Explore your options for the best wood-burning stoves

A multi-fuel stove can combine the use of wood, biomass briquettes and fossil fuels (only burned one at a time), with a riddling grate and air delivery system designed to meet the very different ways that wood and fossil fuels burn. Wood prefers air from above, whereas coal, anthracite and peat take air from below.

Purists argue that a dedicated wood stove will always burn wood better than a model attempting double duty. The truth is, there’s little difference in the kW efficiencies of a wood stove as opposed to a multi-fuel stove once the products are burned properly.

Having choice allows us to respond to the pricing and availability of various fuels over the winter. The room inside a multi-fuel stove of the same external dimensions as a wood stove will have a little less capacity. This is because it has to make way for the open riddling grate and ash pan in a modern Ecodesign stove.

In the event of a power outage, your traditional log burner or multi-fuel stove will keep the house cosy. If you’re set on dramatic twisting flames of a heritage crackling fire (at least behind glass) but want to act greener — log burners used with properly seasoned wood are the best choice with a higher BTU output than pellets.

Compressed biomass pellet burners are feted for their systemised performance. Because pellets from wood waste have a predetermined unit size, you can treat the stove more like a heating appliance, adding a volume of pellets to the stove and setting it with a digital touchpad to put out set kWs of heat. The volume of air reaching the burner is highly controlled, there’s full digital controls, a programmable thermostat, app options and even a remote. Pellets have less calorific value than properly dried wood with a low moisture content, so put out less heat and some rely on an electric convection fan to blow heat out into the room.

The latest designs in pellet stoves are much quieter than early models with silent auger systems dropping the pellets from the hopper and no need for a fan. Their burn time is highly predictable and the heat output is more consistent than logs. Pellets are also cleaner and easier to store, and installation generally demands just a direct vent rather than a fully lined chimney. Pellet stoves can take combustion air from outdoors with a dedicated vent. Both types of wood stove, well maintained should make it to 20 years without difficulty.

So up until recently, this was the dilemma in a highly sustainable, carbon-neutral, wood-burning stove. Was it to be a wood stove or a pellet stove? One of the most recent additions to the stove family is another hybrid. It combines wood pellets with logs — both renewable choices. Switching between pellets and logs delivers the positives of both fuels, with the wood burner staging the show of a gorgeous roaring fire behind glass. Most interestingly, hybrid pellet elements can cover that overnight period where some householders want to keep the stove going but cannot manage to coax the embers of a block wood stove.

Hybrid stoves can neatly segue to a systematic burn with pellets where required and are designed to switch to pellet burning if the log burner goes out or when prompted to do so. They can also be set up to heat multiple rooms using a piped system and integral fans. There are indicators built into many hybrid stoves that signal the optimal time to add logs to the burn, and (loading and ash cans aside) they can operate under app-based voice control.

If you want to leave the fire burning or have it alight when you get home, like a dedicated all-pellet model, pellet burning would be selected to start manually and get the space to temperature safely. You can set this all up with weekly programmes and thermostat controls. The kW output of a hybrid will be given in two numbers, one for the log burner and one for the pellet burner, and their efficiencies range up to around 80%-82% for the log burner, and 86% to 88% for the pellet element. In terms of physical size, they tend towards a vertical thrust, so their footprint is not overwhelming.

So, is a hybrid stove right for you and your family? First of all, there’s price. Flexible, precise, wifi-integrated, hermetically sealed against irritating, dirty particulate escape, and highly energy efficient, hybrid stoves are relatively expensive compared to log burners, multi-fuel stoves and pellet stoves. There is a limited range of models here in Ireland. You can buy an 11kW Stanley Solis wood burner for around €2500. An Aduro Hybrid H2 stove is priced from €4845 (without any CH circuit). This offers 2kW-9kW firewood (max 400mm log length), 2k-9kW pellets (15kg hopper).

A good 10kW Artel wood pellet stove comes in around €1750. For full central heating, the Carraig Mor 25kW Boiler Stove with Hot Plates suited to 15 rads’ is priced at €1,865 in a wood-burner or multi-fuel stove, stoveboss.ie.

On the practical side, if you’re looking for an easy route to an overnight wood burn, it has to be pellets, either in a pellet or hybrid choice. When lighting the fire from your phone — it’s pellets or a hybrid again. If the fire goes out when the last log collapses, a hybrid can segue to pellets seamlessly.

Log burners, some pellet stoves and most new hybrids can operate when the power is out. Ensure you know if your pellet stove requires a convection fan to operate. Fans and augers (delivering the pellet from the hopper to the combustion chamber) in any pellet stove can be noisy. Check that dB sound rating.

For a flame show, wood burners and hybrids trump the discreet flicker and glow of a dedicated pellet-only stove, but once you introduce logs, there will always be more cleaning involved. To cut down on ash and dirty residue, look for automatic self-cleaning burners to minimise the job.

How often will you have to add pellets to your pellet stove or hybrid? Ask your agent to explain the kg/h fuel consumption which will have a maximum and minimum figure to help you finesse this chore and budget for the m2 you’re covering. Finally, and it’s an important consideration, two fuels will require two dry, convenient storage areas.