Putting in the wood

Winter is coming with big nasty teeth, biting winds, and a deep frigid grip. The cost of filling our heating oil is $700 CA a tankful and it is estimated that if we were to run only oil, keep the house at a comfy 20C (68F) it would take a tank a month starting in December. So that translates to $4200 total for oil to see us through the winter from December to May. That is a heck of a lot of money, and I cannot believe that oil is not going to go up in price over the next several months.

We have thought a great deal about alternatives to the use of oil heat and forced air, and looked in to the use of a wood stove or a pellet stove on the first floor of the house. We ran into a couple of problems when with these two alternatives. First and foremost, we are renting the house, and anything we put into the house will stay when we leave. The second problem was one of cost. You see, in order to put in a wood stove it would require a chimney through the house to the roof. We cannot use the chimney that already exists since putting a wood fire above an oil furnace risks a backdraft and potential explosion (bad idea). The pellet stove would not require so much work on a chimney as it could vent right out of the wall of the house, but the cost of the pellet stove would equal the cost of the wood with chimney.

So given these costly alternatives to the oil, we decided to look into the use of the wood furnace in the basement. This has several advantages, not the least of which is that wood is much less expensive than oil. It does mean that you must work a bit harder to make the heat work, start the fire, tend the fire, tote of the ash, but the heat is more constant than the oil since the fan runs as long as the wood is burning to dissipate the heat. Oil comes on and off as the temperature fluctuates and thus it often feels cold before you have the furnace kick in again.

Well, if we want to burn wood, and that seems like the best choice, then we need to get wood. I contacted a local gentleman (Paul Smallman who is a great local Entrepreneur, more in future blogs) and he said he would get things arranged. Our neighbors, who had lived in the house until recently, told us to expect to burn seven cords of wood if we used wood exclusively, and so that is what I ordered form Mr Smallman. The cost of hardwood is more than soft wood, and to have it cut, blocked, and split runs $174/cord which translated into $1218 a darn site better than the $4K plus of oil alone.

Mr Smallman dropped 3.5 cords off several days ago, and we commenced to putting it away. Now, in order to understand what this entails, take a look at the wood pile in front of the house. Just under the window in on the house is the trap door that leads to the basement which means that the wood must be moved from point A outside to point B in the basement and the stacked. To say that the process was an undertaking would be putting it mildly. It was a royal pain in the arse. You see, you have to toss the wood down, separate it into the sizes and then stack according to size. This gives you the chance to handle each piece several times. We asked one of our friends if her sone wanted to earn some money, he did of course, and so he helped me move the wood today. He started his work in the basement, and after about 45 minutes realized that he needed a break. I took over and we worked for another 4 hours stacking the wood.

Now, before you think that it was no big deal, you must understand that our basement is not finished, and there are only one or two places where a grown man taller than 5’8” can stand upright without hitting his head. I spent most of my time in the crouch as I sorted and stacked the wood for our furnace. Believe me, as I stacked the wood the thought of a pellet stove on the first floor looked better and better. I am hoping that Mr Smallman was pulling my leg when he told me it was only half the wood, because I really do not know where we will but another 3.5 cords if we have that coming our way.

So, tonight Nancy and started talking about building a house on the island, and the first thing I mentioned was geothermal heat, pellet furnace, and no basement. Ah the lessons just keep coming.

If you are interested in where the horses are now living, check out the link to the right titled Wild Wind Stables.