How clean do wood stoves burn?
Wood smoke is often full of unburned wood particles and other by-products of the combustion process. Test labs can measure the amount of particulate in the smoke. Before the government started regulating woodstoves in 1988, the average stove produced about 70 – 80 grams per hour of particulate matter. By 1992, EPA Phase II required that all non-catalytic stoves produce less than 7.4 grams of particulate per hour and catalytic stoves produce less than 4 grams per hour. Catalytic requirements are more stringent because the effectiveness of the catalyst degrades over its life expectancy, while non-cat stoves remain consistent.
