Wood Pellet And Corn Stoves


Wood Pellet And Corn Stoves

Corn stoves and Wood Pellet stoves are both extremely popular alternative heating systems especially with recent worries about the widely fluctuating price of oil. The choice between the two fuels usually comes down to locality. In the corn belt where wood is scarce and corn is plentiful or if you happen to be a farmer growing corn the main fuel choice is obvious. Similarly in forested areas where wood is readily available but corn has to be imported the wood pellet fueled stoves seems the obvious choice. There are some places where corn and wood pellets are both readily available so in these cases a stove capable of burning both fuels makes most sense. As commodity prices are so volotile these days it is probably a good idea to buy a stove that is capable of burning both fuels, then if say the price of corn rockets while wood pellets remain stable or if the supply of one fuel source dries up temporarily then it actually may be cost effective to ship in the alternative fuel supply from further afield. Basically try to keep your options open when deciding on an alternative heating system. Some multi fuel stoves are able to burn other cereal crops such as wheat and rye in addition to corn and wood pellets.

Remember that both corn stoves and wood pellet stoves need an electrical power supply to power the fans, controls, and the auger that feeds corn or wood pellets from the hopper into the stove's furnace. They typically consume appoximately 100 kilowatt hours per month. If you live in an area with frequent power supply outages then it makes sense to have a back up generator. Both types of stove typiclaly cost around $2000 which is far cheaper than solar powered, wind turbine and geothermal alternatove heating systems.

A typical Massachusetts home with a wood pellet burning or corn stove requires around 3 tons (or 107 bushels) of wood pellets or corn during in a typical heating season. If fuel corn was available in Massachusetts and was priced at 10$ a bushel (56 lbs) that comes out at $1070. If wood pellets locally were $300 a ton that fuel costs $900. Obviously as the price of these commodities varies you have to do the math to find the cheapest fuel source.

Corn burning stoves do provide a couple of additional problems that the equivalent wood pellet burner does not. When corn burns it leaves behind a residue that becomes very hard called clinkers. Unless your stove has an inbuilt clinker clearing system then these residues need to be cleaned out to keep the stove functioning at optimum fuel efficiancy. The other problem with corn storage for fuel is that any spilled or carelessly stored fuel corn can encourage rodents and pest insects.

Both corn stoves and wood pellet burning stoves require ash to be cleared regularly and a regular service to keep the system operating at maximum efficiency. Other chores to be considered are loading the fuel corn or wood pellets into the hopper.