Why does everyone install wood burners knowing how terrible they are for the environment?

[Don'tcallthepolice]

Just this

No, there's no need here. As I say, built in the mid 90s. One house forages for wood, I'm not sure what the other is doing. But there's no way to regulate it really, or desire to.

3/ 4 beds. But just estate home size, think Barretts.

Foraging is just going to pick wet wood, it's pointless. It will be regulated in due course.

Wow really 8nteresting find
Im 5.9
But we do have a lot of adults here

How come that hasn't worked for ski-ing, (higher end) cruises and SUV ownership then?

All of which are disasters for the environment.

Mine is a high 13.4.

I was planning to get one, very popular in my area but the damage to lungs has put me off.

Another old house dweller here — Georgian listed cottage, single glazed windows (timber DGUs not possible), solid floors and fucking freezing. The inside of my kitchen window was covered in ice this week! I’ve made triple-layered curtains, Roman blinds and draught excluders for all rooms (one of the first things I did during my first winter here 12 years ago, I was shocked by how cold it was!) but once this place is cold and damp, only fires will warm it up.

Just me and the dog live here, I burn seasoned logs from two of my local business clients and the “eco-logs” for extra heat. I don’t eat meat, don’t go on holiday, don’t have children and make a concerted effort to care for my home as it has been for almost 300 years. We’re not all rich folk with money to burn on gas and electric; I’m a frugal single woman and I’d be buggered without my fires. If you like to admire pretty, well-conserved old houses in ancient towns where the Conservation Officer is king/queen, spare a thought for the occupants if stoves and open fires are banned!

I suspect this is actually a key issue for some folks who hate them. They are an expensive middle class marker. Anything which is a middle class marker always has those who will hate it because of that.

They will post endless research, not looking at defra approved, seasoned wood, comparative studies. They hate it for the simple reason it’s costly and perceived as middle class.

Imagine explaining to a Victorian maid of all work that you have the option of clean, convenient heating but choose fires instead!

But ignorant no? Many people who use them don’t have another option. Many people who use them use as a supplementary option.

they may have been maids, but I’m sure they fully understood economics and choice.

I would ask a similar question of tumble drier users as they pollute the atmosphere and our bodies with micro plastics from fibres.
I don’t have a tumble drier, I dry my clothes on an airer overnight in the residual heat from my wood burner.

So many things in life pose a risk to health and the environment. The risk of injury in a car accident is pretty high but most of us overlook that for convenience and pleasure, so I don't know why fires should be any different.

Lots of posters seem unaware that living rurally (or indeed even not in a city!) isn't some rare affliction. Every house I've lived in has already had a fireplace or stove, I've never bought one myself. I've lived with fires since I was born so I figure any health damage has probably already occurred! And we also would be reliant on oil and an often dodgy electricity supply without our stove (ten days straight without power last winter!) And I'm 50 mins outside London so not exactly in the distant remote wilderness!!

Lit mine at lunchtime. It was snowing briefly, very cold.

This is a bit silly.

I’d like people to be more aware of the dangers of them and I’m solidly middle class! I’m a middle class person with a wish to avoid lung disease, cancer, heart disease and dementia! And I’d like my middle class DD to avoid them too.

But I suppose writing off those who highlight the proven dangers of them as being envious of the middle class enables you to dismiss the evidence and carry on as you were, without feeling bad about it, doesn’t it.

I’ll have to tell that to my IL - they’ll be delighted to know that as farmers they are now closed as middle class because they have a wood burner in their farm 😁😁

*classed (not closed)

Because if the Elecy goes off and there's no gas you can keep warm and boil a kettle. That degree of independence is an insurance in Tory Britain.

I have major wood burner envy but I've always been put off by the cost and now the environmental/health concerns. However, I thought that there were ways to reduce emissions, like not using treated wood.

With fuel prices the way they are, it's not the right time to criticise people who may have little choice about how they heat their homes. I wouldn't take kindly to someone saying I should use a heat pump instead of a gas boiler as heat pumps cost so much and they can't be installed in every building. What's needed is help for people to make their homes more energy efficient.

How bad are they for the lungs?

Preach to me only if you are childless, never drive a car, never fly anywhere and never use plastic oh and are vegan as those are all demonstrably worse for the environment.

How does anyone avoid using plastic?

I would freeze without my wood burner. Nobody who relies on one enjoys chopping and stacking wood, lighting the burner at 7 am and keeping the jolly thing going until 8 pm everyday.
It soon becomes a chore as many people will be finding out now they’ve invested in them.
Oh for the option of turning the thermostat and hearing a boiler light up.

We have no gas supply and in a listed building heat pumps, solar etc are not an option. Like a pp we regularly have ice on the inside of our (single glazed) windows in a morning. Options for heating are either fuel oil (diesel) or seasoned wood - both cost about the same at the moment.

I wouldn’t cook with gas
Or walk drive with window down busy streets
Or……..etc

Either then.

Maybe because the black mold that forms when we don't have the wood burner on and we can't afford the gas bill is worse!