Tech Deck Tricks: As Wood Burners Become Yet Another Victim Of Class Warfare, A Confession: I Light Mine Almost Every Day

Another week, another narrowing path of pleasure. A panel of experts recently recommended that wood-burning stoves be given warning labels similar to those on cigarette packs, as I understand it, to emphasize that they pollute smokestacks, damage the lungs of young children, threaten the planet and our overall well-being. . . "Turning on this stove can cause asthma," perhaps, or "wood stoves can affect sexual activity." (Yes, it could be better, because what could be better than pasta... Honestly, it doesn't matter.)

This debate has been going on for a long time, but in the last two years it has become even more acute as energy prices have risen and more people have become involved in the issue. I'm always a bit nervous about these discussions because the heating was the first thing I did when I moved into the coldest house in south London three years ago.

A guy named Gary came to check out my fireplace, told me about the interesting existence of a website called "World of Stoves" and I chose a beautiful "traditional" glass paneled stove that Gary installed in my large airy living room. cheaper than a small family car in a week. An investment, I told myself, and so it turned out: I turn on the stove almost every day when I work at home in the winter, locked in the living room, so there is no need to turn on the heat anywhere else. My kitchen thermostat reads 14 degrees, but it's hot upstairs. I can write and my fingers don't turn blue.

Love. Because of this, I turn on the gas boiler less often. I love to read in the evenings on the sofa while the light flickers in the tiled fireplace. I also cooked a steak, which I was very happy about, although the nearby rug and couch detracted a bit from the cavewoman vibe, and the TV was streaming something on Netflix. But still, heating and powering from the same energy source aren't skills we learn at boarding school, and they might come in handy when the apocalypse strikes (provided we can buy a piece from Waitrose).

Of course, wood costs, pound for pound, almost as much as incense. But that's okay, because every time I go to a friend's fancy country house, I stuff my boots with deliciousness. "Please take as many as you want, we won't be able to get through them all!" They boast piles of firewood taken from their vast dominions.

Last year, the parents of a close friend invited me to their home in the Cotswolds and advised me to take as many logs as I wanted from their barn. "In general, you will help me," said the father. I took this suggestion very seriously, lowered the back seat and filled the entire space. Imagine Santa's sleigh, but instead of presents, it carries logs. My car is like that. When I came to sell it last year, first going to the local car wash for a quick heist, it felt like I was wandering through jungle after jungle looking for a body to find a suitable place to bury it.

But now wood-burning stoves have become another casualty of class warfare, with critics saying they should be banned because they are mostly used by the wealthy. Or, if not prohibited, must be marked with a warning. But that's just the beginning, right? Placing some sort of warning label on caregivers would make subsequent arguments for the ban much easier. "Look, we've already said that the kitchen can cause impotence, so why don't we eliminate it entirely?"

What's more, all wood-burning stoves sold in this country must now have Defra approval, which means they meet the emissions criteria of the Clean Air Act. And it doesn't matter that many not-so-rich people, especially in rural areas, depend on their stoves to keep warm in such weeks. Maybe I'm a city bum and doing another SE19 photoshoot because I love her bangs, but sticks aren't so much about aesthetics as keeping the ends from falling out.

Oh no, sorry to anyone who lives in cold rural areas who might run out of oil or who can't afford to fill up the gas tank for days at a time. Even if you live in a sparsely populated area and the only creature that exhales even the smallest particle from your chimney is a sheep, your wood stove is now an enemy of the state and you can be punished or fined for trying to maintain it yourself. . i live with him

A report published late last year in The Guardian claimed that wood stoves are expensive to run. The study found that if a home uses a newly installed Defra-approved wood burning stove to provide 20 per cent of heat, the annual costs, including installation, are between £2,028 and £2,204, 24 per cent more than running a standard gas boiler. .

Yes, I suspect the wording says "including installation". Take away those expensive upfront costs and the results may be different, genius. I also believe that many people in this country depend on furnaces to provide more than 20 percent of their heat. Residents have a unique way of looking at it, namely with their fingers.

According to "green" kitchens, air source heat pumps are the best option, and maybe they are. But the only people I can think of right now that have these pumps are relatively wealthy people, because they are the ones who can afford them, and they often complain that the pumps don't work. Meanwhile, while we're all trying to figure out where to put the movie and do our bit, do we really need to waste our emotional energy debating whether a legitimate source of heat for millions of people across the country needs to fail? warning sign?

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