Bioethanol Fireplaces?

We briefly looked at the spec of a Bioethanol fireplace on a refurb project.

The refill time (every 5 hours) sort of made me think it was more of a decorative feature than an integral part of the heating strategy, we certainly decided against omitting any radiators despite the 2kW bioethanol fireplace...

Any pros and cons that I should know about?

My friends daughters horribly burnt face is probably a con. Bioethanol burners can  look like they are out when they are still burning - which make pouring what is basically petrol onto the naked flame when you go to refill them a difficult thing to guard against. Luckily she eventually made a full recovery but to look at her at the time you really wouldn't have expected it to be possible and people have died in similar circumstances.

Second half of this video gives an idea - so I'd look at what the procedure is for re-filling them and whether anything in their construction prevents it being possible to add  fuel being added while lit.

I'd also talk to your insurers about keeping volatile liquids in your house 🙂

Jesus

We’ve had one for about 4 months. Use it downstairs in office and sometimes in living room in evening. £2ish bottle lasts 3-4 hours depending on how open you have the burner. Warms up the room well - but the heat dissipates quite quickly once it’s burned out. Cools down quickly so after about 30mins can be refilled. Re issues refilling you have to open the door and remove metal box into which you squirt the fluid - not much chance of refilling when it’s in situ in the burner and still hot.

Had a look at the bio ethanol fire places, problem is it only looks the part. All for effect, and a poor one at that and little or no heat. We ended up with a heavily discounted Optimyst wood burner style thing. Replaced the crappy plastic inserts with real logs, and the smoke/flame effect is pretty good. Kids can stick their hands in as much as they want! Water needs replacing every 5 hours of constant use, but it’s effective as a focal point. Most visitors can’t even tell it apart from a proper stove! The built in fan heater that is only used when the solar panels kick in…so maybe for an hour or so a day at low setting if we’re working from home. Decent heat if not a tad noisy.

The opposite of Paino's experience here. We put a burner inside a normal multi-fuel stove and it gets very hot indeed, and heats the whole bottom of the house. But mainly bought for the nice flame effect! The not long-term constant heating doesn't become a problem as it's roasting long before the fuel runs out. We usually get 2 runs to a fill. And as it's inside a big cast iron stove which is now all hot, that stops the heat vanishing with the flames.
However it would be far less good, and rather uneconomical, as a sole source of heating - we have CH and my wife just puts the fire on when she's feeling a bit chilly. I don't think I've ever put it on for myself 😉

Other pros - effectively zero install costs. No vents, no chimneys required. Proper real flames. Independent of other fuels - so if your electricity/gas/oil fail, you can still heat much like a log burner. This was relevant to us when our boiler packed up just before Christmas this year!.

Other cons - the juice is not the cheapest. There is a smell to it, but good quality ethanol reduces that. The jury's out on whether it releases harmful stuff into the air... although it's pretty clear that if they are bad, they're not as bad as logs. As Maccruiskeen says, you have to be aware that the flames can be near-invisible when starting and ending burns, and that the burning relies on the low vapour point of the fluid, so re-filling and lighting a hot burner is not a good idea. Similarly, be careful when filling as spills will easily ignite, too. Ironically, it's often harder to get the the actual burner going, as the fuel is sat in a big cold pool producing little vapour compared to a wide, shallow puddle of a spill.

We have one of these
https://www.imaginfires.co.uk/howarth-black-bioethanol-fireplace
Not long turned up after ordering 2 months ago so only used it a couple of times but it heats our conservatory up in about 30-45mins, first time had to turn it off after 2 hours as it had got too hot
The imaginfires no spill box is really easy to fill and light, can be done in situ unlike the comment above
Kicks out 3kw so about half a decent sized wood burner but we couldn’t fit a flue etc through the conservatory warm roof so this was much easier, and cheaper
It really looks the part and can pick it up and use it outside in summer evenings
Haven’t bothered with any of the fake logs or coal decorations but did add a fake (magnetic) flue for effect
I’d recommend them but probably not as a primary source of heat for a large room

They look interesting, as has been noted I'd like a wood burner but have been put off by the pollution, how are these for that? I note you don't have a flue, so all the emissions come into the room, and from my knowledge of science know the emissions should be (if burning efficiently) CO2 and water. But the same can be said of burning methane for heating and cooking in particular and yet

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/15/gas-stoves-pollution-alternatives

Do these bioethanol burners also have the propensity to create these harmfuls?