Coal was more commonly used here (than wood) until the natural gas pipeline went through 50+ years ago. Chain saws made it easier to cut wood, but it's still labor intensive. A few people have the outdoor wood furnaces. And, enough people bought wood pellet stoves last year that there was a shortage of pellets and the price doubled. It might be a different story if wood was the primary heat source, but my insurance company is ok with wood stoves.
Imagine the pollution issues if a bunch started using wood for fuel? Let alone fires om garages and such with wood you cant just throw a switch....
You don't have to imagine it. Check out the situation in the Denver area.
No. I am in the middle of farm country and can't name anyone except myself who does. Now there are a _lot_ of town folk that do.
Harry K
My company was fine with it but only after doing a very thorough examination of the installation. I have seen a few that the insurance isn't going to pay off on if they ever have a fire as they don't come even close to a safe installation.
Harry K
I suspect the look on his face was because he couldn't believe someone would make such a clueless remark.
Harry K
RT - Thank you for a STRAIGHT ANSWER I appreciate the lack of nay-saying and BS
Don
I consider a chainsaw a must out in the boonies, so I won't include that cost. It's both needed in an emergency and to keep the downed trees cleared out.
First is the wood availability. I might get a 1/4 of my needed wood off my own property. The rest needs to be scrounged up. Locals seem to do well cleaning up slash piles from the local timber companies as long as they stay on their good side. That is usually free as long as you make things better when you leave then when you got there. Done right, I won't pay for that either.
Where the cost is a problem is in the stove and installation. A DEQ qualifying stove is $1800 to $2200 for my size house. Figure another $400 to $500 for a stainless triple wall stovepipe. Install I could do myself. At least a few hundred more for a hearth and sundry other items. Since the house already has a heat pump and I would keep it as backup, this means all the money is against the cost of wood. My insurance is OK with a wood stove, but it would add $200 a year - if it was inspected by them and done right. I figure I'm going to add one of the outdoor stoves if I'm going to do it. This won't add anything to my insurance if it's more than 10 feet from the house. Plus I can feed it big wood cutting the labor.
Since my total heat bill for the winter is $400 to $600, that's a while to pay back.
Just great. A car that actually smells worse than diesel.
Would you have to use horse manure in your Mustang.
In 10 years, do you envision everyone driving a Kia Fart?
Shiver wrote:
Hey he bragged about saving so much money, thats great.
But his dollars per hours of work were a loser, sad but true I just pointed it out.
In 100 years from now I envision your great grandchildren having nothing to drive.
The Stanley Steamer was powered by petroleum-based fuel.
100 years from now there will quite likely be nuclear plants all over the country producing electricity which will be used to make Hydrogen. It could be the fuel of choice. I expect it will be relatively more expensive than what we pay for gasoline but still will most likely be the cheapest fuel available.
Per Ann:
Even where I live - suburbia - all it takes is one person dumping trash into their fireplace and it gets *really* bad...
Actually, there's much to be said for a steam-powered vehicle. They're supposed to be quite efficient.
Probably 1/3 of the US population lives in the Sun-Belt, so there's no problem with freezing, or long warm-ups.
A steam powered vehicle could burn darn near anything that makes heat. ( kerosene, diesel etc. ) Hell... you could burn corrn. It would reduce the demand for ( refined ) gasoline.
A steamer would be the perfect suburban "errand car" And, you can wait 45 secs for it to warm up. You don't need a Hummer to go buy grocerys.
Unfortunately, if US automakers produced it, it'd probably cost $20,000
Look at issues of Popular Mechanics/Popular Science from the 1950's. By now, ( the year 2000 ) we're all supposed to be flying personal sized atomic powered airplanes.
Our insurance company wouldn't have a clue how we heat our house and nor do they seem to care.
Are you serious?
Imagine the pollution if people started using electricity from coal powered electricity plants or the spent uranium form nuclear powered plants.
LOL. Your comment is spot on. How clueless is it to write about pollution from fires when all this person appears to want to do is to export the pollution caused by his/her heating into someone else's backyard and to inflict it on the people who live where the electricity plants are located.
Not the one I saw. It was powered by solid fuel and had a boiler like an ancient marine vessel. Mind you Australia has had some exceptionally rare cars come in from around the world because we had no manufacturing base for a long time. It used to be a favourite collecting place for rich American car enthusiasts.
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