Home heating discussion (split from a ski question thread)

[SkiFanE]

Oil. Let's just say that house you see blow up on the news due to natural gas explosion...well...btdt. Will never heat with a volatile fuel, not worth saving a few bucks. Oil it is, forever.

 

[vdk03]

You've never seen oil burn? It burns hotter than gas.

 

[SkiFanE]

You've never seen oil burn? It burns hotter than gas.

Yes..but is it easy to ignite?

 

[Fuller Wycliff]

just putting it out there, i know a guy in the solar biz if anyone is interested. not trying to spam the forum or anything, just offering a service that might be of interest.

 

[o3jeff]

If there was gas on my street I'd switch. It'd be about 5k for a new furnace.

Can't you do propane?

 

[wa-loaf]

Can't you do propane?

Propane is pretty expensive and then you are still dealing with deliveries.

 

[Geoff]

Can't you do propane?

Propane:
Unless you are set up to bulk buy it, propane is at least as expensive as oil.

My Vermont townhouse is heated with a propane boiler. Each building has a big buried tank and the units are individually metered off the tank. I'm locked in at $2.25/gallon. Propane is 2/3 the energy of oil so it's comparable to locking in on an oil contract at $3.38/gallon. The lock-in price for single family homes was around $3.00/gallon. You need to buy a lot of propane before it comes in cheaper than oil.

Right now, small fill-ups of propane around here are around $3.60 a gallon so it's like paying $5.00/gallon for heating oil.

Natural gas:
My flatland place has NStar natural gas service. Their price is about to go down 16% in May to reflect the decline in natural gas prices.

My gas bill for January said I burned 107 ccf. You burn about 135 cubic feet of natural gas to get the same heat as one gallon of heating oil. This translates to about 80 gallons of oil. My gas bill was $127.50 so this is way cheaper than oil heat.

Of course, the flip side of this is consuming less energy....

I've been doing substantial improvements to the insulation of my summer house. The attic is now R-30. About 60% of the exterior walls have been gutted, re-framed, and insulated. The rest will be completed next winter.

 

[severine]

Propane is pretty expensive and then you are still dealing with deliveries.

That's what I love about natural gas. I never have to worry about running out; turn on the stove or turn up the thermostat, and we're all set. 10+ years of this will be hard to give up, but there are very few houses on the market right now that meet our needs and have gas.

Thanks, guys! It helps to know! I read on a website that the average home in the US uses 185 gallons of oil per month during the winter heating season. It seems their figures are not exactly accurate...

 

[mattm59]

That's what I love about natural gas. I never have to worry about running out;

After Irene and Alfred, I've been saying the same about my wood pile

I burn about 8-10 cord a year, and average 190 gallons of oil annually. 2300 sq. ft., I wear shorts all winter in the house. 17 years doing this, splitter/saws/truck cost money, but it's good being the noisiest a-hole in the neighborhood, :roll: and I sold enough wood to pay for the splitter and saws, as well as making Christmas money a couple years for me and my son. looks like with a little hustle I'll sell a few cords again.

 

[Abubob]

Home heating prices are what keep me renting. But that may change soon. What I worry about (besides the exorbitant cost) is power outages. My wife gets huge headaches when ever she goes into someone home with a wood stove. Does anyone know anything about outdoor wood furnaces?

 

[Warp Daddy]

2000 sq ft home, 45 windows all with argonized E glass,

2 yrs ago we Insulated the crap out of the all walls and the attic and added new all new soffit vents w/ fibreglass channels to new roof venting towers .

We keep the joint at 69 degrees all day and when we go to bed the program takes it to 65.

Use gas for heat , hot water and gas fireplace .

Thru Feb 9, 2012 we've paid $778.54 average temp for the past month were 8 degrees higher than last season . Last year for the FULL heating season we paid $1407.72 for heat and hot water

Heating season up here is a bit longer than southern NE region

 

[Glenn]

just putting it out there, i know a guy in the solar biz if anyone is interested. not trying to spam the forum or anything, just offering a service that might be of interest.

:lol:

 

[severine]

Home heating prices are what keep me renting. But that may change soon. What I worry about (besides the exorbitant cost) is power outages. My wife gets huge headaches when ever she goes into someone home with a wood stove. Does anyone know anything about outdoor wood furnaces?

Check zoning for where you live. In Simsbury, CT, outdoor wood furnaces are banned, for example. Local regulations will tell whether they're allowed or not.

We've always paid our own heat while renting, even oil fill-ups for the short time we rented an apartment with oil heat 12 years ago. You're spoiled!

 

[wa-loaf]

Home heating prices are what keep me renting. But that may change soon. What I worry about (besides the exorbitant cost) is power outages. My wife gets huge headaches when ever she goes into someone home with a wood stove. Does anyone know anything about outdoor wood furnaces?

Check zoning for where you live. In Simsbury, CT, outdoor wood furnaces are banned, for example. Local regulations will tell whether they're allowed or not.

We've always paid our own heat while renting, even oil fill-ups for the short time we rented an apartment with oil heat 12 years ago. You're spoiled!

Even if it's allowed your neighbors will hate you. Those things just smoke everyone out.

 

[Abubob]

Even if it's allowed your neighbors will hate you. Those things just smoke everyone out.

Can the smoke really be any worse than a regular wood or pellet stove?

Reading some new regs for NH - pretty strict. What is "clean" wood?

 

[wa-loaf]

Can the smoke really be any worse than a regular wood or pellet stove?

Reading some new regs for NH - pretty strict. What is "clean" wood?

If your wife is a sensitive to the smoke as you say she is I think it's a non-starter. The ones I've seen (a local Dairy uses one and a neighbor of my dads had on in Maine) seem to put out a lot more smoke than a wood stove.

 

[o3jeff]

I have a pellet stove that I vent straight out the back wall and unless you walk within 2-3 feet of the pipe you can't smell it and there is zero smell inside the house.

 

[Warp Daddy]

If your wife is a sensitive to the smoke as you say she is I think it's a non-starter. The ones I've seen (a local Dairy uses one and a neighbor of my dads had on in Maine) seem to put out a lot more smoke than a wood stove.

Absolutely there have been REAL issues with these things in our region . They are banned in the community . but outside if you are downwind of these things you will be having problems with smoke smells especially if they are using pallets as fuel or some trash wood -- its god awful !

Bob with your wife's senstivity i imagine this would be something to avoid as others have suggested

 

[ctenidae]

Was just reading some natural gas demand forecasts- thinking is thatgas demand for home heating is falling as people move to warmer climates, but it's made up for by increased dmeand for electricity as those people use electricity for space heating. Interesting dynamic I hadn't really considered before.

 

[Geoff]

Was just reading some natural gas demand forecasts- thinking is thatgas demand for home heating is falling as people move to warmer climates, but it's made up for by increased dmeand for electricity as those people use electricity for space heating. Interesting dynamic I hadn't really considered before.

The rest of the country just uses their heat pump for both cooling and the small amount of heating they require. As long as it's not much colder than 40F, the new high 20+ SEER heat pumps are better at heating than a gas furnace. As soon as you have to use heating elements to make the house warm, it's cheaper to use natural gas. In the south, they have combination units that run as heat pumps until it approaches freezing and then automatically switch over to natural gas.

The number of housing units in the cold part of the country isn't shrinking. It just isn't growing the way housing units are in the warm parts of the country. The existing housing stock is much more energy efficient than it was 10 years ago and I think that accounts for most of the decline in the use of residential natural gas. People used their Obama tax credits to make their homes more energy efficient at minimal cost. It's pretty easy to get your local energy supplier to hook up a blower at minimal cost to run the test for needed caulking and weatherstripping to reduce your air leaks. I'm doing a lot of home remodeling and the building codes now require EnergyStar rated windows and doors whenever you replace them. Insulation is the same way. If you open up a wall as part of a permitted project, there's now an insulation inspection that happens before you seal it back up. The energy efficiency of homes in the north is just going to keep getting better.