenge is a coalition effort led by the Alliance for Green Heat, a Maryland based non-profit.  This fall the coalition is gathering at Brookhaven National Lab to assess and test automated wood stoves, where consumers load the wood and leave – and let computers maximize efficiency and minimize pollution.

“Residential heating with wood offers Americans a homegrown source of renewable energy that not

Julie Tucker, National Lead for Wood
Energy at the US Forest Service with
Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell

only saves them money, but keeps their energy dollars local.  This is particularly important for rural communities that have few options to turn to for their energy needs.”  said Julie Tucker, National Lead for Wood Energy at the U.S. Forest Service.  “The Wood Stove Design Challenge offers a tremendous opportunity to develop the most efficient and cleanest burning residential wood stoves for people who are looking for an alternative to high cost fossil fuel heating” Tucker said.

The initiative is looking at high tech solutions, regulatory barriers to cleaner stoves, consumer preferences and the ability of an industry to adapt to new technology.

The Wood Stove Design Challenge helps design and organize forums for manufacturers, innovators, and university teams to work on modernizing biomass stoves.   Automated wood stoves being developed and fine-tuned for the November event are coming from Indiana, Maryland, Connecticut, Denmark, Germany, New Zealand and China.  While they are competing against each other to see which is cleanest, most efficient and most error proof, the designers are also coming to share their insights and technology with other teams and participants from the US stove industry.  

One of the coalition leaders is Mark Knaebe, a wood combustion specialist at the USDA Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin.  Knaebe is working on a highly innovative prototype of a condensing wood stove that could significantly reduce emissions and increase efficiency compared to existing stoves.  Knaebe will be helping to assess the automated stoves at Brookhaven Lab in November.

All nine states in the Northeast experienced a 50% jump in the number of households that rely on wood as the main heating source from 2005 to 2012 (Energy Information Agency 2014).  Nationally, the surge in wood heating since 2000 has been a welcomed turn around for the pellet and firewood industry, and for reducing fossil fuel usage. 

Consumer Reports Rates Chain Saws

Heavy-Duty Gas

Think it’s hard to decide between industry leaders Stihl and Husqvarna? Well, so does Consumer Reports magazine. But in the October 2013 issue, Stihl edged out Husqvarna on performance and price, garnering a “CR Best Buy”. The Stihl MS 180 C-BE (or the 181 C-BE) got CR’s top rating, and cost only $230.

These two top performers both weighed 11 pounds and had 16 inch chains. The Husqvarna 435 440E came in second at $270. Third and fourth place went to Echo, and a Poulan Pro came in 5^th at $180.

Light-Duty Gas

Among the light duty saws, the Craftsman 34190 (made by Poulan Pro) came in top, at $150 and the Homelite UTI0589A second at $160. The light duty saws were no lighter in weight, and sometimes were heavier than the heavy-duty saws. Their chain length was also the same, either 16 or 18 inch.

Corded Electric

The top ranked corded electric saws performed as well as the light-duty gas saws. The best, the Worx WG303.1 cost only $100 and weighs 11 pounds. It sawed as quickly as some light duty models and spared you the hassle of refueling, pull starting and tune-ups.

Consumer Reports did not provide any information on repair history. For the complete CR story you may have to be a CR subscriber: http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/chain-saws.htm?loginMethod=auto

Now for advice from the Alliance for Green Heat: Even if your wood stove can take an 18 or even a 20 inch log, considering cutting lots into lengths of about 14 to 16 inches, especially if you're planning to burn it in the next few months (less than 6 months). Shorter, split pieces of wood will dry faster, and give you more usable BTUs from each log. And remember, you need to split the wood as soon as possible to really start the drying process. Un-split wood does not dry well and can double the time it takes to season the wood. The EPA's Burn Wise program's Best Burn Practices notes, "Wood burns best when the moisture content is less than 20 percent. You can purchase a wood moisture meter to test the moisture content of your wood before you burn it."

2011 Census Shows Wood Heat Continues to Rise in U.S.

The number of American households using wood as a primary source of heat increased 1.72% this year, continuing a decade long growth spurt for the renewable heating fuel, according to the U.S. Census 2011 American Community Survey (ACS). The survey estimates that 2.11% of U.S. homes use wood-derived fuel as their primary heating source, compared to 2.08% in 2010.

While the growth spurt is continuing, it is also showing signs of slowing down. In the last six years, wood heat showed its greatest uptick in 2005-2006, growing 8.5% in one year. On average from 2000 to 2010, wood grew 4.5% each year, so a 1.7% increase last year may indicate a softening of the market. (Click here for update from 2012 census.)

The US Census does annual surveys based on sample populations which are then extrapolated to estimate trends in the entire country. The margin of error is higher during these annual surveys than during the decennial surveys where the Census tries to contact all households. The slower rate of rise in wood heat in 2010 may not be connected to the warm winter of 2011-2012 as that winter occurred mostly in 2012.

The ACS does not track secondary heat use, but it is likely that more Americans are using wood to supplement their main fuel as well. According to the 2009 EIA Renewable Energy Consumption Survey, 7.7% of American homes used wood as a supplemental source of heat and wood was the second most common secondary home heating fuel behind electricity. When more homes use wood or pellets as primary heat, the number of homes using it as a secondary heat source grows as well, as far as we know.

Wood heat changes at the state level 

During the past decade, several states in the northeast as well as Michigan, Ohio and Nevada saw the number of homes mainly heating with wood or pellets increase by more than 90%.[1] But of these eight states, only Massachusetts and Maine continued the upward trend in 2011. Instead, Hawaii (52.5%), Florida (30.5%), Delaware (23.2%), Wyoming (21.6%), and Idaho (19.8%) had the greatest gains.

The top five states for wood heating as a percentage of households are Vermont (16%), Maine (12.2%), Montana (8.8%), Idaho (8.3%) and New Hampshire (7.3%). The states with the greatest total number of households heating with wood are California, New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Washington.

Residential fossil fuel use declines while solar thermal experiences greatest growth 

In 2000, only 1.68% of U.S. households heated mainly with wood or pellets, but between 2000 and 2010, wood experienced the greatest growth of any fuel with the number of primary wood heat households increasing an average of 4.5% per year since 2005. Rising fuel prices and a federal tax credit offered during the latter years of the decade may account for wood heat’s dramatic upswing. The economic downtown may have also contributed to more people making the switch from oil or propane to wood or pellets, two of the most inexpensive fuels available in America.

While the residential use of wood rises, the use of natural gas, the most common primary heating fuel in America, has been declining since 2006. Once the main source of heat for over 50% of U.S. homes, it fell nearly one percent last year and is now at 49%. Other less common fossil fuels such as propane, oil and coal also experienced declines this past year, continuing a multi-year trend.

Other than wood, household fuels that grew during the year were electricity with a 2.5% increase over 2010, and solar thermal with an 18% increase, the highest of any heating fuel. While overall solar residential numbers are still tiny and there has been in overall decrease in solar heated homes since 2000, the renewable has shown the highest growth rate of any heating fuel since 2007. More than half of the approximately 50,000 U.S. homes heated primarily by solar are concentrated in California, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii.

                                  
[1] These numbers reflect the absolute per capita change in the number of homes heating with wood or pellets. They are not adjusted for population growth. See: http://www.forgreenheat.org/resources/press.pdf

Residential Heating Fuels Show Diverse Growth Patterns

Wood was the fastest growing heating fuel nationally between 2000 and 2010, and in 25 states. But in some regions, electricity, natural gas, propane and even oil are experiencing rapid growth. Wood grew the fastest (+34.6%), followed by electricity (+26.8%) and natural gas (+4.9%), and both propane (-16%) and oil (-21.9%) experienced significant declines. But regional differences abound.

In decline just about everywhere else, the South was the only region to have seen substantial gains in residential oil use. Texas (84.6%) had the greatest increase in oil use of any state by far, with Arkansas (36.75) and Oklahoma (35.7%) rounding out the top three. In both Texas and Oklahoma, oil grew the fastest of any fuel source. In Arkansas, it finished second to electricity (48.2%).

The Northeastern United States experienced some of the biggest shifts in natural gas and propane use over the past ten years. Maine (44.8%), New Hampshire (39.4%) and Connecticut (27.1%) currently lead the U.S. in residential propane growth, and Vermont also ranks second among the states where natural gas is rising the fastest. In each of these New England states, however, wood still remains the fastest growing source of residential heating fuel.

Other than Vermont, gas heating rose the most in Nevada (51%) and Idaho (41.1%). Propane use saw large increases in Pennsylvania (22.2%) and Washington (21.1%), in addition to the aforementioned New England states.

Unlike wood and propane, the large increase of electricity in the U.S. is not confined to any particular geographic region. The states with the three biggest increases were Georgia (54.7%), Iowa (49.5%) and South Dakota (49.2%).

Wood heat use grew fastest in the Northeast and Great Lake States, and fell in most of the south. If history is any lesson, the South may rise again, and heating demographics will continue to provide a fascinating and often surprising growth trends.

Changes in rank

In addition to regional growth rates, state ranking of primary heating fuel use is another lens through which we can understand the growth of wood heat. In 2000, wood was among top the top four heating fuels in 26 states, exceeding at least propane or oil. In 2010, wood was among the top four fuels in 33 states.

In 2000, wood was the third most common heating fuel in two states (Oregon and Idaho), exceeding propane and oil. In 2010, it was the third most common fuel in five states (Idaho, Oregon, Vermont, Washington and West Virginia).

Finally, in 2000 and 2010, wood was the second most common heating fuel in one state (Maine) after heating oil.

Wood is not the most common heating fuel in any state, and it is unlikely that it ever will be – or ever should be.