Excerpts from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113434413248219685.html

Roughly 30,000 people snapped up corn stoves and corn furnaces this
year, twice last year's total.

The furnace is made to hook into the distribution ducts of a heating
system and heat the whole house, while the stove is free-standing,
designed to radiate heat in a single room.

The exhaust from both is clean and cool, requiring only a small duct
to the outside, rather than a chimney.

Dried corn doesn't burn easily. The process in modern stoves and
furnaces is controlled by computer chips and temperature probes.

Owners don't continually shovel corn into the furnace. Corn-filled
hoppers on top of the stove do the work.

To make a million British thermal units of heat it takes $22.64 of
heating oil, $33.80 of propane, or $16.47 of natural gas. Burning corn
can do the job for $8.75.

Sales of wood pellet stoves have begun to falter, partly because the
industry can't make wood pellets fast enough., so US Stove Company is
selling a multi-fuel stove. It burns corn, cherry and olive pits, and
alfalfa pellets. Customers report that it also heats up pretty well
when stoked with certain brands of cheap, dried dog food.



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