Fuel Type Overview
Choosing a burning Hearth Product may be a difficult decision. A critical decision that you need to make when purchasing a hearth product is: The type of FUEL your hearth appliance will burn and consume. This section of our site will help to make the Fuel Type decision that is right for you.
There are five major factors that must be considered when comparing fuel types:
Cost, Availability, Convenience, Efficiency, and Reliability
The following is a list of available fuel types to consider when deciding which type is right for you:
- Gas
- Wood
Factors which need to be considered when choosing a fuel type:
Cost – Burning fuel which is converted to energy costs money. The local and global marketplace continue to change which will affect how much you will have to pay for the supply and delivery of your fuel. However, when determining your TRUE COST, you must also consider the fuel’s indirect costs: time/effort required to operate, the potential aggravation and annoyances (or lack there of), and the cost of the initial investment.
Availability – The long-term availability and the quality of fuel varies by geographical regions. For instance, availability of electric, natural, gas, and liquid propane are readily available today in our area and the quality of these fuels remains consistently very good. However, wood fuels require additional work on your part to source, and may be difficult to predict the consistent quality from year to year.
Convenience - For the enjoyable use of your hearth appliance your fuel choice must best match your lifestyle. When thinking of how much ease-of-use operation means to you, you must think about the time it takes to source, handle, and store your fuel. Additionally how much time and effort would you like to take to operate, clean, and maintain your fuel-specific hearth product?
Efficiency – Efficiency measures how much of the potential energy of the fuel used is released as heat-energy into the home. When heating value is high on your list of goals for your hearth product, you must analyze the actual operating efficiency of a product / fuel type to get a clear picture of how much you will benefit from money that you spend on the fuel usage.
Reliability – When adding a hearth appliance to serve as back – up heat source or as a primary heat source in a section of your home, reliablilty is important. You must consider: Will this product work in a power outage? What would cause the hearth appliance to fail or operate less efficiently? Based on the fuel type you select and the hearth appliance the answers to these questions will vary.