From the Back Cover
Home heating that's safe, clean, efficient, uses 70-90% less fuel than a typical woodstove
...this book is an essential addition to every homesteader's and builder's library. -- Toby Hemenway, author, Gaia's Garden and The Permaculture City
The second, more comprehensive work on revolutionary wood heating; thorough, technically advanced, comprehensive, well thought-out by the experienced masters of rocket stoves. -- Ianto Evans, director and founder, Cob Cottage Company, inventor of Rocket Mass Heaters and Lorena Stoves
HEATING WITH WOOD is often considered a natural and economical alternative to electricity or fossil fuels. However, even with a fairly new and efficient woodstove, many cords of wood are required for burning over the course of a single winter, and incomplete combustion can contribute to poor air quality.
A rocket mass heater is an earthen masonry heating system which provides clean, safe and efficient warmth for your home, all while using 70-90% less fuel than a traditional woodstove. These unique and beautiful installations provide luxurious comfort year-round. In cold weather a few hours of clean, hot burning can provide 20 or more hours of steady warmth, while the unit's large thermal mass acts as a heat sink, cooling your home on sizzling summer days. Packed with hard-to-find information, The Rocket Mass Heater Builder's Guide includes:
- Comprehensive design, construction, and installation instructions combined with detailed maintenance and troubleshooting advice
- Brick-by-brick layouts, diagrams, and architectural plans augmented with detailed parts drawings and photographs for clarity
- Relevant and up-to-date code information and standards to help you navigate the approval process with local building departments.
Earthen masonry heating systems are well-suited for natural and conventional builders alike. A super-efficient, wood-burning, rocket mass heater can help you dramatically reduce your energy costs while enhancing the beauty, value, and comfort of your home.
...represents more than ten years of collaboration and lessons learned from hands-on building and experimentation. The result is a frank, practical and detailed discussion of design and construction, pros and cons, and helpful anecdotal stories. While passionate about empowering the owner-builder, the authors also address code compliance and stress fire safety. -- Catherine Wanek, author, The New Strawbale Home and The Hybrid House, co-author, The Art of Natural Building
Distills the best, most tried-and-true design for efficient, low-cost, low-effort, carbon-neutral, regenerative home heating. It will be hard to improve upon the wisdom of this book. -- Albert Bates, author, The Biochar Solution
Erica and Ernie Wisner have built over 700 super-efficient, clean-burning rocket stoves and masonry heaters. They are dedicated to the search for sustainable solutions and the hands-on teaching of creative, ecological, and practical skills.
Erica Wisner is a skilled educator and project coordinator, with over 25 years' experience building teamwork and facilitating hands-on learning. She loves making things from scratch - anything from blueberry scones to the oven they were baked in. Erica is the author of The Ultimate Girls' Guide to Science and The Art of Fire and she has also created instructional materials and rocket mass heater resources for the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, The City Repair Project, Handprint Press and others. Together with her husband Ernie, she has built over 700 super-efficient, clean-burning masonry stoves and led over 50 workshops across North America.
Ernie Wisner is a jack of all trades - his rich and varied background includes fishing and maritime work, firefighting, botany, natural building, hydraulics, and plumbing maintenance. Extreme conditions and high-risk work focused Ernie's attention on survival skills and emergency preparedness. After witnessing hard evidence of global climate change, Ernie's search for sustainable solutions led him to Cob Cottage Company, where he built his first rocket mass heaters while serving on the research team for Ianto Evans and Leslie Jackson's pioneering Rocket Mass Heaters . Together with his wife Erica, he has built over 700 super-efficient, clean-burning masonry stoves and led over 50 workshops across North America.
