Everything You Need To Know About Ready to Burn Firewood

The pleasure of sitting next to a warm and cosy fireplace with a cup of hot coffee is unparalleled. Whether you simply chill by the fireplace or read your favourite book, there can be no better way of spending winter evenings. It is extremely important to choose theready to burn firewood carefully.

Burning firewood for a prolonged period of time can have a harmful effect on the environment. It is important to use the best-quality firewood to leave minimum impact on the environment. However, the pertinent question is how one can choose the best quality firewood.

Let’s have a look at some tips that will help in making the right choice:

• Check the moisture content of the wood

Good firewood is always dry! It is to be kept in mind that wood with moisture doesn’t burn properly. Most of the firewood, such as cedar and pine, are softwood trees. They have a significant level of moisture even months after it has been cut from the tree. If you are looking for a long burning, it is important to choose dry wood. It will also help in producing clean fire because wood with more water retention needs more energy for burning. Also, the smoke from moist wood will release stronger pollutants when you burn them. They never burn clean. That’s why you must always opt for dry wood.

• Choose seasoned wood

For clean burning, you must choose firewood that has been seasoned well for a significant amount of time. Seasoned woods are always a better choice as compared to unseasoned woods. Unseasoned wood is water-laden and won’t offer a clean burn. The easiest way of identifying seasoned wood is to bang the log of wood in the wall. A log that is seasoned and well dried will sound hollow.

• Age of the wood

The age of the wood helps in deciding the quality of firewood. Older firewood burns cleaner than greenwood. If you want to find older wood, look at the bottom of the pile. Often, they have cracks at the end, signifying that they have been dried and seasoned well. An old piece of wood should be chosen as seasoned and dried wood helps in clean burning.

• Colour of the wood

If the firewood burns clean, it can be assumed that it was stored in a dry place. It has a different colour from the greenwood. The good firewood log is grey and dusty on the outside. It is dry and clean on the inside, which is an indication that the wood contains a lower amount of residual material.

• The density of the wood

The density of firewood is important for burning clean fire. It is to be known that firewood with high density burns more efficiently as compared to firewood with lower density. Firewood with low density burns out quickly. High-density wood takes a long time to burn, which leads to lesser pollution.

• The bark of the wood

Dry and seasoned firewood will always have chipped bark that is peeling from the surface of the log. The bark of the tree needs moisture to stay attached to the rest of the log. Therefore, chipped and peeling bark is an indication that the wood is dry and will burn as clean as possible, creating little pollution.

Benefits of choosing seasoned firewood

• If the wood is laden with moisture, it will take more time to ignite. This can be a painful experience as it will take longer to ignite your fireplace. Even if you succeed in burning green firewood, it won’t produce the required heat or burn well. Lighting seasoned and dry firewood is easier and effective.

• Creosote can be a concerning factor if you use firewood for the stove. Creosote is released when burning any type of wood, but the chemical releases more while burning wet wood. This leads to build-up on the chimney, increasing the risk of a chimney fire. On the other hand, using seasoned firewood helps in keeping your home safe.

• Wet wood also increases smoke output. During the early stage of burning, harmful pollutants are emitted. This might colour the glass in front of the fireplace and brick on your fireplace. It is not good for the environment as well.

• Whether it is a fireplace or stove, seasoned wood burns efficiently. If you use wet wood, some of the energy will get consumed for burning the wood instead of heating your home. It is said that freshly cut wood has 60% of moisture content. Even if the firewood has 40% of moisture content, it will impact the burning efficiency by half.

The above-mentioned tips will help in selecting good ready-to-burn firewood that will burn clean and create minimal pollution.