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Comment by MattGaiser | Hacker News Reader

I am surprised to learn that burning wood for heat/cooking is something done outside Amish type communities at any significant level in the developed world.

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When COVID dies down please spend some time traveling outside of cities so you can understand how people outside your bubble live.

Wood is very common in rural areas. Cold areas that don't have city gas largely rely on fuel oil (diesel), propane, and/or wood. Fuel oil and propane are both significantly more expensive than wood, even if you buy it pre-cut. If you have land and cut it yourself the biggest cost is time.

Agree, parent comment says a lot about the bubble some people live in.

If you live in the rural parts of the northeastern US you'll end up with a years supply of wood just by occasionally clearing your land. It makes a lot of sense to use it for heat, many houses up there have both oil and a wood burning stove for heat.

And if you didn’t use the wood it would decompose and release the carbon anyway. Too much wood burning in the neighbourhood can be bad for air quality though.

Wood, often industrial wood waste, is simply the cheapest heat source in many regions. It's relatively common in suburban and rural Canada, and in the cold northern parts of the USA as well. Also the Nordic countries and Hokkaido in Japan. Probably anywhere with a low population density and a lot of trees.

I know Finland has wood-fired electric power plants in the hundred-megawatt range. Just like a small coal plant but with a wood-fired burner. And while not wood, in a similar vein I believe Ireland was burning peat for electricity until recently.

On the Old Continent, there are a lot of old houses (I'm writing from a 400 year old one, older than the USA), about 10% being more than 100 year old [1], most of which comes with a central chimney (or several).

While a lot of people have other heating/cooking systems, those chimney are still in use to some capacity.

[1] http://www.iut.nu/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Housing-Statist...

This could be why I haven't heard of it. I live in an urban area, but have never heard much about wood burning as a significant heat source in any nearby rural area or any area where my relatives live. And in Canada, it is basically only the 200 year old places that do it.

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-526-s/2013002/t002-en...

Huh? New homes are built with wood fireplaces. People enjoy it, even if it’s not the primary fuel source.

My mum grew up in one of those old farm houses that were heated by open fires. It was always freezing cold in the winter in most of the house. The whole place was later fitted with oil fired heating. My grandmother could never understand why we wanted to build a fire when we visited. The people installing wood burners are a new generation that grew up in centrally heated homes and see it as romantic.

I hate central heating!

My natural body temperature preference is to be too cold rather than too hot[0]. And people always have central heating on far too high for my comfort. When I'm in a building with central heating, I feel my face starting to flush and sweat prickling out on my back. It's horrible and makes me feel really uncomfortable. And because it's "central" heating, I have no option but to suffer.

With an open fire, on the other hand, everyone can regulate the temperature around them to their own comfort level : Too cold? Move closer to the fire. Too warm? Move further away. Central heating is the fascism of domestic temperature control!

[0] I realise I'm probably a rarity in this. I never have the heating on at all in my own home, even in winter. If I get a bit cold, I just stick a jersey on.

The street on which I live is probably about 900 years old. The houses have been rebuild many times, but there is still wood in some houses here that's been dated to the 1530s. My own house only dates to c. 1870-80, though it's made of recycled stone and wood, presumably from the house known from records to have been on the same site in 1620. Apparently, there was considerable demolition and new builds/rebuilding in the town in the 1870s. All the houses in the street have chimneys, and there's a ready supply of wood locally, either gathered from the countryside or purchased from one of the many suppliers. Unsurprisingly, fires/stoves are frequently used for heating, and there's usually a smell of smoke outside in winter. My house originally had three flues; one for the kitchen range (now blocked off and the range replaced with a sink), one in the master bedroom (blocked off with the fireplace merely decorative) and one in the main living room (fitted with a modern stove).

Among those who don't live in cookie-cutter neighborhoods or cities, this is very common in the midwest US.

My parents weren't able to afford to get any other kind of heating for our home. What they could do is put in the work to find and prepare a supply of wood. To this day they still use it for heating

Its extremely common in rural Finland.

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