Amid a lot of confusion among the British public, we answer the question: can you still use wood burning stoves?
We’re all guilty of sometimes reading headlines and not digging into the detail — or the truth — behind them. That’s probably why so many people continue to ask us: “Can you still use wood burning stoves?”
The answer, to be clear from the outset, is yes, of course you can still use wood burning stoves.
So, why the confusion?
Wood burning stove ban
Many of the headlines we mentioned spoke of a “wood burning stove ban”. We had customers getting in touch to ask if their wood burning stove would be banned and even if they’d face a £300 fine for using their woodburner.
In reality, there is no wood burning stove ban. Anyone who owns a wood burning stove can continue to use it.
The misreporting of a wood burning stove ban actually revolves around two things (neither of which impact being able to use your stove. Let’s look at those two things in more detail.
1. A phasing out of less efficient stoves
What was widely reported as being a wood burning stove ban was in fact a gradual phasing out of older wood burning stove technology. Modern wood burning stoves are often around 80% efficient, sometimes even more efficient.
Ecodesign regulations tightened up the requirement for wood burning stove manufacturers (as well as manufacturers of household appliance, lighting and many other products) to make products meet minimum levels of efficiency.
The so-called wood burning stove ban is actually just an end to the sale of older, less efficient appliances.
But it doesn’t matter if your stove doesn’t meet the new regulations if it was sold before they came into effect.
2. Ban on burning wet wood
Combined with the Ecodesign regulations, another piece of new legislation also had people wondering if they could still use their woodburners. Again, this was due to confusing reporting.
In this case the ban was on burning wet wood and household coal on wood burning stoves. Both of those things were inadvisable to begin with because they both risk causing damage to the stove. Household coal is too volatile for use in woodburners, while burning wet wood creates an inefficient burn that can clog your stove system with tar and creosote (as well as wasting your money because most of the heat is used to evaporate water).
So in this case the new law enshrined what we’d always advised customers: burn either seasoned logs or smokeless fuel on your stove.
Again, the reporting seemed to indicating that people would be fined for using their woodburners. In fact, they would only be fined for burning things they shouldn’t on their stoves.
Yes, you can still use your wood burning stove
The upshot is that there’s no reason why you can’t continue to use your wood burning stove. You just need to make sure you do so within the current regulations by only burning the correct fuel.
If you do want to upgrade to a high-efficiency woodburner, see our range of Ecodesign stove.s
