Fire brigade warns: tea light ovens are a fire hazard

Tea light ovens are literally a fire hazard.

+++UPDATE: Please read our current article on this topic HERE +++

It's not just us who have been saying this since July 2022 ( HERE and HERE ), but now also the fire department, because the temperature inside a single tea light can rise to 250 degrees. If several tea lights are standing close together - like in a tea light oven - and the heat is accumulated beyond them, a wax fire can occur within seconds. The Laboe fire department reports this on its Facebook page .

Depending on its composition, candle wax begins to burn at 280 degrees. This can suddenly create a flame up to 1 m high - a tea light oven will tend to cause the flame to spread. If a wax fire occurs, the same applies as to the well-known grease fire: DO NOT EXTINGUISH IT WITH WATER!

The consequences can be devastating. Therefore our urgent request:

• Avoid using tea light ovens and generally do not place tea lights close to each other.
• Please do not use grills indoors - regardless of whether they are charcoal, barbecue briquettes or gas.
• Gas-powered heaters such as patio heaters or catalytic stoves are also NOT suitable for indoor use.

Kremperheide fire department

The Kremperheide fire department also posted a warning image for your post and wrote like the other fire departments:

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Fleckeby Volunteer Fire Department

The Fleckeby Volunteer Fire Department also writes about this topic on Facebook : Tea light ovens have recently been advertised. These can be very dangerous. A tea light reaches a temperature of 250° Celsius. By setting up a tea light oven, several tea lights are now placed close together and placed under a flower pot. This is intended to warm up and release this heat into the surroundings.

However, the heat accumulates under the flower pot. This can ignite the wax and lead to a flame approx. 1 meter high. However, due to the structure of the tealight oven, this spreads out to the sides. This can lead to serious injuries and a house fire. The same applies to a wax fire as to a grease fire.

Eschborn-Niederhöchstadt fire department

Or Erwin Mark from the Eschborn-Nieder Höchstadt fire department in the h3 morning show : Tea light ovens are currently very trendy - no wonder: Heating is expensive, the ovens are pretty to look at and provide pleasant radiant heat. However, they do not provide any more heat than the tea lights would give off. Things can quickly become dangerous, especially with self-made ovens - especially if there are too many candles under the clay pots.

Video from the Braunschweig fire department

The Braunschweig fire department has now even published a video showing how dangerous a tea light oven can be!

Check out this post on Instagram

A post shared by Braunschweig Fire Department (@feuerwehr.braunschweig)

The Braunschweig fire department writes:

Tealight oven! We are monitoring the current situation with concern. We want to show you what happens if the oven is operated for longer than 1 hour and too many tea lights are used. A wax burn is created. A wax fire can no longer be extinguished with water! It is similar to the reaction to a grease fire in the kitchen: large flames follow, which can lead to severe burns and a house fire. Only a fire blanket, an extinguishing spray or a fire extinguisher approved for liquid fires may be used here.  

Tealight oven: Hot or not?

Our cooperation partner at Checked4you has also taken on the topic and writes that the idea is quite simple and that this product can be built quickly: two clay pots of different sizes are screwed together on a pole, with a few tea lights underneath: a small heater is ready. Warm air should be stored between the pots and released slowly.

• To keep an entire room warm with tea lights, you would need a lot of them.
• Dangers: Oxygen becomes scarce and gases are released that can ignite.
• But a self-made oven can be a nice idea for crafting fun and hand warmers.

DIY clips can be found on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and other networks. This has already led to clay pots being temporarily sold out in some hardware and garden stores.

Sure, winter is coming and heating is expensive this year. Radiators are not a good alternative because they run on electricity and it is more expensive and there is also the fear that the electricity will go out if too many people turn on an electric heater. Some people come up with creative ideas to generate heat.

But are tea lights strong enough to keep an entire room warm? No!

A cardigan or a hot water bottle has an even stronger perceived warming effect on your body. A tea light can perhaps slightly warm a square meter. So to really heat the place up, you'd need quite a few lights. And that could be quite dangerous. Because flames need the oxygen in the air to exist. Just like us humans. If there are too many candles, the room can become stuffy.

In addition, the wax usually contains paraffin. If it is cheap, it produces more soot than, for example, stearin. Paraffin comes from petroleum. If it burns, it cannot be extinguished with water. And if the candles are too close together, gases can be produced that can suddenly ignite. Then there's nothing left to blow out. Unless you can smother the flames with a fireproof blanket, you will need extinguishing foam! And the aluminum around a tealight isn't exactly environmentally friendly either.

So: A tealight oven like this can definitely be fun to make and you can also warm your hands a little at the table. However, the design is not suitable as a heater for an entire room. This also applies to charcoal or gas grills, which should never be used in the room!

If you want atmospheric candlelight, you can buy candles with the RAL quality mark, for example. Candles have the label if they do not drip, burn with little soot and smoke and are made from raw materials that do not exceed any harmful limit values.