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Domestic biomass heating.


lewiswood
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5 hours ago, Squaredy said:

For what it is worth my system is a 14.5kw stove that is plumbed into about 8 radiators in a 4 bed semi with very poor insulation.  I have no heat store and it doesn't heat the hot water, just the rads.  In really cold weather it takes a good hour to get the rads nice and hot, and it needs genuinely very dry firewood.  At this time of year it has to be turned down quite low and copes easily.

 

My system is simple but is very limited by having no heat storage capability.  So we use other means to heat the house for an hour or so in the morning before going to work.  Also on chilly evenings when I get home the house is chilly for the first hour or more.

 

I would say if I was buying all my wood it would not save money compared to natural gas.  Financially I think it only works for me because I can burn offcuts from work.  It is not free wood, as it has to be cut and dried.  And it is rarely decent chunky stuff as I can always sell this!

 

I personally think the most important thing about any heating system is the insulation of the house.  If I could get my house insulated to modern standards I could turn mine down by about 80%.  In fact I would get a smaller stove as any stove turned down low results in incomplete combustion and therefore more smoke and pollution and soot in the flue.   In fact often I hear people who live in super insulated houses (e.g. straw bale) say they need almost no heating, maybe a small woodburner for the entire house.  After all humans, televisions, computers and so on all produce quite a lot of heat; the only reason we need extra heating systems is that most properties are not well insulated.

Good point about the insulation of housing. However our place is a Georgian granite manse and to insulate it more than the existing double glazing would mean losing much of its' character as you'd need to insulate within the existing room spaces, so wainscoting, ornamental ceiling plaster work, window shutters and fireplaces would all look out of place as they'd have to be either removed or covered over. 

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