On Being Green

This winter we are keeping warm by burning wood. The heating here is powered by a stove/furnace which can burn either wood or fuel (oil). We decided to burn wood because (a) wood is carbon neutral - there is no greenhouse effect, and (b) oil is 20% more expensive this year than last. Already oil was nearly twice the price of wood - for the same heat output.

However, burning wood is much more work. With oil, I turn it on and a thermostat does the rest. With wood I have to spend about two to three hours a week, with a chain saw, cutting metre length wood logs in two (so they fit in the stove), and bringing the wood indoors. Then each day I need to top up the stove roughly every two to three hours.

Winter is starting to bite now, with temperatures outside dropping to -5°C or less at night, and the house cools quickly overnight. Even with a full stove when we go to bed, the house drops to 15/16°C by the morning. It then takes most of the day to climb back to 18/19°C; not warm by most people's standards, but not cold once you are used to it.

So, I'm looking for a stove that (a) takes metre long wood without cutting, and (b) burns for 12 hours without intervention. They exist I'm told, but I haven't found one yet!

I've looked at other options such as wood-pellets, but the storage space for the pellets is big; we'd have to convert the garage!

Snow

It snowed last week. We were having one of the warmest winters in years, when along came the snow.

It started on a Monday afternoon, with the first flakes appearing at 6pm, and by 11pm the world was covered in a white blanket.

As we were sitting by the fire we heard strange cracking noises outside - like gunshots. We went outside and the most incredible sounds were coming from the forest - and our garden. We guessed it might be trees - but we had no idea what it really was.

As we went to bed the lights flickered, but came back on. The next day there was no electricity and no phone.

We then understood that noise was trees loosing their branches and falling over under the weight of the heavy wet snow. It was happening all over Limousin. Roads were closed and it took four days for them to bring the electricity back. In some parts of Limousin it took six days.

Lucky for us, our heating is a wood burning boiler. There was no pump to send the water round the radiators, but the boiler is in the basement, so the heat rose enough to warm the radiators directly above. So with a fire in the chimney we stayed warm.

A neighbour helped out with a generator for a few hours to keep the freezer frozen, but it was too late - we lost quite a lot of our frozen supplies.

Overall it was great to be snowed in with candles and a nice fire and a good excuse for an enforced 'holiday'!

We also managed to go cross country skiiing about 30 minutes away.