Pollution

I think it is better to burn seasoned wood, from managed woodland, than leave it to rot. Doing so saves consumption of other fuels especially gas, which is not replaceable.

Our new home is totally electricity. Heating, water, cooking, lighting etc, no alternatives. Thing is our fuel bill is, for a number of reasons, a quarter of that in our old home which was gas, solid fuel (including wood) and electricity. We now have an app for the TV which shows a wood fire burning and crackling. Doesn't quiet cut the mustard, mind!🔥

Its like all these fads.Who in their right mind would install a wood burner in an urban area and pay through the nose for wood to burn? The same ones who use a 4x4 or large SUV to take the kids to school. The only sensible place is the countryside with free wood access, but what do I, a yokel know.

Our area in Hertfordshire is also a one out of six and we are two mile from A1M motorway and never venture out during the nightmare of morning and evening "rush hours"

I'm down on the coast and, unsurprisingly score 1. My daughter lives in Putney and even there is only 2, although Wansdworth overall is 3. An industrial city like Sheffield doesn't appear to be badly polluted, so what criteria is actually being applied?

Stand close to a queue of traffic anywhere in a city during the rush hour with a bus and a couple of lorries and it will seem pretty grim. Traffic congestion seems to be the real problem and the solution there is a decent efficient reasonably priced public transport system and we seem incapable of delivering that.

True. But that's the irony, folks install one because they are desirable, then burn any old stuff to keep it cheap, or pay premium prices for wood. Same as buying a 4x4 that will never ever be taken on grass, let alone mud. So the circle completes when London coughs and the politicians decide we all need to be prevented from having items that are a necessity/cheaper alternative rather than a whim. 

Pollution is ultimately about overcrowding. 

How do I get the best burn from my wood burning stove?

To get the best burn from you wood burning stove, it's vital to use your stove's secondary air supply correctly...

You might be thinking that now you have got your wood burner installed, you can happily burn as much wood as you like safe in the knowledge that you have done your bit for the environment. Well, actually that might not be the case!

For a wood burning stove to efficiently convert wood fuel to maximum heat, the wood burner needs to be operated correctly so as to achieve the additional benefits that are not provided by an open fire. So what does this mean in practice? 

Fundamentally for a wood burner to operate correctly you need to burn both the wood itself and the exhaust gases that are expelled during combustion, whereas in an open fire the exhaust gases are expelled from the chimney in an unburned state.

This is why a wood burner is said to be 80% efficient (if operated correctly) and an open fire only 20% efficient, as 80% of the potential heat of an open fire goes up the chimney. Hence, if you don’t operate your wood burner correctly you will lose a lot of heat energy up the chimney and cause more air pollution than if the wood burner was used efficiently.

Managing the primary and secondary airflows

Help is at hand. To burn those exhaust gases you just need to correctly use the two air supply controls on your wood burning stove which control the primary and secondary air flows. The primary air supply arrives below your fire while the secondary air supply arrives in the form of air jets above your fire. The secondary air flow is the most important for achieving combustion of the exhaust gases.

Use the primary air supply to get the fire going and burning hot, then shut it down. From this point on manage the fire by adjusting the secondary air flow.

If this is done correctly you will see the flames dancing around and little jets of gas burning as they exit the wood. Another way to know you are getting a high level of secondary combustion is that your logs maintain their shape until completely burned (when you see this you will understand what I mean), plus the smoke coming out of the chimney will not smell.

Another no-no with respect to your stove is burning wood slowly with minimal air supply. In addition to poor secondary burn, this approach will also lead to nasty black tar deposits in your flue, which increases the likelihood of a chimney fire, and deposits on the stove glass.  

Taken from the yougen.co.uk web site👍🏻

We've just bought a fire pit for the garden and lit it one evening recently while we sat with a glass or two putting the world to right. Haven't had a real fire for 40 years and it was glorious. Not waiting for the pollution police to call!