Global warming and burning firewood

[andrethegiant70]

Has anyone hashed this one out yet? I heat my house primarily with firewood... but we are pretty strident environmentalists, so I have a nagging feeling I'm sideways on this issue. I have rationalized it so far with the knowedge that my local forest service office tells me that their firewood program is an essential component of their fire management program. They don't have to do so much prescribed burning. And if/when the forest burns, its not as bad.

Thoughts?

 

[WRW]

So, he's saying that burning a little, and getting a direct benefit, is better than burning a lot (the whole forest), with nobody staying warm?

 

[vegaome]

Howdy andrethegiant70,

Sounds like the perfect reason to me. Cut wood, stay warm, save on heating bill and practice government approved forrestry rituals. I would sleep sound if I was in your posistion.

On the other hand if you find you cant sleep and you need to get rid of your saws shoot me a PM.

v/r

Mike

 

[turnkey4099]

Has anyone hashed this one out yet? I heat my house primarily with firewood... but we are pretty strident environmentalists, so I have a nagging feeling I'm sideways on this issue. I have rationalized it so far with the knowedge that my local forest service office tells me that their firewood program is an essential component of their fire management program. They don't have to do so much prescribed burning. And if/when the forest burns, its not as bad.

Thoughts?

I am on the same page there. I do a bit of rationalizing.

1. If I wasn't burning wood, then it would be oil. That should be just about an equal swap for pollution, maybe even on the positive side for wood as all the energy (read pollution) put into processing and transporting oil is off he table.

2. The wood I burn would release the same amount of CO2 if left to rot in the forest. Granted over a much longer period.

Harry K

 

[Steve128]

Responsible

I think working with the forest service and listening to them is responsible. I am curious about your "strident environmentalist" statement. Does this mean you cut your firewood with a handsaw? That must be a great deal of work.

 

[RaisedByWolves]

.
Other than the above post (which is on the money) you have nothing to fear.



The wood only contains so much carbon, therefore the carbon released during burning is no greater than the carbon that would be released if the wood was left to rot on the forest floor.












Unless you coat it with sugar!

 

[SawWitch]

Has anyone hashed this one out yet? I heat my house primarily with firewood... but we are pretty strident environmentalists, so I have a nagging feeling I'm sideways on this issue. I have rationalized it so far with the knowedge that my local forest service office tells me that their firewood program is an essential component of their fire management program. They don't have to do so much prescribed burning. And if/when the forest burns, its not as bad.

Thoughtsk ?

As I understand you, I agree with you. I am afraid for the global upwarming. No one of us can see the consequence of it. I think it's gone to "long", it's baaaadddd!
Here in Norway we already have complications because of the global upwarming. And at the North Poole the ice is melting very hurry. I don't like it!

 

[Jim Mesthene]

Burning wood is carbon-neutral.
The tree you burn, releasing carbon, has already absorbed that carbon from the atmosphere; think of it as recycling the carbon. Burning coal is releasing carbon that has been stored underground in solid form for eons.
That's why bio-diesel fuel is carbon-neutral and diesel pumped out of the ground isn't.

 

[SawWitch]

Burning wood is carbon-neutral.
The tree you burn, releasing carbon, has already absorbed that carbon from the atmosphere; think of it as recycling the carbon. Burning coal is hen ee goreleasing carbon that has been stored underground in solid form for eons.
That's why bio-diesel fuel is carbon-neutral and diesel pumped out of the ground isn't.

The clue with burning wood, is to have much oxygen feed. dont try to nearly smother the fire then you go to bed. I know there is many in the area here there we live who are doing it. Oh, it's awful in our bedroom we go to bed, the room likely full of a bad smell of smoke. :yoyo: :bang:

 

[RiverRat2]

I think working with the forest service and listening to them is responsible. I am curious about your "strident environmentalist" statement. Does this mean you cut your firewood with a handsaw? That must be a great deal of work.

Yep!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[andrethegiant70]

I've had too much fun with the chainsaws to sell em all over a simple moral quandry! Even if they didn't cut wood anymore, they would still have squatters rights in the workshop!

You all either rationalize as well as I do or you are correct. Either way, I am encouraged! The last point on "dialing down" the woodstove is a REALLY good one, though. I do notice that it produces a LOT more particulate matter.. when there is an inversion the neighborhood gets pretty smoky. Has anyone discovered a way to get a stovefull of wood to burn most of the night without smoking out the neighbors?

I know he's not been the most popular character around (he can be annoying) but Al Gore's movies "An Inconvenient Truth" is pretty upsetting.

 

[Log Splitter]

As already stated, burning wood is carbon neutral. Burning fossil fuels creates a net add to the CO2 in our atmosphere. Particulate matter from smoke is another deal, but I doubt it contributes to global warming.

Trees are renewable, burn what you need and stay warm with a clear concience.

Al Gore is a.... nevermind, this is too good of a forum to start discussing politics.

 

[tek9tim]

Since the CO2 subject has been hashed out thoroughy... I have yet to see a firewood program that is comprehensive enough to actually start to make a dent in the fuel loading of the forest. The trees that make the problem are green, unless of course the ol' bark beetle has come around. But getting rid of the dead trees of only a few specific species (usually not the species that die the most, either) in limited areas, only along roads doesn't really do much for fuel reduction. Helps out road maintenance, by eliminating possible trees falling across the road, but otherwise...

 

[Erick]

Global Warming

:hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange:
That horse is down
:deadhorse:
The latest "international study" on "global warming" (alarm word alarm word) showed that the temp of the earth has risen .7* (yes that’s 7 tenths of a degree) in the last 100 years. Other science has shown this to be a natural trend of the earth that has been going on since the beginning, but the "media" doesn’t seem to get those stories on the front page. Bad news sells news papers and commercial time folks, that’s why you rarely see stories about kittens being rescued from trees, or people helping the elderly. It happens every day but "feel good" stories won't sell newspapers. People have an innate curiosity toward the worst the world has to offer and the media feeds on that curiosity.

OK off my soapbox now

Ala Forest Gump "that’s all I got to say about that"

 

[IchWarriorMkII]

I read that the instruments used to measure the temperature used to have a margin of error greater than the recorded ???? in temperatures (which have just been confirmed as .7 degrees).

A Congressional hearing concernning global warming was cancelled this week due to:

Snow and Ice storms! Yay!

Global warming is nothing more than liberal politics.

 

[WRW]

Since the CO2 subject has been hashed out thoroughy... I have yet to see a firewood program that is comprehensive enough to actually start to make a dent in the fuel loading of the forest. The trees that make the problem are green, unless of course the ol' bark beetle has come around. But getting rid of the dead trees of only a few specific species (usually not the species that die the most, either) in limited areas, only along roads doesn't really do much for fuel reduction. Helps out road maintenance, by eliminating possible trees falling across the road, but otherwise...

Not being from around where you are at, I'll ask you if the program might, or might not, help create better fire breaks.

 

[rupedoggy]

How to have an air tight stove and not produce smoke? The answer is a smoke burner. It is a kind of catalitic convertor that fits in the pipe. It gets hot and burns up the smoke. You can even turn down the airflow when you go to bed. Mike

 

[buzz sawyer]

As already stated, burning wood is carbon neutral. Burning fossil fuels creates a net add to the CO2 in our atmosphere. Particulate matter from smoke is another deal, but I doubt it contributes to global warming.

Trees are renewable, burn what you need and stay warm with a clear concience.

Al Gore is a.... nevermind, this is too good of a forum to start discussing politics.

If by fossil fuel you mean coal, why would this add carbon since it absorbed it when it was vegetation? Wouldn't it be neutral?

As for banking a fire, doesn't this make the wood last longer? Wouldn't the net result be fewer emissions?

I can't help wondering who caused all the heat that ended the last ice age 20K years ago.

 

[Grace Tree]

I read that the instruments used to measure the temperature used to have a margin of error greater than the recorded ???? in temperatures (which have just been confirmed as .7 degrees).

A Congressional hearing concernning global warming was cancelled this week due to:

Snow and Ice storms! Yay!

Global warming is nothing more than liberal politics.

I agree
Phil

 

[Jim Mesthene]

If by fossil fuel you mean coal, why would this add carbon since it absorbed it when it was vegetation? Wouldn't it be neutral?

The earth stores carbon in three ways:
CO2 in the atmosphere
CO2 dissolved in the oceans
Carbon stored in limestone, coal and oil

CO2 levels have varied widely in earth's history. When there's a lot in the atmosphere, plankton and jungle grow and convert it to solids and a lot gets dissolved in the oceans. This takes place over millions of years and is a normal cycle.
Human beings have only been around for 100,000 years. We can't survive in some of the extreme conditions that are normal on the Grand Scale of things. We're actually pretty fragile in that sense, and are unlikely to survive, as a species, as long as dinosaurs did.
If we are pushing the atmospheric levels of carbon too high, we're doing it by converting the long term storage (coal, oil) into atmospheric carbon. You get a lot of gaseous CO2 from just a little oil.
That's why burning 1 million BTUs of wood, is carbon-neutral; the tree sucked CO2 out of the air and you're putting it back. You haven't taken any carbon out of the long-term storage.
1 million BTUs of oil adds to the CO2 in the air without removing it first like the tree did.
That is a simple version of the carbon cycle in earth's geology, not a liberal plot.
There is no absolute certainty that elevated CO2 levels in the atmosphere are caused by Man. There is no doubt that levels are rising faster than at any time geologists can discover (except for right after huge volcanic eruptions). If the levels get too high, this will be a worse place for people to live.