Firewood StorageOne major downside of using a wood burning stove for home heating is that firewood storage for each heating season takes up a lot of space. Our modern convenience lifestyle has us totally accustomed to heat on demand with gas boilers so transitioning to wood heating can require a fairly substantial adjustment to how we view and use our outdoor spaces. Typically firewood is cut and, fresh from the tree is known as 'green' wood. At this stage it has a very high moisture content - typically around 50% by weight - and needs drying to bring this down to between 15% and 20%. This process is called seasoning and takes anywhere between 6 and 18 months depending on the type of wood, the weather conditions, how small it has been cut and split and how it has been stored. Good firewood storage both reduces the time needed for for firewood seasoning and ensures the best firewood quality when you come to burning it. Before considering what type of firewood storage to go for you need to work out roughly how much firewood you will need for one heating season. This will depend mostly on whether you intend to use any other heat sources. If your wood stove is social centerpiece in a home otherwise heated by gas central heating you will be unlikely to use more than one cord of firewood. Conversely if you are only using wood heating you will typically need between 3 and 5 cords. These are obviously estimates and depend on lots of specific things, such as the efficiency of your stove, how well insulated your home is and how warm you like to be. Well insulated homes with thermal mass stoves may use as little as one cord for an entire heating season. So what is a cord anyway?One cord of firewood measures 4' by 4' by 8' - this is a large amount of firewood! When you realise that you need to store not only this season's firewood but also the firewood which is seasoning for next winter you get an idea of the scale of the issue. What do we need from wood storageFirst consider how wood dries: - moisture leaves most easily from the cut ends, then out through the split and outside surfaces. The core of the wood takes longest to season as the moisture there has furthest to travel.Wood dries fastest when exposed to wind and, if possible sunshine. Think of clothes on a washing line - they usually dry fastest on a windy day, versus as warm day. Rain slows down seasoning, as the core of the firewood cannot dry while the outside is wet, however for the most part surface moisture quickly dries off again given a windy day. Provided rainwater doesn't have a chance to pool in the wood pile, and the firewood stack is lifted off the ground the timber will continue to dry out. So, when considering our firewood storage we need to be more worried about exposing it to the elements than protecting it from rain. You may have other needs from your firewood storage, possibly including
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