Up to 25% of sulphur can be removed from bituminous coal by crushing and cleaning, but now there's new technology in the form of burners, which can remove up to around 80% of it, but this soft type of coal's mainly used at power stations, and we don't have many of those left over here.
Home-burning coal's usually anthracite, but this year, the UK's expecting an all-time low of coal use anyway. Despite the burning of it affecting the atmosphere, it seems ridiculous not to open seams up again. We're still sitting on a lot of coal, but of course, other forms of generating power're seen as cleaner. NOT so "clean" when you consider the number of "safe" leaks from various nuclear power stations dotted around our small island. Shudder.
Critters
Forum rules
Topics should be about experiences, comments, and observations from our members' personal lives.
Topics should be about experiences, comments, and observations from our members' personal lives.
Re: Critters
I hear ya.
I had a coal burning fireplace, but it used bituminous or soft coal.
Later, I had a soapstone stove with a catalytic converter in it so it was said to produce less pollution.
I could burn wood or hard coal, but they suggested we not burn the soft fireplace coal in it.
I never burned coal in it at all, because it took a different type of grate and I didn't want to mess with the clunkers.
We rarely smelled wood fires burning back home, due to all of our rules, regulations, and restrictions.
But since moving south, many people still heat with wood down here.
Plus, with corn so plentiful, many homes have corn burning furnaces which require very little attention.
It is surprising how much heat comes out of those little burner boxes in the center of a fairly large furnace.
The corn burning furnaces, the burner units are constructed a bit differently than corn burning free standing stoves.
The few I've seen all have blowers adding air to the burner box to produce a hotter heat from the corn.
Sorta like a blacksmith uses air to make the coal hotter to heat steel.
A little conveyor continuously feeds kernels of corn to the hopper(s).
A good use for the bad corn which cannot be used for animal feed.
I had a coal burning fireplace, but it used bituminous or soft coal.
Later, I had a soapstone stove with a catalytic converter in it so it was said to produce less pollution.
I could burn wood or hard coal, but they suggested we not burn the soft fireplace coal in it.
I never burned coal in it at all, because it took a different type of grate and I didn't want to mess with the clunkers.
We rarely smelled wood fires burning back home, due to all of our rules, regulations, and restrictions.
But since moving south, many people still heat with wood down here.
Plus, with corn so plentiful, many homes have corn burning furnaces which require very little attention.
It is surprising how much heat comes out of those little burner boxes in the center of a fairly large furnace.
The corn burning furnaces, the burner units are constructed a bit differently than corn burning free standing stoves.
The few I've seen all have blowers adding air to the burner box to produce a hotter heat from the corn.
Sorta like a blacksmith uses air to make the coal hotter to heat steel.
A little conveyor continuously feeds kernels of corn to the hopper(s).
A good use for the bad corn which cannot be used for animal feed.
-
Icey
Re: Critters
That's a good one! Good grief, doesn't the corn burn away rapidly, or is it turned into compacted blocks or something?
Re: Critters
The kernels, removed from the corncob, still as just corn kernels, fed by conveyor to a small chute, drop down into a small burner box. In a free-standing stove, like a Franklin stove, the firebox itself is usually only like two to four inches square.
Corn produces some ash to clean up, but not like you get from wood stoves.
Most corn burners can be run using manufactured pellets in lieu of corn, but then you get much more ash.
There are so many types of corn burners, some hard to keep clean, some almost self-cleaning they are so well engineered.
I've owned wood stoves, the best I ever had was a Woodstock Soapstone Stove, easiest thing in the world to keep clean and ash removal was via an ash drawer. To keep the glass in the stove clean, as fresh air entered the stove, it washed across the front glass to keep it from getting smoke build-up on it.
A cheap wood stove we had previously, you couldn't see the fire after a couple of hours for the grime on the glass front. So the way Woodstock made their stoves was a blessing.
Corn for stoves was not as plentiful back home as down here, so I never opted for a corn burner. Although we did have a small one in a fishing cabin on the river right next to several farms who raised corn for horses. I don't remember ever being out there when it was so cold we needed to use the stove. We used the Coleman camp stove for cooking on.
Corn produces some ash to clean up, but not like you get from wood stoves.
Most corn burners can be run using manufactured pellets in lieu of corn, but then you get much more ash.
There are so many types of corn burners, some hard to keep clean, some almost self-cleaning they are so well engineered.
I've owned wood stoves, the best I ever had was a Woodstock Soapstone Stove, easiest thing in the world to keep clean and ash removal was via an ash drawer. To keep the glass in the stove clean, as fresh air entered the stove, it washed across the front glass to keep it from getting smoke build-up on it.
A cheap wood stove we had previously, you couldn't see the fire after a couple of hours for the grime on the glass front. So the way Woodstock made their stoves was a blessing.
Corn for stoves was not as plentiful back home as down here, so I never opted for a corn burner. Although we did have a small one in a fishing cabin on the river right next to several farms who raised corn for horses. I don't remember ever being out there when it was so cold we needed to use the stove. We used the Coleman camp stove for cooking on.
-
Icey
Re: Critters
Interesting.
We have a dual-fuel burning range and stove, which were upgraded not so long ago. It burns oil and wood, and the ashes only have to be emptied about once a week, sometimes longer. There's no glass front on them though, but they're wonderful things now. Even the hidden flues're self-cleaning.
I also have an "ordinary" cooker for quick use, but being electric, it can work out expensive to use.
We have a dual-fuel burning range and stove, which were upgraded not so long ago. It burns oil and wood, and the ashes only have to be emptied about once a week, sometimes longer. There's no glass front on them though, but they're wonderful things now. Even the hidden flues're self-cleaning.
I also have an "ordinary" cooker for quick use, but being electric, it can work out expensive to use.
Re: Critters
Debi and I looked at a self-cleaning wood stove, but the only models the company sold used wood pellets, and not designed to burn corn at all.
I've heard many horror stories from folks with pellet stoves. At least with corn you know you are getting corn, but with wood pellets, manufacturers are not so careful about what goes into them. I guess some have better quality control than others.
At the cost of wood pellets, it would double my heating bill using electric inductance heating along with the heat pump.
It costs me roughly six dollars a day in electric usage, which includes water heating, lighting, etc. Most of those I talk to using pellets are spending about twelve dollars per day on pellets. If they buy cheaper pellets, they go through more of them so the cost can actually end up being more.
Some of the frau's relatives went in together and bought their own pellet machine, getting a one year loan, so for their first year of use, it cost them like twenty bucks a day to heat. This of course dropped after the loan was paid off, but they still needed another machine to turn scrap wood into sawdust, so they bought that next.
I think if I bought another wood stove, it would be a standard wood burner with a catalytic converter like my last one.
This way I could just cut up whatever and shove it in the box to burn. But since I'm unable to do much manual labor anymore, probably a corn burner would be my best bet.
I've heard many horror stories from folks with pellet stoves. At least with corn you know you are getting corn, but with wood pellets, manufacturers are not so careful about what goes into them. I guess some have better quality control than others.
At the cost of wood pellets, it would double my heating bill using electric inductance heating along with the heat pump.
It costs me roughly six dollars a day in electric usage, which includes water heating, lighting, etc. Most of those I talk to using pellets are spending about twelve dollars per day on pellets. If they buy cheaper pellets, they go through more of them so the cost can actually end up being more.
Some of the frau's relatives went in together and bought their own pellet machine, getting a one year loan, so for their first year of use, it cost them like twenty bucks a day to heat. This of course dropped after the loan was paid off, but they still needed another machine to turn scrap wood into sawdust, so they bought that next.
I think if I bought another wood stove, it would be a standard wood burner with a catalytic converter like my last one.
This way I could just cut up whatever and shove it in the box to burn. But since I'm unable to do much manual labor anymore, probably a corn burner would be my best bet.
-
Icey
Re: Critters
Well we've never used "pellets" in ours. We throw in logs, but're lucky to have plenty of those available round here, or have it delivered by the sack. It still works out much cheaper than running on electricity, for instance, but I don't know whether gas's any better.
Re: Critters
Gas used to be so cheap, most homes had outdoor gas lights that ran 24/7 all year round. Even when the mantles were broken, they still just dumped the gas into the air, rather than being turned off.
Now Gas and Electric seem to run almost neck to neck. It's a toss up which one is cheaper to use for heating. What is cheaper one month may be more expensive the next.
Those who can afford to switch to Solar are soon finding it was not such a good deal. Besides being expensive to install, maintenance is fairly high.
But now we have a totally new problem with going solar. Many cities are making it ILLEGAL to live Off-Grid.
So if you fork over the money to install a large enough solar system with reserve storage you can make it through long periods of low sunlight, you may have wasted your money.
Now logically, if you did install such a large system, you would stay on the grid in order to sell power back to the utility companies. But what happens when too many people have more electric than even the power companies can buy it back, even when priced at next to nothing.
Their prices would still have to skyrocket in order to pay their stockholders. So once again, the poor suffer and the rich get richer.
I stopped by our Sustainable Energy place again in the earlier part of the week. Without a backup power system, their basic setup is only good during the day. One large enough to handle our daytime usage would cost around 24 thousand dollars installed. It would take 20 years, with no maintenance costs, to break even. Even selling electric back to the power company, I would still be buying 100 bucks a month from them at a much higher rate.
Maybe if I was 30 years younger I might consider it. After all, most of my yard lighting is solar powered, as are my emergency lights around the place. Even so, I have to replace the batteries in them, some every year, some every other year. I normally just replace the whole unit because it is cheaper to replace the unit than replace the batteries.
And it never fails, after you replace the batteries in one, the electronics go bad from the humidity in the air causing corrosion.
The time before last, when I replaced the lights in the yard, I went through like four tubes of silicone, sealing all the places water could leak into the electronics. It helped them to last longer, but not by much.
I had some nicer units for a while. Each held four batteries, and the electronics was sealed in plastic potting material. They never went dead before morning as most with one or two batteries do. They lasted about five years, then luck of the Irish, when I spent six bucks on each to replace the batteries. We had the hailstorm hit and destroyed them all.
Now I just buy the 97 cent yard lights by the case. When one quits working, I stick a new one in its place. I don't throw them away right away. I take them apart and keep the solar cell and sometimes the electronics if not corroded.
Never did anything with the electronics, but connected all the solar cells together until I filled a board 1 foot high and 2 feet wide. It puts out enough power to charge a car or lawn mower battery, or run a little fountain pump during the day. I used diodes so they don't draw power when the sun don't shine. Shame I've not had time to build more with all the work I have been under lately.
Now Gas and Electric seem to run almost neck to neck. It's a toss up which one is cheaper to use for heating. What is cheaper one month may be more expensive the next.
Those who can afford to switch to Solar are soon finding it was not such a good deal. Besides being expensive to install, maintenance is fairly high.
But now we have a totally new problem with going solar. Many cities are making it ILLEGAL to live Off-Grid.
So if you fork over the money to install a large enough solar system with reserve storage you can make it through long periods of low sunlight, you may have wasted your money.
Now logically, if you did install such a large system, you would stay on the grid in order to sell power back to the utility companies. But what happens when too many people have more electric than even the power companies can buy it back, even when priced at next to nothing.
Their prices would still have to skyrocket in order to pay their stockholders. So once again, the poor suffer and the rich get richer.
I stopped by our Sustainable Energy place again in the earlier part of the week. Without a backup power system, their basic setup is only good during the day. One large enough to handle our daytime usage would cost around 24 thousand dollars installed. It would take 20 years, with no maintenance costs, to break even. Even selling electric back to the power company, I would still be buying 100 bucks a month from them at a much higher rate.
Maybe if I was 30 years younger I might consider it. After all, most of my yard lighting is solar powered, as are my emergency lights around the place. Even so, I have to replace the batteries in them, some every year, some every other year. I normally just replace the whole unit because it is cheaper to replace the unit than replace the batteries.
And it never fails, after you replace the batteries in one, the electronics go bad from the humidity in the air causing corrosion.
The time before last, when I replaced the lights in the yard, I went through like four tubes of silicone, sealing all the places water could leak into the electronics. It helped them to last longer, but not by much.
I had some nicer units for a while. Each held four batteries, and the electronics was sealed in plastic potting material. They never went dead before morning as most with one or two batteries do. They lasted about five years, then luck of the Irish, when I spent six bucks on each to replace the batteries. We had the hailstorm hit and destroyed them all.
Now I just buy the 97 cent yard lights by the case. When one quits working, I stick a new one in its place. I don't throw them away right away. I take them apart and keep the solar cell and sometimes the electronics if not corroded.
Never did anything with the electronics, but connected all the solar cells together until I filled a board 1 foot high and 2 feet wide. It puts out enough power to charge a car or lawn mower battery, or run a little fountain pump during the day. I used diodes so they don't draw power when the sun don't shine. Shame I've not had time to build more with all the work I have been under lately.
-
Icey
Re: Critters
I absolutely hear you re. the solar panels Gary. The outlay can be costly, and take years to get your money back. As over there, selling excess energy back to the companies isn't always viable over here either.
Our electricity costs quite a lot more than gas. Ordinary folk just couldn't use electric heating all winter, and storage heaters aren't all that good either.
It's still best to have a wood-burning system, but not all of the flues're made to accept it, so then there's the costly outlay of having all that replaced, plus, many places're now smoke-free zones so folk don't look into what's available.
We can't get piped gas where we are, but we DO have some mobile gas heaters in case of an emergency, and they're extremely warm and more economical than electricity, though they're rarely, if ever, used.
Our electricity costs quite a lot more than gas. Ordinary folk just couldn't use electric heating all winter, and storage heaters aren't all that good either.
It's still best to have a wood-burning system, but not all of the flues're made to accept it, so then there's the costly outlay of having all that replaced, plus, many places're now smoke-free zones so folk don't look into what's available.
We can't get piped gas where we are, but we DO have some mobile gas heaters in case of an emergency, and they're extremely warm and more economical than electricity, though they're rarely, if ever, used.
Re: Critters
I guess coming from such an advanced area as St. Louis County. It was a major shock to find a major city like Knoxville so far back in the dark ages. We live INSIDE the City limits of Knoxville, but do not have Natural Gas available in our subdivision. Homes with poured concrete basements are as rare as hens teeth, and all other services are minimal at best.
We may have complained about some of our laws which seemed ridiculous to us to even become law.
But after moving to an area where no such laws exist, I see first hand how horrible things get without them.
Not can get, the lack of laws, and the who cares attitude of the populace, has already created the problems we alleviated by establishing laws controlling many issues.
Take signs for example: Some really old signs are renovated and maintained for their historic attributes.
But down here, nearly every sign ever erected is still standing, even though the business who put it up has been long gone, sometimes for many decades.
Although there are hundreds of abandoned signs between me and the one which reads Putt-Putt Miniature Golf. I drove down there one day shortly after I moved here, to play a round. I learned they were out of business for more than a decade before I moved here. I've now lived here over a decade and the sign still stands. Along with the hundreds of others for businesses which no longer exist.
Excluding historic signs, this is something we do not have a problem with back home. If you close, you take down your sign and get your deposit back from the city. If you don't take down your sign, the city will do it for you, but you don't get your deposit back either. Even paper signs placed in a window must be dated and changed every thirty days, or the day after the event it advertised passed.
Heck, down here, some stores still have paper or painted on glass signs in their windows, advertising something from 1998, but never bothered to take it down, even though the store is still open. Crazyness abounds down here!
We may have complained about some of our laws which seemed ridiculous to us to even become law.
But after moving to an area where no such laws exist, I see first hand how horrible things get without them.
Not can get, the lack of laws, and the who cares attitude of the populace, has already created the problems we alleviated by establishing laws controlling many issues.
Take signs for example: Some really old signs are renovated and maintained for their historic attributes.
But down here, nearly every sign ever erected is still standing, even though the business who put it up has been long gone, sometimes for many decades.
Although there are hundreds of abandoned signs between me and the one which reads Putt-Putt Miniature Golf. I drove down there one day shortly after I moved here, to play a round. I learned they were out of business for more than a decade before I moved here. I've now lived here over a decade and the sign still stands. Along with the hundreds of others for businesses which no longer exist.
Excluding historic signs, this is something we do not have a problem with back home. If you close, you take down your sign and get your deposit back from the city. If you don't take down your sign, the city will do it for you, but you don't get your deposit back either. Even paper signs placed in a window must be dated and changed every thirty days, or the day after the event it advertised passed.
Heck, down here, some stores still have paper or painted on glass signs in their windows, advertising something from 1998, but never bothered to take it down, even though the store is still open. Crazyness abounds down here!
-
Icey
Re: Critters
I don't think we have to pay our Councils for any signs over business premises, but that probably changes if you advertise on a communal board, such as you might find at the entrance to retail parks.
Of course, if someone buys a shop, for instance, and lives above it, they not only have to pay Council Tax but business rates as well. This's why people've campaigned for unused offices and shops to be let out at low rents, because you can't just start a business up here cheaply. The rates're mostly high, and then you have your water rates and electricity on top - before you even get started.
Folk can advertise certain things in their shop windows free of charge - such as when a sale's on, or special offers. These're usually painted onto the glass or by way of posters, but these're removed once the event's over. If customers wish to place adverts inside a shop door or window, they pay a small fee for each week or month they keep it there.
Of course, if someone buys a shop, for instance, and lives above it, they not only have to pay Council Tax but business rates as well. This's why people've campaigned for unused offices and shops to be let out at low rents, because you can't just start a business up here cheaply. The rates're mostly high, and then you have your water rates and electricity on top - before you even get started.
Folk can advertise certain things in their shop windows free of charge - such as when a sale's on, or special offers. These're usually painted onto the glass or by way of posters, but these're removed once the event's over. If customers wish to place adverts inside a shop door or window, they pay a small fee for each week or month they keep it there.
Re: Critters
It still makes it really hard to find business that are still open, when the road is lined with signs for businesses who closed a decade or two ago and their signs are still up.
I saw a sign which appeared fairly new, still had some shine to it, and the lights inside the sign were on when we passed one night on the way home from dinner.
The lights were only on because the people who bought the building were having the electric box and wiring tested to see where each breaker went.
Since they were a small franchise operation, the old sign from the previous store was the wrong shape for their sign. So rather than take down the head of the sign already up and replace it with their own, they erected a whole new smaller signpost half way down the parking lot, between the two entrances.
They were only in business about eight months before they had a fire and decided not to reopen in our area. They did reopen in another county further south, but now we had both signs still standing in front of a vacant burned out store.
A month or so later, the building was razed, and the land still sits empty, but both signs are still up.
It seems only the major chains come through and take down their signs when they move to another location, and everyone else just ups and leaves everything behind.
I saw a sign which appeared fairly new, still had some shine to it, and the lights inside the sign were on when we passed one night on the way home from dinner.
The lights were only on because the people who bought the building were having the electric box and wiring tested to see where each breaker went.
Since they were a small franchise operation, the old sign from the previous store was the wrong shape for their sign. So rather than take down the head of the sign already up and replace it with their own, they erected a whole new smaller signpost half way down the parking lot, between the two entrances.
They were only in business about eight months before they had a fire and decided not to reopen in our area. They did reopen in another county further south, but now we had both signs still standing in front of a vacant burned out store.
A month or so later, the building was razed, and the land still sits empty, but both signs are still up.
It seems only the major chains come through and take down their signs when they move to another location, and everyone else just ups and leaves everything behind.