In these days of high heating oil prices, demand for outdoor furnaces, which cost about $5,000, has increased sharply Some say that at current fuel rates, these furnaces could pay themselves off in just one winter.

Furnaces’ economic benefit depends on what it burns, how abundant that source is and what it costs. For instance, wood may seem plentiful now, but that wouldn't be the case if people went back to depending heavily on it for fuel as they did in 1890. In Bill McKibben’s Hope, Human and Wild, he examines the fact that much of the greenery we see now did not exist in the 1800s; we used to use wood the way we use oil now, and therefore trees weren't all that plentiful. A wood-reliant economy is unsustainable unless timber is harvested and grown very carefully. A move to a timber-centric energy system would require the implementation of drastic lumber management and forestry policy changes to establish and sustain a sufficient fuel stock.

Furthermore, wood is a fossil fuel; trees are carbon sinks that release carbon when they're cut. Burning neither wood nor coal yields clean results. Nor does burning tires, trash, or the assortment of other things people tend to toss into furnaces, which usually result in toxic gas releases and dramatic decreases in air quality.

Ultimately, furnaces are not a solution to our oil price woes. Burning coal and wood on a heating oil scale is a sooty, dirty, toxic process and an express ticket to deforestation. Furnaces are a Band-Aid for a hemorrhage, with the potential to cause a whole new set of problems.