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What impact does burning wood in a home fireplace have on climate change?
I notice many people using their fireplaces and buying wood to burn in fireplaces in the winter months. I am guessing this has to have some impact on the climate like fossil fuels (e.g. coal and forest fires) do. Am I correct? If so how much of an impact does it have? Links and resources to information would be greatly appreciated.
A summary first then a more detailed answer. If trees are felled or purposely grown to provide firewood then this is going to contribute to global warming. If the tree has died of natural causes then it would release the CO2 anyway and burning it is simply speeding up the release of the gas.
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You are correct, home fireplaces do have an impact on climate change. I'll explain a little more...
When a tree grows it sequesters carbon dioxide from the atmopshere and together with water and sunlight it photosynthesises and produces glucose and oxygen. The glucose is the food the tree needs to grow. Approximately two thirds of the mass of a tree is carbon (most of the rest is water). Here it is as an equation: 6 CO2 + 12 H2O + photons = 1 C6H12O6 + 6 O2 + 6 H2O
When a tree degrades the stored carbon is released back into the atmosphere again. In it's natural habitat trees burn, rot, die, get blown over etc where they rot and are subsequently replaced by more trees - it all forms part of a natural and balanced cycle. During it's lifetime a tree sequesters carbon dioxide, stores it then releases it when it degrades.
If a tree were to be felled and used as firewood without being replaced then it upsets the natural balance - CO2 is released but no provision is made for recapturing the lost CO2. Consequently there is a positive contribution to global warming.
The use of wind-blown or casualty timber in a home fireplace isn't so bad as ultimately, the tree would have rotted and released CO2 anyway. The biggest impact here would be the removal of the dead tree before it's had chance to rot and nourish the ground - an area which I don't know a great deal about but if you want expert information about this then Byderule would be the person to ask.
An average sized mature tree weighs 2 to 3 tons of which 1.5 to 2 tons is carbon. You would need to burn about a dozen such trees to equal the CO2 emissions equivalent to those of an average American each year.
Other answeres have mentioned black particulate matter (soot from burning the wood) - this remains in the atmopshere for a very short period of time (minutes to 2 years) and contributes to 'global dimming' - the blocking out of sunlight. This cooling effect is more than offset by the warming caused by the carbon dioxide which has an atmopsheric lifespan or residency period of 115 years.
Personally I love open fires, unfortunately here it's central heating but at one of my other houses it's all open fires. It's very remote and there's woodland and forest all around with an abundant supply of casualty timber, there's a massive woodpile and come the New Year we'll be sat round roaring open fires (hopefully with deep snow outside). All the timber we burn there is casualty timber and in addition, we've planted several hundred trees (not to be burned) which more than offset any carbon emissions.
If you have an open fire yourself my advice would be to burn casualty timber (ask the landowners permission first if removing from private land) rather than commerically grown timber. If you do have to buy in firewood then offset what you burn by planting some trees.
Fossil wood fertility sculpture
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