[SustainableTompkins] Poplars for fuel

[Rob Morache]

With regard to the talk about fast growing firewood... i personally love the 
idea and have had experience with the speed at which the native black locust 
trees grow. There is also alot of talk lately about using willows. 
Regardless of the species I have 2 ideas...

A forester up in Syracuse that used to care for my trees once told me of an 
experiment in the Carolinas done during the 90's in which a stand of eastern 
white cedar (notoriously moisture hungry trees) was planted in a porous bed 
of crushed stone. Raw municipal sewage was pumped into the bed and the trees 
grew at a rate of 5 feet per year... 5 times normal, because of the 
fertilizing nature of poop. The water was kept in the gravel bed (and out of 
ground water) by a clay liner. The stand was on a hillside, so that the 
water would end up percolating out into a test pond at the bottom... the 
water was clear and suitable for recreation, though not for quite drinking. 
I am trying to find documentation on this and will post it when I do, 
however John Todd, of Ocean Arks International has also suggested growing 
fuel trees as part of his biological wastewater treatment systems.

Let's now revisit our problem with the recent manuring done by the local 
CAFO... I have driven by there at the wrong time on numerous occaisions and 
sympathise with the neighbors...Seems to me we have an abundant supply of 
unwanted poop... nice poop without industrial metals and the usual chemicals 
of municipal sewage... just maybe if the CAFO was approached in a spirit of 
partnership, thinking of their effluent as a resource rather than a 
nuisance, that waste could become a means of accellerating the growth of 
fuel trees, which when burned would not spew heavy metals into the air. (The 
Carolina trees ended up as paper pulp, because they mopped up the metals).

As for burning, long ago I had thought of grinding the wood into sawdust, 
which would speed its drying time, and blowing the seasoned dust into a 
furnace as a means of both firing it continuously and mixing the wood with 
ample air to encourage more thorough combustion. It was just an idea, and 
not being a machinist or engineer, the idea just sat in my head.... I 
remember a similar concept proposed using coal dust to fuel a new breed of 
steam turbine locomotives back in the 70's. It might be an idea to run with 
if someone has the inclination.

Anyway, those are my thoughts... get everyone to the table, because one 
person's trash is another person's gold mine. There's lots of potential 
here.

Rob


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joel and Sarah Gagnon" <joel.and.sarah.gagnon at lightlink.com>
To: "Sustainable Tompkins County listserv" 
<sustainabletompkins at lists.mutualaid.org>
Sent: Friday, September 15, 2006 12:10 PM
Subject: Re: [SustainableTompkins] Poplars for fuel


>I have used poplar and other low-density hardwoods as fuel and can share my 
>limited experience.
>
> They burn cleanly, once dry, but they don't burn long because of their low 
> density. A pound of dry wood has the same fuel value whether it is oak or 
> willow, but the oak packs a lot more heat into a unit volume. I use 
> poplar, box elder, willow, pine, hemlock, spruce, sumac and 
> fungally-compromised normally denser woods to heat in the swing seasons 
> when all you need is a quick shot of heat to take the chill out of the 
> house in the morning. To use them when the heat demand is greater requires 
> frequent feeding of the fire. Being lighter, though, they are easier to 
> handle.
>
> One problem with growing poplar for fuel is that it is rabbit candy. I 
> don't think it coppices or root sprouts either, so it needs to be 
> replanted every time it is harvested. I like a locust stand for firewood 
> (Black Locust, Robinia pseudoacacia). They grow quickly, are dense, have 
> multiple uses (fence posts and rot-resistant lumber) and both coppice 
> (grow back from the stumps) and root sprout. The light shade they cast 
> allows understory cropping of things like blackberries and raspberries.
>
> Joel
>
> At 08:16 AM 9/15/06 -0400, you wrote:
>>The recent posting of an article about the genome of the black
>>cottonwood (a kind of poplar) raises a question about poplars in
>>general.
>>
>>It's been suggested to me that a person who heats with wood might
>>be wise to plant a stand of fast-growing poplars.  Apparently you
>>can get seeds or seedlings (I'm not clear on which) locally, I
>>think from CU or from County Extension, for about 25 dollars a
>>thousand.
>>
>>On the other hand, I've also heard that poplar wood is not the
>>greatest for heating.  I'm talking about just cutting them up and
>>feeding the billets to a fireplace insert, not cellulosic
>>conversion or anything like that.
>>
>>Does anyone have experience with growing poplars for fuel in this
>>area, or pointers to the advisability of this approach in our
>>growing region?  Given their rate of growth, it sounds like a
>>great idea, but I haven't heard of a lot of people around here
>>doing this.
>>
>>Jon
>>
>>
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