You may not be thinking much about your fireplace or wood stove as temperatures start to warm up during the spring and summer months. Even though the temperatures are nice right now, it will not be too long before winter will return once more. Rather than waiting until the last minute, now is a great time to inspect, clean, repair, or replace your fireplace or wood stove. This is also an ideal time to get a wood stove insert installed when you want to improve your heating efficiency.

A Wood Stove Insert Fits Into Existing Spaces in Your Fireplace or Stove

A wood stove insert, which is available on our website, here at Copperfield Chimney Supply, will fit into the existing space of your current fireplace and will create a sealed system. You can also use this type of insert when you want to improve the efficiency of your current wood stove. In most cases you can use your existing chimney by making slight modifications to accommodate the insert.

Wood fuel, one of the oldest energy sources on the planet, could become the newest commodity market if it can overcome supply limits and green concerns as demand grows for renewable energy.

Supply constraints are starting to put wood fuel into competition with the paper industry, experts say, in an uneasy reminder of existing tension between the food industry and companies making biofuels from food crops.

In theory burning wood and crop waste emits less carbon than fossil fuels because it simply returns to the air carbon accumulated by plants as they grow, but that balance breaks down if stock is not replanted, or natural forests are logged.

In the meantime, utilities are burning biomass in ever greater amounts and now want price certainty and derivatives to manage their cost exposure in forward power sales, although European policymakers are mulling limits on subsidies for burning wood fuel given concerns about deforestation.

"It's coming very fast," said John Bingham, a director at consultants Hawkins Wright, referring to the development of an open market, and citing Eurostat data showing EU imports of wood pellets up 42 percent last year.

He saw increasing evidence of a larger scale market including big producers of wood pellets in Europe and North America and big intermediaries, such as Cargill and Gazprom, to balance large utility buyers.

Shaped wood pellets are made for the energy sector, while raw wood chips are used mostly by the paper industry.

The energy exchange APX-Endex is working with the Port of Rotterdam to supply an exchange-traded pellet product this year, while index provider FOEX has joined up with specialists Wood Resources International (WRI) for a global wood chip index.

Those developments herald a gradual shift to a more transparent market beyond bilateral deals between suppliers and users, such as timber companies and utilities.

APPETITE

Indicating the size of appetite, Britain's biggest coal-fired power plant, Drax, burned nearly 1 million tonnes of biomass last year, more than double previous years, while burning ten times that amount of coal.

Drax says biomass expansion depends on clearer UK support, under power market reforms to be announced before the summer. Its sources include straw and energy crops such as miscanthus.

Wood pellets have about 70 percent of the calorific value of coal, experts say.

The British arm of German utility RWE, RWE npower will this year convert a coal plant near London to burn biomass.

The aging plant will burn 2 million tonnes through 2015, when it is due to close, said a spokesman who added the facility would be a test bed for the alternative fuel.

That compares with domestic UK wood fuel production, excluding recycled or waste wood, of about 1.5 million tonnes annually, according to Forestry Commission data, underlining a need for a global trade.

It is an open question whether there is enough volume for an open market, however, given utilities have already tied up large volumes in long contracts, or produce pellets for themselves, said WRI's Hakan Ekstrom.

If EU wood fuel subsidies were more predictable and reliable -- for example the UK support to be announced in the next few weeks -- then utilities would commit to buy bigger volumes, and so motivate more supply, traders say.

But new utility demand for wood fuel, subsidized by EU low-carbon incentives, may also impact the paper and even construction industries, Ekstrom added.

"The concern is that the energy industry is starting to compete with pulp in particular but even MDF or particle board plants. They don't like to see that the energy sector is subsidized so that they can pay more for chips and pulp logs.

A wood burning stove can be added to any room of the house to provide heat and warmth on cold winter's nights. Modern versions of the traditional classic type of stove provide high energy efficiency to keep the most warmth in the home and prevent it from escaping through the chimney. There are many types and models to choose from, including cast iron wood stoves and steel wood stoves.

Buy wood stoves here!

Wood burning stoves are a sturdy, reliable method of home heating. With the solid construction of the stoves we sell here at Woodstoves-fireplaces.com , you can rest assured that your home will safe from the flames dancing only a few inches away. With steel top and sides, a cast iron door, a firebrick lined interior and thick, resistant glass for viewing, our Napoleon wood stoves and Majestic wood stoves will provide your home, and family, with many days and nights of warmth and beauty.

Tax credits are powerful incentives for potentially hesitant consumers to invest in new biomass-fueled freestanding stoves and energy conservation technology. For nearly a decade,

HPBA has worked in Washington, D.C. to maintain a tax credit for purchasers of new biomass stoves so that communities and individuals can reap the financial and environmental benefits that newer, more efficient technology provides.

UPDATE: In late December 2019, the biomass stove tax credit was extended for qualifying purchases made before December 31, 2020. Remind consumers that they are able to claim the credit on their 2018 and 2019 returns if they made a qualifying purchase in those tax years.

HPBA continues to fight for another extension of this important incentive for consumers to invest in cleaner, more efficient technology.

Industry Specific FAQs

During the colder months of the year, you can use Napoleon Wood Stoves to provide heating for the rooms in your home. You can install wood stoves in any room you desire and do not have to be limited to living room alone. Modern wood stoves are available in a variety of sizes. Wood is a renewable energy source which provides a more efficient way to heat the home and reduces your reliance on electric and gas heating.

Napoleon Wood Stoves are Energy Efficient

When selecting Napoleon wood stoves you will want to determine where you want to place the wood stoves in your home. Some styles will need to be placed away from the wall due to the amount of heat they give off. There are some models available which only need to have about 8 inches of clearance from the wall. All modern wood stoves are energy efficient with high heating efficiencies. You can find all your home hearth needs, including wood stoves when you shop at Copperfield Chimney Supply .