More families are turning to backyard fires to keep warm and entertained over winter, according to market research, but it is prompting health and environmental concerns among professionals.
"All fire pits should be used with adequate guarding around the perimeter to prevent falling directly into the fire pit as well as to ensure people are unable to stand close enough to allow sparks to ignite clothing.
The backyard fire trend is being hotly felt at the Albury-based nursery, Peards, which ordered an entire shipping container of fire pits when the pandemic hit and families began investing in more home-based activities.
Increased smoke in the atmosphere through recreational fires had also flared concerns about the negative impacts on health and the environment.
Fire pits are subject to fire restrictions and regulations, as well as local council laws, but are generally allowed in most backyards across Australia.
I used to talk to an early pioneer of “modern” biochar in Aus and his main focus was always clean burning, the same standards that combustion stoves face and high efficiency burners.
He always designed kilns with a secondary burn, there is no reason why outdoor fire pits (as wasteful as they are) couldn’t have flues to improve burn efficiency. Something like this:
This was designed for simple urban biochar production, it burns completely clean. That said, people can’t even use combustion stoves properly, there is a technique to burning efficiently that most don’t know (if they dont read the manual).