Heating Cost Calculator

[Steven Lake]

http://www.travisindustries.com/CostOfHeating_WkSht.asp

Was doing some wood stove research and stumbled onto this cool little calculator. I know it's not a "solar" thing per say, but it can give you an "at a glance" overview of what it'll cost to heat your home in your area. I think it'd be a good way to supplement your solar config by finding the cheapest way to heat your home. :)

Anyhow, I thought it'd be helpful, so I posted it.

[CDN_VT]

Well thanks .

We use 2 Airtights . Water ,space & cooking ..

My wood heats me three times minimum at least .

Fall, buck,split & stack .

VT

[niel]

that is a nice calculator. i think it might be better in the energy use and conservation section so i put it there. i also stickied it. maybe bb would like to enter it into the ongoing upper tier thread with many other facts, figures, and general stuff too that he started.

[BB.]

OK,

I have added to the Work FAQ thread:

http://www.wind-sun.com/ForumVB/show...6286#post36286

-Bill

[Steven Lake]

Wow! This is great to hear that it was indeed so useful! Neil, thanks for moving it. I'm never quite sure where things like this should go. Well, at least not yet, but I'm working on it. ^_^;;

As for the numbers, I played with the calculator and it came out that it's cheapest to heat with wood, assuming no electric is used for fans or anything and you just do straight wood stove heat, or at the very least peltier fan circulation. (honestly, not surprising, but still...) Oddly though, in our state it's actually cheaper to heat your home with #2 Kerosene (ie, fuel oil) than it is propane or natural gas if you can't do wood. Go figure that one out.

[niel]

i used to be able to get kerosene around here, but no more so i haven't a clue what it is going for these days. i think i last paid a bit over $1 a gallon last time i bought some.

i had one of those 22k btu heaters and the wick burned down too far. i tried a replacement wick, but it didn't go well. i'm not even sure it was the proper replacement, but i know i screwed up putting it on. it's been collecting dust now for about a decade. i don't miss that smell either, but when there's no choice it's better than freezing. i could've used it a couple years back when snow storms were playing havoc with the north east.

[Steven Lake]

Niel, around here Kerosene (both regular and #2 "fuel oil") are running about $2.50 a gallon. It's grown so much in popularity that it's no longer the "poor man's" way of heating. Back when I was in elementary, you knew who the local poor were, as they heated with Kerosene. Those who weren't poor but were simply "cheap" (a badge we're proud of. lol) would burn #2 kerosene, locally known as "fuel oil" in their furnaces. Everyone else would do propane. In fact, it was a bit of a status symbol to have a gas furnace and/or stove. Now everyone has them and only those too poor to go with the "new gas" still have fuel oil.

It's kinda interesting how both usage and perceptions change over time, isn't it? Oddly though, if they succeed in tapping those propane super fields out west, propane may become the poor man's fuel. lol.

[niel]

It's kinda interesting how both usage and perceptions change over time, isn't it? Oddly though, if they succeed in tapping those propane super fields out west, propane may become the poor man's fuel. lol.

steven,
yes it is as i was using it for one of the reasons you stated and it wasn't because i am well to do. i think that propane would be nice as a new poor man's fuel as i like propane better.

[Steven Lake]

Oh, I do too. I'd love to do all my heating and cooking with propane. But until they can make it cheaper than wood, I'm sticking with that method of home heating for now. Oh, and PS, feeding a wood stove may be cheaper, but good gawds is it a ton of work. lol.

[solarvic]

Isn,t propane a by product of oil refining? I used that before I got my gas well and it was a lot more expensive than oil. Since oil is so expensive I think propane would parrelell the price hikes of oil. solarvic