One of the big disadvantages of pellet stoves is as a home owner couldn't just go out and cut down a tree and make your own wood pellets. This is one area where traditional firewood stoves had an advantage since many home owners can produce their own firewood at a very low cost.

Pellets are simple a compressed form of the original material. They can be made wood pellets machine from just about any form of biomass but wood is the most common material to use for heating. Making pellets is a fairly simple process but it takes specialized precision machinery. Because of this most pellets are made in commercial pellet mills that can invest tens of thousands of dollars or more into this kind of machinery.

In recent years pellet mill technology has developed small pellet mills that are lower production but are more affordable. This allows small pellet businesses to enter the market and even as a consumer there are small models that you can buy to make your own wood pellets.