What Is Your Heat Source?

given my childhood, I really have no plans of ever cutting firewood, splitting firewood, carrying ashes, cleaning chimneys, or lighting wood stoves again. We have natural gas and I even opted for a natural gas fireplace in this house. The house is pretty new, and we have fairly conservative habits. I figure with the rise in costs, We'll probably spend about $1400 through the winter for gas, that's a drop in the bucket compared to our summertime electric bills. We have gas appliances except for the dryer.
Clean effecient and highly dependable. We have never had a gas outage in Hilliard Ohio. We have had a few power outages though. Even if Gas cost more I wouldn't have electric. Last winter when the ice storms hit, my daughter (8 months pregnant) and her Husband went 5 days without heat during Christmas. The hassle and concerns they went through in that five day period would be enough to convince me to pay twice as much for gas as electric.
Dave
 
mishi8 said:
We're looking at a high efficiency furnace too. Since it vents out the side of the house, what about the hot water tank? Does it still exhaust through the chimney?
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This is something you have to take into consideration about the cost of the high efficiency. Yes, the current hot water tank still goes through the chimney. BUT the contractor warned us that next time we have to replace the hot water tank, because of regulations, there will be an extra expense, in that the opening will have to be made smaller (with a liner).
 
kveeti said:
This is something you have to take into consideration about the cost of the high efficiency. Yes, the current hot water tank still goes through the chimney. BUT the contractor warned us that next time we have to replace the hot water tank, because of regulations, there will be an extra expense, in that the opening will have to be made smaller (with a liner).
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Yes, that would be the case for us with any new furnace, since we will be upgrading from a 33 year old, low efficiency furnace...will need to bring everything up to current codes. I'm considering going with an on-demand (tankless) hot water heater at some point too...I understand there are side venting units as well as chimney venting ones. To eliminate the need for a chimney altogether should further increase the energy efficiency of our house, and we can reclaim the space the chimney takes up in our kitchen and second story. :)
 
mishi8 said:
I'm considering going with an on-demand (tankless) hot water heater at some point too...I understand there are side venting units as well as chimney venting ones.
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We just upgraded to this system,and let me tell you it is awesome!Ours is side venting.We will be upgrading our furnace soon (before Christmas) we also will have central air conditioning installed.
 
We are 100% electric here. I have and use a nice slow combustion wood burning stove however. Since we just moved in and it is only starting to get cold around here I only used it a couple of times and have found it quite effective in helping to warm the entire house.

I will see how effective come mid january when the -40's hit in our typical Quebec winter nights.

I grew up with natural gas and miss it so much. I find the elecrtic heat just makes the house so bloody dry. Itchy skin, staticy (is that a word?) and tank top off becomes crutial bi-daily in the winter months.
 
We have a heat pump, a LP(liquid propane) gas furnace and a fireplace. The heat pump works until the outside temps drop below 40 F. then the LP kicks on. I just had 200 gallons of LP put in the tank and it cost $450! Holy Crackers!!!! We also use the fireplace to help keep the cost down on the other two. I keep the heat set around 68. We have parrots in the house so I don't want the temp too low because of them. Well...and the kids too. It's crazy expensive sometimes.
 
Natural gas. But, with a programmable thermostat, it shouldn't be too bad. The heat kicks on at 4:30am, gets the house to 68, then will let it drop to 62 after 6:30. Then, the heat will come on again at 5:30 til about 9pm, once more, when we're there and moving around. The house stays pretty warm--I've only seen it actually get down to 62 once or twice, when we've had doors open for more than a few minutes. Last year, max gas bill was about $175--hoping it won't be too much worse this year. So far, it hasn't been any higher than this time the last 2 years.
 
daveedka said:
given my childhood, I really have no plans of ever cutting firewood, splitting firewood, carrying ashes, cleaning chimneys, or lighting wood stoves again. We have natural gas and I even opted for a natural gas fireplace in this house. The house is pretty new, and we have fairly conservative habits. I figure with the rise in costs, We'll probably spend about $1400 through the winter for gas, that's a drop in the bucket compared to our summertime electric bills. We have gas appliances except for the dryer.
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A neighbor cut down one of their big oaks a few years ago, and insisted that we take about a cord of pre-split firewood. Just had our first fire of the season Friday.

But that was just for romance. We have gas on a programmeable thermostat. And two dogs for nighttime. And dog gas :thud:
 
Boohoo said:
Mo, what are you feeding those dogs? :)
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It may be the vegetables. On the other hand, what we feed them is only a portion of what they eat. The world is full of interesting snacks when you're a dog.
 
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