Pellet Stove - Background and History

Background and History

Scrap wood and ship-lap burners have been around for decades. Barrel stoves, braziers, and oil drum fires in Depression-era Hoovervilles support this. Professionally built wood ovens with sawdust hoppers were used in the early part of the century. All of these units used scrap and loose wood, or sawdust. In 1930, the Presto-Log was invented reusing scrap sawdust from the Potlatch pine mill in Lewiston, Idaho, as domestic heat. From this came the miniaturized pellet stove, which emerged from Washington State in the 1980s.

The pellet stove has changed in appearance over the years from a simple, boxy workhorse design, to a decorative heating appliance. Pellet stoves can be either free-standing units or fireplace inserts vented into an existing chimney. Most pellet stoves are constructed using large, conductive, steel or cast-iron pieces, with stainless steel to encase circuitry and exhaust areas.

Pellet furnaces and pellet boilers are also available in addition to the decorative stove. These units can be retrofitted into existing home heating systems with only minor changes to existing ductwork and or plumbing.

The heating industry has considerably shifted toward biomass stoves and heating devices based on efficient combustible and renewable resources. This was a trend that began during the 1973 oil crisis causing the creation of the first pellet stoves. Even so, pellet stoves have become a viable, economical, and popular option for home heating systems only in the last ten years. Between 1998 and 2010, 824,410 pellet appliances (stoves and fireplace inserts) were made in the US.

While some stoves are UL listed for fuels other than pellets, such as wheat, corn, sunflower seeds, and cherry pits, many pellet stove manufacturers recommend the use of a corn and pellet mixture.