Interest in Outdoor Wood Boilers Grows (Nanny State Wants More Control)

Yahoooooo! ^ | November 22, 2007 | Stephanie Reitz

[MrBambaLaMamba]

BBQ grills are next.

Next? --> http://www.reason.com/blog/show/119460.html

[Racer1]

I don’t know what they are referring to a small town in the article, but living close is not the place for the outdoor type wood heating appliance. On the other hand if city slickers want to move to the country they need to be aware of where they are moving. Here in the country we have wood smoke, farms and the smells associated with them, dust and pollen, thats just the way it is. I wonder about people that move out into the country and the first thing they do is start complaining. One more thing, funny how a party against over regulation wants to regulate all the time.

[ArmedConservative]

Proud wood burner here.

After throwing a couple more logs into the stove, I went outside to look up at the chimney. All I saw was a small wisp of smoke, nothing like the scenarios I have read in previous posts. Of course, I only burn hardwood that has been seasoned for about 2 years, and I never burn trash, pressure treated or pine.

Most of the folks in my neighborhood burn wood and I have never heard a complaint.

[Melinda in TN]

I live in rural TN and my neighbor has one of the wood burning boilers. His is pretty smokey at times but it doesn’t bother anybody because the houses are few and far apart. Everybody here uses wood burning stoves, including me. Mine is going right now. If you burn good seasoned wood the smoke is not normally a problem. It’s a cheap source of energy for us. We have 14 acres in trees and cut trees that are already down and dry.

I’m very allergic to cigarette smoke but wood smoke doesn’t bother me at all. I’ve only had two bad experiences with the wood burning stove, once when I burned wood that poison ivy had been growing on and once when I burned some Black Walnut.

[libertarian27]

This will not end with OWB.
They will be going after Fireplaces, Wood Stoves & BBQ’s next.
It’s the natural progression of the nanny-state.

How do you like your steak?
Rare-boiled, Medium boiled or Well-done boiled?

[JustaDumbBlonde]

"We're not hillbillies or trashy people. We're educated people who did our homework before we made our purchase, and we made it a point to operate it very conscientiously..."

Apparently, it is still quite alright to stereotype and malign hillbillies and trashy people, without raising so much as an eyebrow from the reporter or anyone else.

[traviskicks]

Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.

[cmet]

I have one of these furnaces. It takes a lot of firewood, and regular trips outside to monitor and refill, but the cost of propane makes it worthwhile.

The smoke is awful. I have about 15 feet of smokestack, but some windless days, that is not enough.

I would NEVER use this furnace if there was a neighbor in the smoke path. For those who do not recognize their neighbor’s right for smokefree air around their home, then we need laws.

[thackney]

I've got news for the writers fuel numbers, heating oil is up about 18-20% already this year.

Average cost of heating oil is up 35% over last year.

This Week In Petroleum
Residential Heating Oil Prices
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/oog/info/twip/twip_distillate.html#prices

[WackySam]

I live in the City of Tampa and burn well seasoned pecan wood in my fireplace every chilly night. Not only do the neighbors not complain, they always comment on how nice it smells.

[bert]

they are worse than hillbillies, they are noreasteners

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Teddy Roosevelt started the national parks system because the national appetite for wood threatened to deforest the entire country, with 1900 levels of population and energy consumption. If we tried to sustain our current energy consumption levels using wood, or other forms of biomass, we’d be deforested in a generation. (May well happen anyway.)

Pollution is a legitimate “neighborhood” effect. Historically, wood burning hasn’t been regulated because “everyone” did it and we all recognized that tolerating others soot and ash was the price we paid for staying warm in the winter.

I wonder why coal hasn’t made a comeback? My family used coal in Queens as recently as 1960. (We still had an icebox in Manhattan as recently as 1954. No refrigerator. The iceman lugged a huge block of ice up several flights of steps a couple times a week.) Coal has a lot of the drawbacks of wood. In the 1950’s the coal truck was a common sight rumbling down the street and dumping a barrel or two of anthracite down the coal chute into the basement.

[tacticalogic]

The libertarian in me repels at regulation, but imagining that wood heat is environmentally friendly is self-delusion of the worst kind.

The constitutionalist in me doesn't mind the local regulations nearly as much as federal regulations handed down with assinine claims of "regulating interstate commerce".

[Nam Vet]

Aren't the logs in those systems about 4 feet long? Seems like loading could be a problem. Then again, I think I read that you just have to stoke those systems once a day.

Nam Vet

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Our Lopi wood stove is lit and running right now. Fired by seasoned black oak that was cut and split two or three years ago, we get very little smoke and my neighbors are far enough away so it wouldn't matter if it was smoky.
The free standing outdoor burners are a different animal; lots and lots of smoke, like it was fan-driven. And with a stack about five feet off the ground, there is little opportunity for dispersion. A higher stack would resolve most of the problem but I'd have to be supported with cable...

[Joe 6-pack]

"Actually there is more forest now than there has ever been since the area was settled."

I can't cite you a statistical source, but a few years ago I was told by someone (in a position to know, and with no incentive to lie) that the United States presently has a greater percentage of forestation than at the time Lewis and Clark conducted their exploration of the American west.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Don’t tell the people of Newfoundland that!

See how they like living in a denuded wasteland when Toronto converts to wood burning.

[Racer1]

Thats even worse. I was going by what oil users in this area have told me since beginning of Sept. I don’t use stuff myself.

[Centurion2000]

You are on to something. Your right to fill the air will smoke and soot ends at the tip of my nose.

Then stop driving your car if you have the courage of your convictions.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Coal really belongs in industrial boilers like utilities and big manufacturing settings. From first-hand experience I can tell you, the storage, handling, burning and disposal of ash is a filthy job. Its had to believe, but even residual oil is a cleaner fuel (except when its spilled in a marine environment.)