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[LegoLord]

Talking about burning dried bodies, there's anecdotal evidence from Egypt that mummies burnt to run steam trains weren't worth the effort. I forget the actual quote I heard now.  It was a documentary.

And the fact that these are multiple thousand year old mummies worth a lot of money has nothing to do with it?

Sorry, but seriously, mummies as a fuel source?  They aren't even all that common, when compared to normal dead bodies.  Also, steam engines require much more fuel than smelting copper.

[Martin]

Sorry, but seriously, mummies as a fuel source?  They aren't even all that common, when compared to normal dead bodies.  Also, steam engines require much more fuel than smelting copper.

Actually they are (or were, before they were used to run trains). Basically anyone who died in the desert mummified naturally, and relatively common people were mummified at various times. There were thousands and thousands of mummies of common folk, slaves, etc. and with trees being scarce and mummies plentiful, well, you can see where things led. They were also ground up and used for medicine apparently. Now, royal mummies are indeed rare, but not because there were so few mummies, but because there was so few royalty.

[Urist McDetective]

Talking about burning dried bodies, there's anecdotal evidence from Egypt that mummies burnt to run steam trains weren't worth the effort. I forget the actual quote I heard now.  It was a documentary.

And the fact that these are multiple thousand year old mummies worth a lot of money has nothing to do with it?

Sorry, but seriously, mummies as a fuel source?  They aren't even all that common, when compared to normal dead bodies.  Also, steam engines require much more fuel than smelting copper.

They are worth a lot when you're talking about royalty, now. If you're suggesting it has always been this way, I disagree.
Wiki link suggests that it's an urban myth under debate... but hey, I said anecdotal.

*edit* no, I didn't read all the way through to the end of the thread.

[Granite26]

Early Christians hiding/worshipping in caves(re:crypts) in Egypt used to burn mummies for light, as well.

[0x517A5D]

Actually they are (or were, before they were used to run trains). Basically anyone who died in the desert mummified naturally, and relatively common people were mummified at various times. There were thousands and thousands of mummies of common folk, slaves, etc. and with trees being scarce and mummies plentiful, well, you can see where things led. They were also ground up and used for medicine apparently. Now, royal mummies are indeed rare, but not because there were so few mummies, but because there was so few royalty.

The whole burning mummies for train fuel was invented out of whole cloth, pardon the pun.  By Mark Twain no less.

I shall not speak of the railway, for it is like any other railway--I shall only say that the fuel they use for the locomotive is composed of mummies three thousand years old, purchased by the ton or by the graveyard for that purpose, and that sometimes one hears the profane engineer call out pettishly, "D--n these plebeians, they don't burn worth a cent--pass out a King;"*

* Stated to me for a fact. I only tell it as I got it. I am willing to believe it. I can believe any thing.

http://etext.virginia.edu/railton/innocent/text/mapchap58.html

[Sowelu]

What if carpentry created "Wood Scraps" and Wood scraps could be burned at a wood furnace/ashery similar to melting metal objects?(10 Wood scraps = 1 bar of charcoal/ash?)

I think just a basic conservation of mass approach would solve much of the problem. In addition to the wood scraps, adjust some tree/product conversions. 1 barrel per tree? 25 arrows per tree? 1 spear per tree? Expand those out a bit and those trees go a lot further so that turning some trees to ash doesn't seem as costly. In reality, a tree should produce about 3 barrels plus a pile of scraps.

I don't seen an inconsistency that it costs more stone than wood to produce things - wood is quite predictable in how it behaves under tooling. Stone isn't.

And I like the idea of burning unwanted wood items for ash - barrels, bins, etc. That seems like a no-brainer.

Conservation of mass with regard to trees is a very commonly requested feature, and probably shouldn't be brought up here so much as it's already very wanted.  But yes it would solve many problems!