That reminds me: heating, or at least partially heating, with wood is not unusual here, especially in the countryside. Pretty much free fuel if you have land. I know, I know, the environmental impact...
I Wonder if people still heat their home with coal.
- Thread starter Lef T
- Start date
That reminds me: heating, or at least partially heating, with wood is not unusual here, especially in the countryside. Pretty much free fuel if you have land. I know, I know, the environmental impact...
Enough people still heat with coal to make it worth selling in 40# bags at $10.00 per bag.
rze99
Doctor of Teleocity
or peat!
www.theguardian.com
‘Like an oilwell in your back yard’: Irish people turn to cutting peat to save on energy bills
Curbs to protect Ireland’s bogs have gone up in smoke amid soaring costs – theft of trees and woodpiles in Germany also rising
www.theguardian.com
chris m.
Doctor of Teleocity
During the oil crisis in the 70s I lived on Long Island, NY. Most people had an oil furnace in their basement, and would get deliveries of home heating oil. A lot of folks bought small coal burning stoves that you could put in your living room and burn coal that would come in bags like these. I wonder how many folks died of carbon monoxide poisoning at that time. I remember we had one of these stoves, about the size of a small coffee table. I don't remember there being a chimney for it, but there must have been.
I could imagine folks like traditional blacksmiths buying coal for use in their furnaces. Glass blowers, too. So maybe its more of a specialty product now, with most of the customers NOT using it for home heating these days.
Wooly Fox
Tele-Meister
Anthracite is the rarest form of coal, very high BTU and burns very cleanly. You can only get it from a very small number of coals seams. The largest area for it near Pittsburgh and North West Pennsylvania though all these mines are small. Ukraine is the other anthracite region but we know how that is going. UK has some but like Cumbria it's high sulphur so most power stations don't want it.
My cousin conned me into taking a ride to deliver his niece up to Chicago to her parents' home from Muscle Shoals Alabama one winter when we went there in 1958 for Christmas. It snowed the whole way; we passed literally hundreds of accidents along the highway. I figured we'd end up in one, but my cousin must have been a pretty good driver because we finally made it to Chicago without incident to ourselves.
With all the snow, I thought the morning would surely be a sight to behold! When I got up the next morning I couldn't wait to get outside and see the city covered in snow! What greeted me when I got out in the morning air, was one of the most depressing sights I've ever seen! I guess coal must have been the predominant means of heating, because a blanket of soot was mixed with the snow, and the whole place looked like wet newspaper.
With all the snow, I thought the morning would surely be a sight to behold! When I got up the next morning I couldn't wait to get outside and see the city covered in snow! What greeted me when I got out in the morning air, was one of the most depressing sights I've ever seen! I guess coal must have been the predominant means of heating, because a blanket of soot was mixed with the snow, and the whole place looked like wet newspaper.
Lots of people were still using coal to heat in Alabama in the mid to late fifties, I know because the stanch of burning coal was everywhere. The relatives we stayed with had heavy duty stoves for burning coal, they were made of cast iron, and would get to roaring and making sounds like they were going to blow up when the fire was going good!
Problem is that you don't have readily available natural gas in Cape Breton to do a conversion from coal like we're doing here in Alberta.
Saw on the news that there's a coal mine reopening in Cape Breton. Looks like there's a demand for it. British Columbia is shipping metallurgical coal to China as fast as they can dig it out of the ground.
Uncle Daddy
Friend of Leo's
There's a rule now about burning loose household coal here in the UK. We can only buy the stuff that's processed into nuggats with cement dust.
www.gov.uk
Restrictions on sale of coal and wet wood for home burning begin
Sales of coal and wet wood for household burning are being phased out to cut harmful pollution to human health
I have a woodburner as well but I've got to admit to rarely using it. Just so much easier to stick the central heating on but there is a certain charm to having the woodburner on for a really cold winters night.
I have friends who said the same thing. The first one up has to build the fire up.
I copped the images from the website of a store I worked at for 12 1/2 years. We got coal shipments with all the other winter associated goods including coal stoves. I know that the number of folks heating with coal is very small but that is why people bought it from us.
Seeing as we were a farm based store a local farrier might buy a bag or two but the vast majority was for coal stoves. I did strike up a conversation with a husband and wife who were glass blowers who were from out of town and needed to get their propane tanks filled to blow glass at some big arts/crafts show in the area.
AJBaker
Friend of Leo's
In Germany it's still fairly common, you can buy coal brikettes by the 10kg or 25kg bundle that you can burn in a normal woodstove. This works because it's lignite which burns at a similar temperature to wood, but which can burn much longer.
The downside is that it produces a lot of ash, and has a fair amount of sulfur and other (probably nasty) components.
It used to be cheap as chips, but there's a big shortage this year, as they're burning the stuff to make electricity.
The downside is that it produces a lot of ash, and has a fair amount of sulfur and other (probably nasty) components.
It used to be cheap as chips, but there's a big shortage this year, as they're burning the stuff to make electricity.
Nogoodnamesleft
Tele-Afflicted
A fireplace with a boiler behind it. The boiler sent water through radiators throughout the house. We used coal. That was in my childhood.
The "coal men" would bring big bags of coal to put in a coal shed in the back yard. We'd shovel coal from there into a bucket as needed to bring it in the house. Occasionally you'd let the fire burn out to remove the ash under the grate (there was a metal drawer to pull out and empty). Most mornings though it was just poke the fire and add some more coal to get it roaring again.
I loved it. If you felt a chill you sat closer to the fire. Conversation at the fireplace was a normal part of life. It was a focal point. Later of course that's been replaced by no conversation in front of a television set. I miss those days sitting by the fire with my granny.
Depending on the region of Ireland, it would be coal or turf used the fireplace. It varied quite a bit. Sometimes heating oil, again depending on the region and how modern the home was. Some others ended up with electric heaters for water.
The "coal men" would bring big bags of coal to put in a coal shed in the back yard. We'd shovel coal from there into a bucket as needed to bring it in the house. Occasionally you'd let the fire burn out to remove the ash under the grate (there was a metal drawer to pull out and empty). Most mornings though it was just poke the fire and add some more coal to get it roaring again.
I loved it. If you felt a chill you sat closer to the fire. Conversation at the fireplace was a normal part of life. It was a focal point. Later of course that's been replaced by no conversation in front of a television set. I miss those days sitting by the fire with my granny.
Depending on the region of Ireland, it would be coal or turf used the fireplace. It varied quite a bit. Sometimes heating oil, again depending on the region and how modern the home was. Some others ended up with electric heaters for water.
Nogoodnamesleft
Tele-Afflicted
Yes, true. The mention of television was showing my age wasn't it.
lammie200
Friend of Leo's
BTW, announcement tomorrow on nuclear fusion progress. No radioactive waste to deal with. I wonder how long we are from implementing it on the vast scale of demand.
bettyseldest
Friend of Leo's
I believe that as part of the Red Wall/Levelling up agenda, the new coal mine is proposed to be able to ensure that the World Coal Carrying Championships have a secure supply of coal to allow the event to carry on in future. Supply of Eastern European coal is at risk due to the goings on in the Ukraine.
Since 1963, the championships take part on Easter Monday each year. Starting at the Royal oak pub outside the village of Gawthorpe, competitors carry a hundred weight (112lb) sack of coal over a 1012 metre course to finish at Maypole Green in the centre of the village. A world record time of 4 minutes and 6 seconds was set in 1991, by Dave Jones of Meltham.
Given that the event is the jewel in the crown of the government's plan to not only bring prosperity to the north of England, but also drive us rapidly out of recession, it was imperative that we secure a supply of coal into the future.
The only issue with the bolded was the fact you would have to fight with the dog for that space. The dog always won
Nogoodnamesleft
Tele-Afflicted
This is true. But he was good at sharing and sometimes made a good pillow.The only issue with the bolded was the fact you would have to fight with the dog for that space. The dog always won
