> Wood fuel is far worse for people and wildlife than fossil fuels.
Can someone help me with this? I just moved and have both a fireplace and natural gas furnace. I had intended to supplement the furnace with wood heat in the winter. In what ways is wood worse than natural gas?
I can imagine a few but I’m not sure they are right:
Renewable isn't really accurate for wood, at least not in human time scales. A maple takes about 25 years to mature. It's about three maple trees to a cord. Assuming 5 cords per winter, we're talking 375 trees before the first tree cut can be reharvested (assuming it was replanted immediately). That doesn't into account soil depletion and carbon release.
Anecdote from my grandmother. She said the local doctor back in the 20's had a story about med school. Helped out on an autopsy of an old Chinese sailor who spent most of his life on sailing ships. His professor pointed out that the mans lungs were pinkish and asked the students what condition might have caused that unusual condition. Ans: Man hadn't spent his life breathing smoke.
Can someone help me with this? I just moved and have both a fireplace and natural gas furnace. I had intended to supplement the furnace with wood heat in the winter. In what ways is wood worse than natural gas?
I can imagine a few but I’m not sure they are right:
Wood disadvantages:
Local air quality
Removal of trees
Wood advantages:
Renewable
Neutral greenhouse gas emissions (?)
Abundant (in my area)
Natural gas disadvantages:
Finite resource
Greenhouse gas emissions(?)
Natural gas advantages:
Better local air quality than wood(?)