The ingredient people/neighbors/legislators find most offensive is the visible sign of a dirty or poor burn, which of course is smoke caused by gross amounts of particulate emission.
Someone in another thread mentioned holding ones head above a gas or oil fired chimney and it got me to thinking about what is objectionable to most people. The objectionable part is not the stuff that will kill you if you do the chimney thing. What kills you is CO and that's what this thread is about
As far as comparisons between CO output of an OWB and a gas or oil fired appliance go , they aren’t even close. Here are a few facts I have verified with my own equipment and eyes.
An oil furnace of modern manufacture (last 25 years) will emit less than 70ppm CO in the exhaust gas if kept in proper tune. If you throw in a good burner such as a Riello F-series I routinely observe CO of less than 10PPM when we install one. I would go as far as to say that a properly set up oil furnace will emit less CO than a lot of 90% gas furnaces I have tested. Particulate emission is however, much higher. In the gas boiler world particularly in the condensing units, some manufacturers say that up to 100PPM is OK for their product. The exception is of course Viessmann whose gas fired M/C boiler emits no CO when kept clean, as in 0PPM. You could hypothetically vent the thing inside your house without CO consequences. I know of several running inside greenhouses with no vent. The CO2 is used by the plants and there is no CO.
Now as for OWB’s, I have never observed less than 500-600PPM in an OWB flue under any condition. Idling units often peg my meter at 8000PPM+. In other words holding your head over an idling OWB would result in death in 3-5 minutes after falling unconscious in a little over 1. A gasifier running with decent wood (<23%MC) will nearly always show a CO reading of less than 400 with 1000-1200 being the norm in idle mode. In most cases a gasifier will, after initial light up drop to below 200PPM if things are kosher. There really is no comparison between a typical OWB and nearly anything else. I have sampled ambient air 25 feet downwind of an OWB and registered 25-30 PPM out in the yard. You might as well have a coal fired power plant back there or do a couple packs of Winston Reds a day.
This is good a place as any for a little Carbon Monoxide pep talk and a few facts…...and these are medical facts.
At 400 PPM, frontal headaches occur within 1 to 2 hours, life threatening after 3 hours.
At 800 PPM, nausea and convulsions occur within 20 minutes, death within 2 hours.
At 1600 PPM, nausea occurs within 20 minutes, death within 1 hour.
At 12800 PPM, death within 1 to 3 minutes.
New studies indicate that chronic, low level exposure can also have serious health consequences.
The EPA recommends 9 PPM CO or lower as an ambient air quality goal averaged over 8 hours and 35 PPM or lower over 1 hour.
Someone in another thread mentioned holding ones head above a gas or oil fired chimney and it got me to thinking about what is objectionable to most people. The objectionable part is not the stuff that will kill you if you do the chimney thing. What kills you is CO and that's what this thread is about
As far as comparisons between CO output of an OWB and a gas or oil fired appliance go , they aren’t even close. Here are a few facts I have verified with my own equipment and eyes.
An oil furnace of modern manufacture (last 25 years) will emit less than 70ppm CO in the exhaust gas if kept in proper tune. If you throw in a good burner such as a Riello F-series I routinely observe CO of less than 10PPM when we install one. I would go as far as to say that a properly set up oil furnace will emit less CO than a lot of 90% gas furnaces I have tested. Particulate emission is however, much higher. In the gas boiler world particularly in the condensing units, some manufacturers say that up to 100PPM is OK for their product. The exception is of course Viessmann whose gas fired M/C boiler emits no CO when kept clean, as in 0PPM. You could hypothetically vent the thing inside your house without CO consequences. I know of several running inside greenhouses with no vent. The CO2 is used by the plants and there is no CO.
Now as for OWB’s, I have never observed less than 500-600PPM in an OWB flue under any condition. Idling units often peg my meter at 8000PPM+. In other words holding your head over an idling OWB would result in death in 3-5 minutes after falling unconscious in a little over 1. A gasifier running with decent wood (<23%MC) will nearly always show a CO reading of less than 400 with 1000-1200 being the norm in idle mode. In most cases a gasifier will, after initial light up drop to below 200PPM if things are kosher. There really is no comparison between a typical OWB and nearly anything else. I have sampled ambient air 25 feet downwind of an OWB and registered 25-30 PPM out in the yard. You might as well have a coal fired power plant back there or do a couple packs of Winston Reds a day.
This is good a place as any for a little Carbon Monoxide pep talk and a few facts…...and these are medical facts.
At 400 PPM, frontal headaches occur within 1 to 2 hours, life threatening after 3 hours.
At 800 PPM, nausea and convulsions occur within 20 minutes, death within 2 hours.
At 1600 PPM, nausea occurs within 20 minutes, death within 1 hour.
At 12800 PPM, death within 1 to 3 minutes.
New studies indicate that chronic, low level exposure can also have serious health consequences.
The EPA recommends 9 PPM CO or lower as an ambient air quality goal averaged over 8 hours and 35 PPM or lower over 1 hour.
