It’s summer, so heating your home is probably the farthest thing from your mind – but it’s actually a really good time to think about it, because you’ve got a few months to make changes before winter arrives again. At Quadra-Fire, we’re passionate about biomass because it’s a green alternative to fossil fuels, which makes us big supporters of heating homes with renewable fuel – namely pellets and wood.
Commit to Heating with Renewable Fuels!
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, heating and cooling accounts for more than half the energy use in a typical U.S. home. By heating with renewable wood or pellets in a stove or insert, you can help reduce that number and your consumption of fossil fuels.
Cordwood is derived from forests that replenish year after year, making it an exceptional renewable fuel for all time. If you have access to inexpensive or free wood, or live in an area where cord wood is abundant, burning wood may be particularly attractive. Some tree species produce better logs for heating than others, so keep that in mind when making wood selections. For more information, see our April 9 blog about choosing the best wood species.
Pellets are made from organic waste like compacted sawdust, wood chips, and bark – basically, trees. And they’re often derived from manufacturing processes that use wood, so you’re also turning materials that may otherwise go to a landfill into energy. Pellets are burned in freestanding pellet stoves, or in fireplace inserts that retrofit existing wood-burning fireplaces. Pellet stoves and inserts have extremely low particulate emissions due to high burn efficiencies and the density of the fuel. They also don’t generate much ash to clean up.
Neither wood nor pellets require energy-intensive processes to harvest and process them into fuel, unlike fuel oil or propane. Fuel oil is derived from crude oil, which in the U.S. is generally extracted from the earth through frack-mining, then transported via rail or pipelines to refineries for processing. It’s then distributed through additional pipelines or tanker trucks to dealers who deliver it to homes’ storage tanks. Hardly an efficient process! If you’re burning wood, simply cut down a tree, split the wood and burn it. And pellets are readily available at retailers. See how easy it is to reduce your carbon footprint?
In addition to peace of mind knowing you’re heating with a renewable fuel in a highly efficient Quadra-Fire stove or fireplace insert, financial benefits can be derived for years to come. This is especially true if you’re one of the 48 million households heating with propane, or the 8% of Americans using fuel oil.
Keep in mind that heating an entire home with biomass isn’t an option for everyone, but supplementing your existing heat source with a pellet or wood stove in the main living zones of your house can save hundreds of dollars in heating costs. For example, you can see just how much you could save with a pellet stove using our pellet fuel savings calculator.