All About Pellet Stoves
Growing steadily in popularity, wood pellet stoves are quickly becoming an option for heating appliances for several reasons. Not only are pellet stoves an environmentally-friendly way to heat your home, but these stoves are also convenient, economical, and efficient. At Ace Chimney Sweeps, we carry and install some of the highest-rated brands of pellet stoves, such as Harman and Enviro. Our customers have asked us many questions about pellet stoves, so we thought we would share with you some information from How Stuff Works about this cost-effective heating appliance.
How do pellet stoves work?
Simply load the wood pellets into the stove’s hopper. Operated by electricity, the auger delivers these pellets to the burn pot, which can be found in the combustion chamber of the stove. The heavily-compressed pellets are ignited within the burn pot, and the room is then heated by a convection blower. The combustion gases are pushed out by an exhaust blower through a pipe in the back of the stove, which can be vented into an existing chimney or connected to the outdoors through a small hole.
Tell me more about the wood pellet fuel.
Made from recycled materials like sawdust, wood pellets are very tightly compressed to reduce the moisture content. This allows the pellets to burn hotter and cleaner than typical wooden logs. Since the pellets are made from recycling old wood and emit fewer pollutants, this makes a pellet stove a very environmentally conscious choice to heat your home. Pellets are very inexpensive to buy, and they require less storage space. However, one drawback of pellet stoves is that these pellets can be hard to find. You may have to order your fuel online.
What are other advantages to pellet stoves?
Available in a wide range of styles and sizes, pellet stoves are easy to operate as they only require you loading pellets into the hopper. Also, you will most likely only need to load the hopper once a day to sufficient heat your living space. Pellet stoves also require less cleanup since pellets create much less ash and creosote than firewood.
What are the disadvantages to pellet stoves?
We talked about how it can be difficult to find pellets in every market, which can be a great disadvantage depending on where you live. Although you will save money over the years on heating costs with a pellet stove, these heating appliances can be considerably more expensive to purchase than a typical wood-burning or gas-fueled stove. Additionally, since pellet stoves do run on electricity, you run the risk of being without heat if a winter storm knocks out your electrical power.
Questions about pellet stoves? Contact Ace Chimney Sweeps to learn more about this green way of heating your home.