We've been house shopping. I'm open to any form of heat except propane. It is by far the most expnsive to heat a house with!
Propane in upstate NY - $5.699 - Yowzers
- Thread starter Donald
- Start date
Is this really true?
Depends on the area and electric rates.
Generally, in the Northeast (excluding heat pumps - they vary in cost too much - wide range of perfomance and efficiencies)
Most expensive to least:
1. electric
2. propane
3. oil
4. wood pellets
5. firewood (bought)
6. Natural gas
7. coal
8. firewood (U cut)
Although I still do new-builds with oil heat in rural areas it's now about 2-to-1 propane to oil (if no NG available) because with oil you have to buy the tank and you need a chimney. (I will not do a job where a cust. wants to power vent oil, power venters suck, no pun intended)
Can't do oil here.
Pellets are
cool but difficult for forced airCan't do coal
Wood is ideal if you have good supply but again for a large house difficult
NG always best choice if you have that choice
Electric resistance nuts
Hence I love the energy density of LP in combo with the on demand cooling and heating of a heat pump. Get the most efficient units and size correctly.
Just gonna add my $.02 here. Propane is a commodity (like most other energy sources), so the price can vary widely. I use propane to heat my house and a year ago I contracted it for $1.13/gallon. This year, thanks to a few people who are not friendly to energy (sorry, had to say it), I contracted propane for $1.44/gallon. For awhile, propane was over $2/gallon here cash price, but has dropped slightly. Remember that propane is a BYPRODUCT of other sources, mostly natural gas. In other words, you don't go drilling and you hit a vein of propane. I have a 1,000 gallon tank on my place that I own, and I am considering buying another 1,000 tank just so I can buy my propane whenever it is the cheapest, usually the time of year to do it is in late June.
Natural gas is usually slightly cheaper than propane, but a year ago when temperatures in this area hit -30°, quite a few people got hit with fantastic heating bills. Several local school districts got hit with hundreds of thousands of dollars in extra heating bills because they were heating with natural gas. The liquid propane sitting in a homeowner's tank, like mine, was not affected.
As far as wood being one of the cheapest sources of heat, maybe, but there are a lot of things that might not be considered. Does that include the cost of your chainsaws, chainsaw gas, commercial wood splitters and the cost of transporting the wood? I know of a local carpenter who was out of work for three months because he was chopping his own wood, broke his leg and then needed surgery. Depending on if the wood is burned inside the house or in an outside-the-house type of system, wood can put a permanent odor inside your house, not necessarily offensive, but it can be to some people.
Natural gas is usually slightly cheaper than propane, but a year ago when temperatures in this area hit -30°, quite a few people got hit with fantastic heating bills. Several local school districts got hit with hundreds of thousands of dollars in extra heating bills because they were heating with natural gas. The liquid propane sitting in a homeowner's tank, like mine, was not affected.
As far as wood being one of the cheapest sources of heat, maybe, but there are a lot of things that might not be considered. Does that include the cost of your chainsaws, chainsaw gas, commercial wood splitters and the cost of transporting the wood? I know of a local carpenter who was out of work for three months because he was chopping his own wood, broke his leg and then needed surgery. Depending on if the wood is burned inside the house or in an outside-the-house type of system, wood can put a permanent odor inside your house, not necessarily offensive, but it can be to some people.
Bingo! I knew a guy that heated his house for "free" with wood. He loved the "free" heat so much he put in an outdoor woodburner and heated his house and water for "free". This started to require an amount of wood he could no longer supply from his own property, by the time it was done he ended up with dump trailer, tractor and several saws to harvest and haul wood, plus the splitter ect.... Not to mention the truck which was also needed though he already had. Of course the costs of all this equpiment to provide "free" heat was never factored into the equation, not to mention time and wear and tear on his body.
Its great if you enjoy the work, however in the case of the guy I knew I figured it would have been far cheaper to have put in a geothermal system in the short and long run.
We burned wood for one winter, lots of work (split it with a maul!), lots of hauling ect... and we were only supplementing our main source of heat.
I took the wood stove and fireplace off the insurance policy and that alone saved enough money to easily pay for one month of electricity for the heat pump during the worst of winter (Or October thru part of January depending on how you broke it down).
Easy choice for me.
What about it being dangerous ?
$3.57 a gallon at tractor supply in Hesperia,Ca 20 min ago.
It’s not any more dangerous than natural gas. The outdoor propane tank can be unsightly, but they make underground tanks. Worried about CO? Buy a CO detector. All electric heat has the potential to be dangerous, not to mention very costly. Whatever.
Driving a car can be dangerous also…