New, modern yurt build in Mongolia

[UKadventurer]

Originally Posted by Bob Rowlands

Thanks for update. Very nice place you have there UK.

My Hungarian friend Bela heated his small mountain house with coal burned in an old school late 1970s Fischer wood stove, that he retrofitted into his old fireplace. He burned wood in that fireplace many years. His old wood bin got turned into a coal bunker.

Burn time differential wood to coal I do know know, he just said coal burned longer. Cost wise beats me, I never asked. Heating with coal was a WHOLE lot less work vs cutting and splitting wood. He was fit in his retirement years, but regardless, making a wood pile is a LOT of work.

You're welcome. I was starting to feel it had been a long time since I posted anyway. Your reminder prompted me to post. Cheers for that.

The general rule of thumb is you can get a far longer burn with coal/coke than with wood. Unless you have a very sophisticated wood boiler.

We have unlimited fallen wood in the forest next to us but the whole process of cutting, splitting and seasoning is a massive amount of labour. My back isn't great either so I'd have to pay somebody and that defeats the savings of doing it myself. Firewood is widely available but I don't think it's properly seasoned and/or stored here. It costs $2 per 10-12kg (22-26lb) bag. The last batch was a bit damp. Maybe they didn't store it well over the wet summer months. I don't have a

moisture

tester so I'm unable to test the

moisture

content.

In contrast, semi-coke costs about 20% of firewood by weight and burns longer and cleaner. It's essentially smokeless once going. Firewood is nice in a glass fronted stove and we'll still use it as a backup and some is needed to start the semi-coke burning.

By the metric ton (2200lbs) the price here is:
firewood = $200.
semi-coke = $40.

However, it's all about availability and price. You can't use what's not available and you don't want to pay too much for your heating unless there's huge benefit like convenience. I'm definitely willing to trade a bit of inconvenience for huge savings. But the inconvenience of dealing with semi-coke is nothing compared to making our own firewood.

Coal/coke price depends on whether it's local or how local. Mongolia has massive coal reserves but no gas/oil production. So coal - processed into semi-coke briquettes - is a no brainer and is the most used energy source that powers and heats the entire country. We can buy semi-coke bags from a store about 5 miles from our place once per week. I can pickup and deliver it myself which is also a big saving.

Wood is mainly used by nomads and other yurt dwellers, but is probably imported from Russia, just like LPG (propane) and oil, benzine, diesel. So it's expensive. LPG and diesel are about $1 per liter or $4 per US gallon. I use diesel for my truck and LPG for cooking and backup heat. It's costly so I try to limit my use.

Some folks swear by wood pellet stoves because they can have auto-feeders (augers) which can give you all night and day burns, but their mechanical complexity means they are prone to breakdowns. We don't even have a good supply of wood pellets so it's not even an option here.

So far, our coke boiler with radiators seems to be promising but it's not super cold yet so we won't really know if it's sufficient for our needs until December/January. If not, we have multiple supplementary means of heating.