# A Brief History of Pellet Stoves and Pellets

- Link: https://hearthsidepatio.com/pellet-inserts/brief-history-pellet-stoves-pellets/
- Published: 2014-11-19T23:45:36-05:00
- Author: hearthsideri

It all began during The Great Depression when a lumber mill in Northern Idaho developed
a way to recycle wood byproducts. They did this by compressing them into logs that
were about 13 inches long and 4 inches in diameter. These logs burned much cleaner,
hotter, and longer than traditional firewood.

Wood-burning boxes, or stoves that burn scraps of wood or sawdust, have been around
for a very long time. As wood for wood-burning stoves became less and less available
for home heating, alternative fuel sources began to be sought after. The first home-
size pellet stove became available in the 1980s. The purpose of the pellet stove
was to use renewable and recycled fuel.

For those homeowners that can get wood down the street in the forests that are close
to home, a wood stove will always be their best choice for heating. For everyone
else who has to buy their fuel, pellets are less expensive than buying cords of 
wood.

The pellets that were to be used in **pellet stoves** started out being made of 
a combination of sawdust, wood byproducts, and wood chips. They were much smaller
than the logs of the 1930s and look quite a bit like rabbit food. The biomass fuels
that are used in the pellet stoves of today can be wood pellets, corn kernels, nutshells,
small wood chips, waste paper pellets, grass pellets, hulled wheat, and cherry pits.
Not all pellet stoves can burn all of these fuels so if you want to burn a certain
fuel, we recommend that you purchase a pellet stove that can burn that specific 
fuel.

Pellet stoves in RI come either free-standing or as inserts. The free-standing type
can be installed just about anywhere as long as they can be vented to an outside
wall. They do not require a flue or chimney of any kind. The pellet stove inserts
can be installed into an existing fireplace and a surround can be added to cover
the space left between the outside of the stove and inside wall of the fireplace.