Wood heat is a relatively clean option!
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Ever consider how much fuel you use collecting firewood? Hauling, cutting, and splitting it?
How much CO2 does your woodburner of choice emit?
Just looked it up, wood heat puts out tons more pollution than gas heat. WHW you better quit burning wood, sell your saws, drive a bike, grow a garden (we can't have farmers polluting) etc. For those of us that know better wood rotting out in the woods puts out a lot of pollution also. Steve
To answer your first question,
on average 1 BTU of fossil fuels is used to produce 27.6 BTUs of heat from firewood. This is an excellent "Energy Return on Investment" (EROI). I have done my own calculations and I do quite a bit better than this, but I am not "average", as most of my my wood is harvested within a couple of miles of my home and I split by hand.
Regarding emissions, your statement is too vague to be evaluated, but one study found that wood heat is one of the best options in terms of overall emissions. Here are some results from that study, which looked at three categories of emissions.
(1) CO2 equivalents: Wood is the CLEANEST option
Wood heat produces 8.56 tons of CO2 per quad of heat delivered, which is lower than every other heat source, including natural gas (17.5 tons), fuel oil (22.1), kerosene (31.7), LPG (19.6), coal (29.4) and electricity (57.4 for the national average, although this varies regionally). Every scientist who works in this area realizes that "wood rotting out in the woods puts out a lot of pollution". The CO2 from rotting wood is identical to the CO2 from burning wood; it is part of the natural carbon cycle. The carbon cycle of forests is taken into account when computing net CO2 emissions, as is the fuel used to gather and process wood. Scientists who calculate emissions are not as dumb as you seem to think.
(2) Acid equivalents: Wood is the CLEANEST option
Wood heat produces 1.4 billion "acid equivalents" per quad of heat delivered, which is lower than every other heat source, including natural gas (2.4), fuel oil (6.8), kerosene (3.5), LPG (1.6), coal (20.8) and electricity (15.2, for the national average).
(3) Fine particulate emissions: Wood burned in CERTIFIED stoves is neither the cleanest nor the dirtiest option; choice of stove is critical
A stove that just meets the EPA certification standard produces 430 thousand tons of fine particulates per quad of heat delivered, which is lower than coal (729) and electricity (520, for the national average). The best modern stoves, such as the Lopi Cape Cod hybrid, have particulate emissions that are a fraction of the EPA standard. The particulate emissions of these stoves are lower than fuel oil (188) and kerosene (74), but are higher than natural gas (28). In terms of particulates, natural gas is the cleanest fuel, but in terms of CO2 and acid equivalents, wood heat is the winner (among the options listed).
The following link will take you to the study that is the source for most of the above figures. As I stated, the particulate data in this study do NOT reflect the newest stoves, whose emissions are dramatically reduced. Nonetheless, the study concludes that wood is one of the cleanest options:
http://basineducation.uwex.edu/centralwis/pdfs/hpawma.pdf
Wood heat is much cleaner than most people imagine, particularly if you use a modern, efficient stove.
Doug