Wood Pellet Boilers

- Carbon neutral central heating

As the price of fossil fuels steadily increase the demand for a carbon neutral home heating also rises. Here at Commercial and Domestic Boiler Repairs Ltd we’re keen to do our bit for Mother Earth by educating the public and installing Wood Pellet burning Boilers for our domestic and commercial customers.

Is Wood Fuelled heating right for you?

Let’s take a look firstly at the options you have when switching to wood fuelled heating and the way wood fuelled heating works in you home. There are two main ways of using wood to heat your home:
If you’re looking at heating just a single room the best option is a standalone stove that burns logs or pellets. This has the added advantage of having an option for a back boiler to be fitted that can provide your hot water. These stoves will have to be filled with fuel manually.

If you want to heat your whole home and water, a boiler system that burns pellets, logs or chips is your best option. There are also boiler models that have an automatic fuel feeder that releases pellets or chips at regular intervals from storage units called hoppers. There are a few things to consider before deciding that you want to change to a wood fuelled heating system, unfortunately they aren’t an option for everyone in the UK.

Firstly you must have an area in your home to contain the systems. You'll need a large dry area close to the boiler to store your wood. Ideally this should be close to where the wood is delivered to your home to minimise the distance you have to carry it. Do you have a suitable flue? You need a vent which is specifically designed for wood fuel appliances, with sufficient air movement for proper operation of the stove. Your But we can also fit your existing chimney with a lined flue, which is fairly inexpensive.

There are also strict safety and building regulations when installing these systems. We’re happy to help you figure out if you can comply, but this is usually only a problem if you live in an old or unusual home. Also if you live in a smokeless zone then wood can only be burnt in certain appliances. Finally if your flue extends 1 meter or more above the height of your roof or if you live in a conservation or world heritage site you’ll need to talk to your local council.

What are the main costs and benefits?

If a wood fuelled heating option is available to you the first thing to remember is while the initial start up costs seem much higher than other heating options, in the long run the financial and moral benefits far outweigh the costs.
For example a standard Combi boiler has a life of about 7 to 10 years while a pellet burner has 50 plus. Also when switching from coal or electricity fuelled heating the average home reduces their CO2 emissions by up to 9.5 tonnes per year – which is a staggering saving!

Costs

• Wood costs do vary depending on how far away you are from your supplier. Obviously if you have your own wood source to burn costs would be very minimal. But if not, typically heater and hot water costs would be just £1,000 a year in a detached property.
• A standalone pellet stove would set you back around £4,300 including installation, while a log stove will usually cost less than half this. A typical automatically fed pellet boiler for an average home costs around £11,500 including installation, fuel store and VAT at 5%. The manually fed log systems are slightly cheaper. To find wood fuel supplier near you, visit the log pile website at http://www.nef.org.uk/logpile/fuelsuppliers/index.htm

Benefits

• Reduce CO2 emissions by 9.5 tonnes
• When replacing solid or electric fuel systems you could save £390 a year on heating costs.
• From June 2011 the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) have announced that the Renewable Heat Incentive. The incentive has been designed to provide financial support to encourage the uptake of renewable and low carbon heat technologies.
• Wood costs often depend on the distance from your home to a wood supplier and whether you can buy and store wood in large quantities. If you have your own supply of wood fuel then this can significantly reduce your costs. Typically, heating and hot water costs for a year will be around £1,000 in a detached property.
• Wood fuelled heating systems have far fewer parts than other systems so there is less to maintain and less that can go wrong.

Wood fuelled heating really does make sense. Fossil fuels will eventually run out and the cost of them is always increasing. While wood fuel prices have slightly increased due to the slowing of the housing boom and less wood by products being produced, it’s still by far the cheaper option. While the start up costs are much higher than other central heating options, your guaranteed 5 times the life of the average Combi boiler and your going to reduce your carbon footprint by almost 10 tonnes a year.

Whether you’ve made up your mind or you have any more questions regarding your property and wood fuelled heating, give us a call at Commercial and Domestic Boiler Repairs on 0207 244 8882.