Why Burn Corn

admin — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 09:34:33 +0000

There is currently on the market a number of manufactures that make stoves which burn shelled corn, basically the stoves are similar to wood or pellet stoves, they have been design for dry granular fuel. Typically corn burning stoves have a combustion air fan and a fuel stoker, both of which are not common in standard wood stove construction.

Why burn corn?

The corn used as a fuel in stoves have two requirements of this corn fuel:

The shelled corn must be dry, with preferably 15% moisture content or less. Corn which is higher in moisture content will have a lower heat value per unit weight than "dry" corn. Also moist corn may also cause flow problems through the fuel loading auger.
The shelled corn must be free of fines. Dirty corn which has a lot of fines and cob pieces will cause problems with the fuel loading auger.

The storage, moving and handling of grain corn has evolved tremedously now every year farmers harvest, dry, convey, and store millions of bushels of corn. The equipment to do all these things is readily available. Consequently putting a corn storage system together for a home heating set up is possible with augers, conveyors and storage bins which are readily available.

Two reasons why corn is so attractive as a heat source are that dry shelled corn is so easily handled and in plentiful supply. Shelled corn also has a high heat energy per unit weight. Here's how shelled corn measures up to other solid fuels.

Table 1. Heat Energy of On-Farm Fuel Sources
Shelled Corn	7000 BTU/lb (16,200 kJ/kg) at 15% Moisture Content
Straw	6550 BTU/lb (15,200 kJ/kg) Air Dried
Corn Stover	7540 BTU/lb (17,500 kJ/kg) Air Dried
Wood	8000 BTU/lb (18,500 kJ/kg) Air Dried

You can see from this table that shelled corn has heat energy close to that of wood.

Corn Stove Guide » Corn Fuel

Why Burn Corn