9 out of 10 wood-burning stove suppliers will tell you that ‘wet wood’ is the single most common issue that causes their customers to complain about their stove. Why?
It is widely accepted Globally that burning damp wood causes the following:
- It dramatically reduces heat output. How? By reducing your efficiency on your stove by over 50%. Check out these test results from www.soliftec.co.uk (Efficiency tests).
- It blackens the glass on your wood-burner.
- It clogs your flues with tar which can lead to extremely dangerous chimney fires.
- It costs you more. Lower efficiency means more fuel to try and achieve the same heat. You could be spending as much as double on damp wood to get the same heat as you would from dry.
However, this is not the worst of it.
The British Government announced in February 2020 that it will be banning the sale of wet wood. This ban will take effect from 2023. Why?
Wet wood with a moisture content exceeding 20% will be banned (along with coal).
The reason is that these fuels are among the most polluting to our atmosphere.
Read the Guardian news report here: “House coal and wet wood to be phased out by 2023…”
We have no excuse here in South Africa. We can dry wood, relatively quickly in our climate (6-12 months) compared to Europe.
We ran a few home tests a couple of years ago on a couple of varieties of fire wood available in Cape Town. The results were interesting: