Wood Burning Stoves Are The Future, Not The Past
September 20th, 2011
One of the harshest facts that we have had to face in recent years is that the worldwide supply of oil and natural gas is diminishing, while prices are skyrocketing. It is time to find alternative ways to heat our homes, such as using wood burning stoves over gas powered heating. While scientists may differ over when the world will reach peak oil, they all agree that it is coming (or already here), and that the time to prepare for a paradigm shift in the energy industry has arrived. Between the amounts of pollution our dependence of fossil fuels has produced and the prices that we pay just to stay warm at night there have not been so many incentives to make a change for at least a century.
To begin with, a wood burning stove is carbon neutral, which means that keeping your house warm at night is not going to harm the environment. Wood is a renewable resource, there are thousands upon thousands of acres dedicated to tree farms, and many companies specialize in taking wasted wood from other uses (such as furniture or homes) to make wood pellets. Because wood is so easy to procure without professional help it is extremely difficult to restrict the supply in order to fix prices like we see with oil and natural gas. This means that the average homeowner is able to get an extremely cheap energy source while causing significantly less damage to the environment at the same time.
Plus, wood burning stoves have grown much safer in recent years. Advanced understanding of combustion and metallurgy has made modern stoves much safer than their old counterparts, drastically reducing the risk of a fire or burn injuries. Many modern stoves are so insulated that they are cool to the touch, and better locking doors make loose coals landing on the carpet improbable. With this new technology you probably have more to fear from your electrical outlet than your stove.
Categories: home improvement, lifestyle
