Popple/Aspen as fuel?

We burn Aspen here sometimes because A) we're not bestowed with deciduous forests full of Oak and Hickory and B) its pretty plentiful. It also pretty much splits itself which is nice.

Aspen provides around 18 million BTUs per cord. For reference, White Oak: 29 million BTUs per cord.

Source: forestry.usu.edu/htm/forest-products/wood-heating

Also, dry time is mostly dependent upon relative humidity thus low relative humidity of a semi-arid climate like Colorado equates to very quick seasoning times. East coast is much longer. Aspen contains quite a bit of water so it takes a bit longer to season when compared to something like Ash.

Aspen is good for starting fires, and GRILLING steaks, smells good burning. It dries well once split in my semi arid climate. A large Aspen split added on top of my last load before bed will leave a few coals to start am fire. I don't have access to hardwoods so burn pine. Also very few limbs to trim on aspen, and it splits well.
I like a few aspen logs .

Lots of quick short lived heat. Dad burns when working in his shop, he can stay close and keep fire fed. go-fer wood..... throw some in and go-fer more!

nrford said:

throw some in and go-fer more!

Click to expand...

Yep, looks like good starter wood.
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/wood-combustion-heat-d_372.html

In NY I give it a year to season, otherwise it gives off an acrid smoke thats eye watering. My biggest appeal to aspen is the ease of processing. You can whip out a cord in lightening speed. And its fun to have wood around for recreational fires...and the wood itself acts like kindling for tougher burning woods like hickory and oak.

It burns it gives off heat just takes a lot more to get through the same time period. Better than Willow in my book. Like willow it can go punky quite quickly even css.

Aspen (popple) has been the primary wood we use in our wood stove located in the living room to heat our house for the last 23 years, mainly because it is plentiful, splits easy, dries well, and with big splits provides heat for several hours between stove loadings. I also use it in my wood gasification boiler, although pine is the primary wood used in the boiler. All of our stove/boiler wood is dried two years, although one year may be enough. I like to burn well seasoned aspen or pine and burn it relatively hot because both burn well, there is no creosote formation, and we have lots of both readily available on our property.

I cut a lot of popple for use at my hunting camp. It grows like weeds there in northern Maine as well. I've found that once split it does dry relatively quickly - I've cut in early summer and burned that fall just fine. It's very easy to process - I have lots of trees12-14 inches diameter at the base that are straight as an arrow with no branches until the top. If I have someone feeding me the rounds I can split them faster than my father can with the wood splitter. As others mentioned, it's definitely not a long burner though.

It will also rot in the stack if not kept dry ie; NO RAIN Exposure.

I don't go out of my way to get a poplar . . . but I'll burn it when I get it . . . quick burning, easy to process . . . best use for me is in the spring and fall burning season.

I burn it all the time and i kinda like it, Drys fast, easy to split and good to burn if you're around to reload. Not good for over night burns but its use during the day saves me my hard wood for the night burns.

I burn it too, mostly because there's sooo much of it available and agree with pretty much all the comments. That said, "what's up with the aspen here in CO?" Everything that is dead and dry, either standing or fallen has a grain twist that rivals a good hunting rifle. It's an absolute pain in the butt to split with an axe. Too dry maybe? I sure don't see that twist in anything green.

Aspen has fibers that interlock (run in multiple directions), and is very hard to get a smooth finish when dried and used as furniture lumber, and very tough to drive a nail through as well. If you can keep the boards dry it is a good building material, any moisture will produce rot very quickly. The interlocking fibers are one of the reasons it is a preferred source for paper making.

Iffn you got lots of it you can either burn that or pay the gas man I'm thinkin. It's up to you.