Question of the Week: How do you heat your home?
Posted on December 22nd, 2008 - 10:30 AMEach week we ask a question related to the environment. Please let us know your thoughts as comments. Feel free to respond to earlier comments or post new ideas. Previous questions.
No matter how you do it, home heating is a major consideration in cold areas. Some people use traditional fuels such as oil or gas for home heat. Some use renewable fuels, for example wood or solar, to heat or add to the main heat source.
How do you heat your home?
Tags: home heating
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Question of the Week
December 22nd, 2008 at 10:52 am
Natural gas furnace.
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Ed reply on December 22, 2008 12:15 pm:
With the toxic hot air that comes out of Stephen Johnson’s mouth.
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Concerned Citizen reply on December 23, 2008 9:57 am:
Oh no! That sounds like poor indoor air quality!
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Maine Helen reply on December 22, 2008 8:53 pm:
Wood heats me thrice: when I cut it, when I stack it, when I burn it.
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Linda S reply on December 28, 2008 3:34 pm:
Propane - but I sure wish it was solar, wind, or hydro!!
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Dudly A. Carnes reply on January 6, 2009 10:57 pm:
I don’t heat my house ,can’t aford to. I use Salvation Army sleeping bags and rags to keep me warm. Is that green or what ?
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:54 am
Wood and Natural Gas
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:55 am
I have a high efficiency natural gas furnace. The distribution of natural gas is very efficient. When assessing the greeness of a particular option - the “cost” of handling and distribution should be factored (i.e. LNG bulk shipping, energy losses in the distribution system, cost of hauling and other energy consumptive methods of delivery). I would be interested in a calculation to determine the total cost and not just direct cost and use (at home).
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:56 am
Natural gas furnace
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:56 am
Wood and Oil
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:57 am
Natural Gas. Burning clean since the dawn of time!
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:57 am
natural gas
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:58 am
Home heating oil
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:59 am
Natural Gas heats our home
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:59 am
Wood and Electricity
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:59 am
natural gas
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:00 am
natural gas
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:00 am
We use natural gas furnaces for our home heating. We also have a fire place, but it is more for atmosphere than real home heating.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:00 am
Natural Gas fuel - forced hot air furnace
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:01 am
We heat primarily with wood. We have a combination wood & fuel oil furnace. If the temperature gets too low with the wood, the fuel oil will kick on. We try to not let that happen.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:01 am
Wood Pellets…
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:02 am
Oil, coal and wood. We just went 7 1/2 days with no electricity so the coal and wood stoves were critical to heat our home due to the deficeincies in the electrical power grid due to lack of powerline trimming throughout the state of NH.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:02 am
Baseboard electric. Clean, warm, draft free heating that is proving relatively cheap!
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:03 am
Wood with back up electric.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:04 am
Electric baseboard and portable kerosene.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:04 am
hot water baseboard radiators heated with natural gas
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pranchul reply on December 22, 2008 2:17 pm:
i haet my through solar radiation by open all my windows during day time if there is sun in the sky,, otherwise….close all my windows of house as i don’t want to produce any pooltion for atomsphere so i keep my home bu closing all my window,,,,,closing window tempeture will be optimoinial level..when there is no sun light in sky,, at time if there is electricity i use heater,,,,,,,,but for few mintues,,,,,,,,,,,,,because do not want to waste power supply,,,,,,and room in which i shelter i use heater,, other room windows are close,,, because in our body there is imense heat,,,,,,so what is matter heating home wiht energy,, and burning,,,,,,,i will eco freindly,,,
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Matt reply on December 29, 2008 9:33 am:
Ohh my god! It seems some also heat their homes by burning their text books.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:04 am
Electricity from nuclear
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:06 am
Oil #2.
i want natural gas because it’s cleaner than oil, but also costs more. last week 116 gallons of oil were pumped into my (300 gallon) tank and it cost me $286.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:06 am
Ground source heat pump!
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:07 am
Yak dung
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:08 am
A better question would be: How efficiently do you heat your home, in BTUs/per dollar spent on fuel? Regardless of the nature of the fuel, we should do what we can to maximize the utility of our dollars, so we are protecting the environment by paying the least amount for our heat. That way, there are more dollars left over for other environmental uses.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:08 am
My main heat source is off-peak electric @ $0.040KWH. When my heat is cycled off, my corn burner (run 24/7 in the winter months) picks up the load ($2.80/bushel).
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:09 am
A mixture of propane (furnace) and wood. Wood is a renewable resource, making proper tree selections when you are cutting can improve the health of a stand, and it makes a big difference in our heating bills.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:09 am
geothermal system. free standing wood stove for backup if no electric.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:10 am
I heat with heat-pumps that have capacitors attached to them to eliminate electrical waste and a monitoring system that sheds high usage to keep kw down during peak hours. I actually use more electricity in off peak mode than on peak mode. Averaging 4500kwh’s per month is a significant reduction in peak mode.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:11 am
high efficiency gas forced air furnace and electric heat pumps.
In Atlanta we have moderate temperatures mostly and heat pumps are efficient and reliable.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:12 am
I heat with wood and oil. I have a multi-fuel furnace made by H.S. Tarm that burns wood and oil for hot water baseboard and I have a Vermont Castings wood stove in the main living area to reduce the load on the furnace. Works very well
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:13 am
I use an electric ceramic room heater to heat only the rooms which my family and I are occupying at the time, and keep the thermostat very low throughout the other 7 rooms. We wear sweaters and use fleece throws, and we have a lot of bedcovers for night. I don’t advise this for everyone, but this was an experiment which we started this year. My natural gas heating bill went down over 70% each of the last two months, and probably this month too.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:14 am
We have an all-electric home but augment this with an alcohol sotve. We buy denatured or isopropyl rather than the expensive container of the jellied alcohol. This helps keep the house very comfortable.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:15 am
Electri baseboard and an alcohol-buring fireplace.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:15 am
I use BIOHEAT which is a mixture of renewable biodiesel and heat.ing oil.It burns cleaner and reduces our dependence on foreign oil
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:18 am
Wood is our only source of heat. High efficiency wood burning stove.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:18 am
Oil. In 1999 we were at a crossroads in buying a new boiler for our forced hot water zoned system. We have a separate oil hot water heater which is very fast and cost effective. Should we use gas or oil? We thought that over the long term, gas would become the predominant choice for the source of energy and the price of oil would stabilize and / or fall. These last six months we questioned our own thinking but of late we are holding to our plan.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:20 am
Gas
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Concerned Citizen reply on December 23, 2008 9:59 am:
I hear methane is highly flammable.
Keep up the cabbage and you’ll conquer global warming!
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:23 am
We converted over to a geothermal system which runs on electric. Very efficient.
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Awalker reply on December 22, 2008 12:24 pm:
Hi Jen,
Would you be able to elaborate on your experience with geothermal? I would be interested in how it was installed (vertical/horizontal), how many tons/size of house, and your final costs/tax incentives. Oh, what part of the country are you located?
Thanks for your time.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:27 am
Natural gas furnace and a pellet stove.
Since the only wood available in Northeastern Nevada is pine, the pellet stove is a better alternative.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:33 am
Mainly natural gas for my furnace, and hot-water radiators. I turn off the radiators in rooms I don’t use much. I installed an electronic timer thermostat set to let the (empty) house get cooler in the daytime and at night. During the day I angle the south- and west-facing Venetian blinds so whatever sun’s warmth can come in. And I use an electric mattress pad to preheat the bed before I climb in, then turn it off (because I’m suspicious about sleeping on an electric field).
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:41 am
Well, I don’t have any of those extra stuff yet because it’s not my own home, it’s a villa that I am renting with no fireplace. When I get my own place there will be a fireplace and solar and all the good renewable things. For now, I keep my thermostat at 65 degrees Feranheit and when it gets too chili, my daughter and I just put on our sweaters or warm jackets. We have a fireplace on the porch, but that won’t warm the inside of the house, but we do like to light it and sit around it for some warmth in the cold season :)
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:45 am
Oil and occasionally, wood.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:46 am
I heat with wood pellets. I burn approx 4 tons per season. I spread the ash on the lawn. I have not used my furnace (gas) for two seasons. I do run it once a month for 30 minutes to ensure proper operation.
I have a free standing stove and fireplace pellet insert.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:50 am
We have a wood stove for the really cold days and nights. We also have an electric heat pump for the milder days when a wood stove is just too hot. It doesn’t ever run much.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:50 am
Puppies.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:52 am
Two pellet stoves heat 2500 sq ft. Backed up by radiant floor heat powered by a gas fired boiler. Pellets made from beetle-killed lodgepole pine here in western Colorado are becoming available but cost isn’t dropping significantly from those made in Wyo or NM. Cost may be higher with pellets, but we’re warm. That’s the tradeoff. To maintain this level of warmth with gas would really by prohibitive.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 11:54 am
I have an electric heat-pump. But with two sliding glass doors in an 830-sq-ft condo, even 70 degrees feels cold!
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:06 pm
Two years ago we went to a pellet furnace, not a stove, and threw out the wood furnace. Pellets are cleaner in the home, there’s no smoke, and it’s easier on our bodies. The north is gearing up for pellet production as the best pellets are made from soft wood. With the demise of the paper industry, soft wood must be cut or eventually cause a fire hazard. I look for pellets to come down in price.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:12 pm
A gas forced air furnace that is insanely cheap to run. I heat a 1,000 foot renovated condo for less than $50 during the winter months and get solar heat on sunny days through big windows on concrete floors.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Moved to Hawaii, no heater
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:20 pm
Natural Gas and radiators….
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:28 pm
I use a #1 fuel oil circ. hot water boiler. Our costs are fixed as we only can get oil deliveries to our remote town in the summer. We are paying $ 6.00 a gallon. We have a wood stove in which I burn pallet wood when it gets below 0 F. Our windows are 3 panes of glass and the house has a lot of insulation. Solar radiation today is almost 0 because we are at a very high latitude. We won’t start to feel the passive solar until February.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:35 pm
Main room - woodstove. Office and bedroom - electric space heaters.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:37 pm
The sun, wood, and backup electric
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:40 pm
Natural Gas. Interesting discussions though. My question is always the efficacy of burning waste materials in a stove or funance that will result in more PM emissions as well as NOx. It seems that either natural gas - which burns very efficiently, or electric which increases efficiency through generation at large facilities with pollutions control equipment makes the most environmental sense. Geothermal of course accomodates the best of true renewable (the temperature of the earth) with a booster electric heat pump.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:41 pm
While studying, I light a candle which keeps the room warm. For night time, throwing on an extra blanket. In the morning a candle in the bathroom keeps the mirror from fogging up. Then off to work.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Eat lots of baked beans then get under the covers.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Passive Solar helps the natural gas forced air system - set a 68f. We add an efficient wood burning stove to the mix in severely cold weather. My mother, on blood thinners, is usually cold, so she uses a new energy-efficient (auto shut-off) space heater in her room, then wears a coat or sweater when using the rest of the house.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:47 pm
I live in Barmer a district of India. Its minimum tempreture is 4-5 degree centigrate. We are not heating our homes.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Just installed a horizontal loop geothermal system with electric backup. Working well so far. Electric kicks in when outdoor air temps are around 20 F.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:51 pm
en republica dominicana la temperatura es caliente asi que no nesesitamos calentar la casa con calefaccion, pero en siertas ocaciones como; Año nuevo , Resureccion de Jesus, reuniones familiares ETC..
hacemos una fogata con madera para calentar.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 12:58 pm
We heat with wood and natural gas. The wood is burned in a Hearthstone stove that is supposed to reduce emissions.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:03 pm
We heat with a heat pump, supplimented by a wood stove.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:14 pm
Wood, propane, and passive solar.
We have a masonry heater (sometimes called Russian or Contraflow Heaters) in the center of our house sized to cover most of our heating needs except in the coldest part of the winter in south central PA. Although we try not to use it, we have a heat pump. The back up when temps drop below 30 is not electric, it is from our domestic hot water heater which is propane fired. We also built our house with a large amount of south facing glass and ceramic tiled floors to absorb the heat. Our bills stay pretty consistent throughout the year even with AC in the summer.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:15 pm
High efficiency propane furnace supplemented with an air tight wood stove (burning wood from dead trees from our land).
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:17 pm
I heat my home with good old electricity produced by our coal burning power plant. Our plant puts sulfur and carbon dioxide into our air that makes my crops grow better. If you passed elementary chemistry, you should know that plants breath in carbon dioxide and bread out oxygen. WOW. Do you know that we have more forest acres and trees now than when the pilgrims arrived. Bet they did not teach you that in science class either. If I had my choice I would like a nuclear plant next door for it is the cleanest energy that can be produced, I know my plants would suffer but after all I can buy sulfur to put in my fertilizer to help keep them healthy.
Keep up the good work,
Jimmy McCurry Texas A&M Class of 1978
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:28 pm
Coastal Georgia- heat pump and fireplace. I heat to 68F and use the fireplace for comfort in the living room. I get wood from friends who have had trees cut down or trimmed-use my little chain saw to size the wood. I would ike to get a fireplace insert so I could damper off the fire when I go to bed and reduce heat loss, but my fireplace is not a std size & w/ 2 kids in college I can’t afford it now. I did replace both my upstairs & downstairs AC/heat pumps w/ over 15SER units in 06 and saw my electric bill halved. The sun on my wood framed house does really contribute to a nice winter afternoon warm-up, but the summer sun is really tough on the AC $.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:37 pm
Are you collecting this information on behalf of Santa Claus? He probably has a vested interest in what’s at the bottom of your chimney…
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December 22nd, 2008 at 1:40 pm
stove heat..low lvls rather than elevated bills with central..laptops comps..exhaust from cpu’s and video card fans..channeling heat..
thx.
lotherhn
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December 22nd, 2008 at 2:07 pm
A space heater just for the rooms that need more heat, rather than heating the whole apartment.
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Lan reply on December 29, 2008 10:32 am:
Me too.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 2:08 pm
Lots of stove oil and electricity during winter months. With the high cost of heating fuel I don’t have a choice at time to also use electric heaters. If I could afford an alternative source of heat that is cheaper I’d go for it.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 2:14 pm
Love warms my home…actually, we use passive solar supplemented by good old fashioned pulverized coal.
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deBlob reply on December 23, 2008 10:02 am:
I hear that coal is super efficient. AND, I think we should start burning piles in pubilc. Ya see, it’s cold where I live, and I’d like it stop being so. Hence, if we just burn coal in the streets, it’ll heat us up so we won’t have to wear coats! It’ll be like Miami in New York! ALSO, it’ll have a great permenent affect: the value of homes in New York will go up because of our new weather patterns from climate change! Yay! That’ll be so nice! I can’t wait!
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December 22nd, 2008 at 2:15 pm
A woodstove in the kitchen upon which we cook so we hardly use the electric range from September through May. A wood pellet insert in the fireplace and a free-standing woodstove in the back room. We turn off the fire-place stove at night. Use about 2 ton of pellets a year; may use more this winter as the snow is hanging on in western Oregon. Wood comes from our tree trimmings and trees that blow down. Thinking about coppicing but haven’t really explored this yet but that would alleviate some concern about the close supply of wood.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 2:43 pm
We use a boiler, burning heating oil. We supplement with a woodstove, which provides almost all the heat for our 1700 sq. ft. house — even in Fairbanks Alaska, where the average temperature in January is -10.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 3:02 pm
Since Hurricane Katrina, I have been heating my home with an electric space heater. It has been tough because the electrical socket I use for the heater also has to be used for my electric hot water heater and washing machine. If I need heat in the bathroom, I have to heat the water first, and then heat up the bathroom with the space heater. Fortunately, winters aren’t that cold here in Mississippi.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 3:38 pm
natural gas-forced air with supplimental natural gas fireplace some issues with balance. we had builder make some ajustments to layout, yet he stayed with original duct layout
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December 22nd, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Currently we are heating our house with a high efficiency natural gas furnace. But I am thinking of converting to a horizontal closed loop geothermal system.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 6:50 pm
The majority of Kivalina residents use fuel oil at $7.75 a gallon because that is the only source in the village that is available. The other alternative is drift wood along the beach. Only a few unemployed residents use that source when their heating assistance runs out, and it runs out quick.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 7:29 pm
I heat with fuel oil. It is very expensive, very dirty i think. This is how i heat my home.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 8:39 pm
I use natural gas, and wood in a certified fireplace insert. Because of air quality restrictions, I’m not able to use wood as often as I would prefer.
Most of the wood I burn is salvaged from pallets that would otherwise go to the landfill. Much of this wood is various hardwoods, and all of it is seasoned.
If I could afford to use only gas, I probably would do so, use the wood for emergencies.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 8:57 pm
heat pump
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:17 pm
Sunlight/warm air and opening and closing appropriate curtains throughout the day. We have electric heat which I have put on for about 10 minutes so far this year (when the temp fell to the 30s overnight for several nights so we really needed to get the chill out of the air). We installed high efficiency windows 2 years ago and this past year we had insulation blown into our attic and it’s really made a difference in how much our home retains heat. We do live in FL so this obviously wouldn’t work in the colder parts of the country in the dead of winter but in the fall and spring in the North it would definitely make a difference in the amount of additional heating.
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:18 pm
I heat with a high efficiency natural gas furnace (third furnace) installed January 2007 - 2008 in my Lustron home built in the the Early 1950’s.
http://www.lustronpreservation.org/index.php
http://members.tripod.com/~Strandlund/index-2.html
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December 22nd, 2008 at 10:35 pm
Natural gas furnace and occasional use of wood burning box stove.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 3:40 am
I use a pellet stove When the temp goes lower than 40,
above 40 I use a heat pump (Stove uses 2 1/4 ton a year)
Northeast of Boston
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December 23rd, 2008 at 8:04 am
Wood keeps the house nice and warm all winter.
Fuel oil provides the hot water and baseboard heaters as a backup/base.
http://www.geologyjoe.blogspot.com
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December 23rd, 2008 at 10:05 am
I found a completely ecofriendly way to heat my home with a zero carbon footprint! I hold daily aerobics classes in my basement. The heat from all the middle aged women (don’t be disuaded, you can do it too!) sweating off their post-baby weight heats my whole home!!!
Thank you, Entennimines, for fattening women up so they heat my home!
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December 23rd, 2008 at 10:29 am
Electric!!!!!!!!! I use a heat pump system that heats and cools my home. Living near a nuke power plant and several hydroelectic dams on the Columbia River, power is relatively cheap compared to other parts of the country. We have considerably clean energy.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 10:37 am
Wood in a fireplace insert and a natural gas furnace backup. Why let the wood rot in the woods? Besides, he who cuts his own firewood, warms himself twice. The fireplace insert keeps the house at 70 degrees even when it is below zero outside.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 11:00 am
I COMPOST!
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Concerned Citizen reply on December 24, 2008 9:54 am:
Good for you, Composty!!! :)
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December 23rd, 2008 at 11:11 am
Electric forced air. It seems inefficient. We’re going to install digital thermometers this year to try to improve our efficiency. Our electricity in Washington mostly comes from hydro. Our electric bill is $120/month during winter, for a two bedroom condo! It seems like too much. At least PSE gives us the option of buying “green power” for our bill.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 11:12 am
So many people using the natural gas to heat their homes, but what about the smell? I do not suggest flatulence as a means of kindling one’s domicile, it is wholly unorthodox and highly improper. It is kind of like the old yentas who come to Temple only to sit there and gossip about who got their hair done by non-certified stylists and whose sons are dating shixsas. The hot air that comes from their mouths can heat the entire interior for days on end! They sound like the teenage soap dramas… who is sleeping with whom, which one hates whose brother. It’s enough to make me want to kvetch! These women should take after Hagar’s example from the Book of Genesis, not Sodom and Gomorrah’s example from the Book of Job!
I digress, however, as I often do. It is besides the point. We Horowitzes are ALWAYS warm in the winter because we have a loving family, well-lit Hanukkah candles, and a tube that connects to our neighbor’s house. It allows us to pilfer some of their heat without raising our own thermostat! Shvelta, my daughter, thought of the idea after watching one of those cartoon shows on the network television. Our little genius.
We have also used the same log to heat our cozy fireplace since 1993. You’d be surprised how long wood can burn if you only use it when necessary! We’ve saved a ton in heating costs and we get the delightful smell of burning wood coming from a hearth. It does not get better than that: real Heaven on Earth, I’d say.
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Mary G reply on December 24, 2008 9:57 am:
You connected a tube to your neighbor’s house? Isn’t that illegal? Shouldn’t this post act as a confession for law enforcement agencies? Do they know about this?
AND, technically, you’re still using the same amount of energy to heat your home - your neighbor is just paying for it. They must think they’re crazy with all their high bills! On the other hand, it sounds like a very inventive idea. Good on your daughter, Shvelta.
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arty reply on January 1, 2009 3:04 pm:
great ideas here. I will have to try that.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 12:52 pm
I heat with an electric heat pump, backed up by a 95% efficent natural gas forced air furnace. When I am at home, I use a cast iron wood-fired stove to prevent the thermostats from turning on the automatic heat. Most importantly, I have rebuilt my traditionally constructed home by doubling the exterior wall thickness, adding 9″ of fibreglas insulation and stone siding. The insulated metal roof helps and reflects summer heat. I find that zoned electric room heaters are cheaper to operate than a central electric furnace. Almost 40% of my living space is earth sheltered and I built a stone windbreak wall along the windward side of my house. All of the windows and doors are double and/or triple glazed with multiple layers of thermal window coverings. Our energy bills have even caused our local utility to check us for possible meter errors!
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December 23rd, 2008 at 1:22 pm
Coastal California Mountains/Silicon Valley
We heat with freestanding wood stove using wood we’ve scavenged from our yard and sawn & split into logs ourselves.
Also, the house has entire or partials glass walls to South and West so some passive solar heating occurs even in winter.
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LM reply on December 23, 2008 1:24 pm:
I should add: We insulated roof and underneath the house in 2007 and our wood consumption went down considerably.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 1:43 pm
Shlomo, Happy Hanukkah
In terms of our question of the week- I believe we use natural gas to heat the home–but on another issue–I used a “green technique” for the past few days. Given the artic temperatures in the Washington area, I’m cooling some of our refreshments naturally but just leaving them on the deck for a few hours. Can’t leave them out overnight–they would burst! Temperatures have fall to the teens for the past two nights.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 4:45 pm
How to heat our home? [Location: SE Wisconsin]
1) natural gas. we are close enough to a city & piped supply. A high efficicney furance - the kind with a small pipe on the side of the house. The gas burner requries electricity to operate, so power outages affect us, too.
2) We explored solar, and discovered we have too many trees for roof mounted panels.
3) We added even more insulation to the attic, to some very high R level.
4) Also had the air exchange rate checked, and got that down to an “approved” level.
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December 23rd, 2008 at 5:18 pm
Crazy industrial gas furnace estimated at 30 years old by our home inspector.
A ceramic plug-in dual duct floor heater. Here in Nebraska, we’ve been pointing it right at our knees while sitting on the couch watching TV this week.
A coil of caulking rope to chase evil drafts with.
Old attic insulation of a R level and substance yet untested.
I’m actually really stoked about the improvements that are possible with our little goldmine of a bungalow. Nowhere to go but upgrade, and our 08 bills will prove it once we install the heat pump with the tax incentive help of the Stimulus Package that reinstated heat pump tax rebates for ‘09 only (we currently have window units for air).
http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=products.pr_tax_credits#chart
Andrea
http://www.lincolngreenscene.com
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December 24th, 2008 at 10:44 am
I live in Florida where it gets “chilly” some times. On those occasions I simply bundle up or, preferably, find a warm body (female in my case) to snuggle with.
To my less fortunate Northern friends…consider the rock music group “Three Dog Night”. Their namesake is taken from an eskimo tradition of how to keep warm on cold nights.
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December 24th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
We use a natural gas furnace to heat the home during the day. At night, the thermostat is set to 60 for the house but or two toddlers’ room is supplemented with heat from an electrical radiator to keep it around 68-70.
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December 24th, 2008 at 7:05 pm
Mi fával fűtünk.
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December 27th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
I have natural gas heat and a propane fire place. Thank goodness in Georgia we don’t need a lot of either to heat. It’s the a/c that kills us.
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December 27th, 2008 at 9:12 pm
Wear more layers and lower your thermostat 2 degrees at least
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December 28th, 2008 at 11:27 am
With Natural gas, looking into geothermal
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December 28th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Our house in SoCal was built in 1939. I suppose the technology of the day limited the options available for installed heating systems. Thus, only a wood burning fire place is built-in, and we use it on most cold nights. The wood we use is either cut on our property, culled from the nearby National Forest (dead or downed trees only), or pilferred from any convenient source (construction sites, friends, etc.). We do use an electric space heater when wood is gone or we get too lazy to stoke up another fire. It’s real hell in this part of the country, being 565 feet above sea level and 20 miles from the Pacific Ocean, but we tough it out.
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December 29th, 2008 at 8:44 am
high efficiency natural gas
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December 29th, 2008 at 10:04 am
Our primary source of heat for the entire winter is wood that my family of six works together to harvest from our property, so we only pay for the chainsaw and logsplitter (and wood stove of course).
This only heats the first floor, however, so we use oil fired hot water-baseboard heat on the second floor where the thermostats are usually set around 58F. The house has 2,800 sq. ft. And the oil is used to heat domestic hot water too. Annual consumption of heating oil is 400 gallons. Consumption of wood is around 4 or 5 cords. We burn wood from November 1 through April 30th or thereabouts.
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arty reply on January 1, 2009 3:02 pm:
don’t forget the fuel for the TWO STROKE, NON CATALYTIC CONVERTER CHAIN SAW ENGINE.
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December 29th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Clean Burning Natural Gas with a high efficiency forced air furnace is the way to go right now - until truly efficient solar or wind is developed.
Electric options claim to be cleaner and more efficient - but what about all that pollution coming out of the stack at the power plants - as well as all the energy losses in the conversion of fuel to electric power and the losses in transmission of that power to the end user?
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January 4th, 2009 at 8:30 am
I use low watt electric panels from eheat.com. Usually used as a supplemental heater; but we have managed to convert a three family tenement built in 1884 to use these exclusively. Second and third floors took to them well. But because of major airflow issues, we had to do about $15K worth of insulating and wall thickening on the first floor. Former tenants used to burn $500+ monthy in gas to keep warm. Now we burn about $250 monthly of NStar’s over priced electric power. 18¢ per kwh. However, when the conversion is complete, the house is ready for a wind or solar solutions. Our local power plant burns USA coal. A better solution than sending $$ to the crazies.
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January 5th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Natural gas is our primary source of energy. I have a somewhat energy-efficient furnace, new in the last 7 years. Have replaced all windows in the home with double-pane, low-E glass windows. Our home has a pre-fab fireplace that is only used for aesthetic, seasonal purposes as it feels as if there is more cold air coming down the flue as opposed to the fire-heated, exhaust air going up.
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January 5th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
Mis resoluciones con respecto a lo que haré por el medio ambiente este año son las siguientes: todo debe empezar en nuestras casas porque es ahí donde más carbono se produce y donde más se desperdicia. He discutido el tema con mi esposo y mis hijos para que ellos participen dando ideas de cómo ahorrar agua, luz, gas, gasolina y cómo reutilizar cajas, bolsas, latas y botellas para reducir la cantidad de basura que sacamos cada día. Aprenderemos a tomar un baño rápido y olvidarnos de los baños de tina, jalar la cadena de escusado cuando sea realmente indinspensable, llevaremos bolsas reciclables al supermercado y hablaremos sobre nuestras resoluciones con nuestros amigos para tratar de convencerlos de que todos debemos participar.
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January 5th, 2009 at 10:05 pm
We use a geothermal heat pump for heating and air conditioning. Originally it was based on pumping well water, interfacing it with the electric heat pump and then re-injecting the well water in a second well. The upside of this is that electricity use was much lower than a standard heat pump interfacing with ambient air. The downside was that in a matter of months the few ppm of iron in the water plugged off the injection well and it just ran out into the woods. Another downside was that the well pump ran so much that we went through them pretty quickly.
After a time we recently spent $10K and changed to a circulating geothermal system. It appears to be as efficient energy-wise as the once-through (although it might be too early to tell for sure) and we are no longer wasting aquifer water. The fluid (water + antifreeze, I believe) now circulates through tubing laid in the ground — actually we make use of the former 450 ft injection well and had to drill a second well. So it goes from the heat pump, down and up the first well, down and up the second well and back to the heat pump. The fluid is contained in tubing throughout the circulation.
I highly recommend the circulating system. I warn you to check the iron levels of your water if you are considering the once-through system. There are lots of heating & cooling companies that install these systems, which are pretty straightforward. You probably need to have a property that’s at least a half acre or so (just guessing) if you use the circulating system.
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January 6th, 2009 at 8:38 am
Our main system is an new “efficient” forced air / fuel oil and we have been frustrating the oil supplier by use of digital thermostats, extensive use of wood (fireplace with wood stove insert - paid for itself the first year) and occasional spot use of electric heaters (in the early AM, why warm up anything but the bathrooms before leaving for work?).
During the cold 2008 Dec in northern NJ we used < 40 gallons of fuel oil!
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January 8th, 2009 at 11:16 am
Many people in my community use wood to supplement their home heating needs, as do I. Traditionally, dead wood is used since the green trees provide foor so, we do not kill our food source. Rather we cultivate the pinyon trees. However, our research has found that we must pay attention to lifestyle and diet in assessing exposure to radiation. Testing of weapons of mass destruction by the US spread radiation across the Great Basin killing native grass, trees, animals and ultimately native people. We gather dead wood that is potentially still hot! We use the wood in our homes, ceremonies, sweats, camp fires. We have to do more to understand the problems and we need help! Failure by those institutions we trust to keep us safe to consider the unique lifestyle differences of Native Americans resulted in a disproportionate burden of risk that continues today. See Risk Analysis 20(1),101-111 (2000) The Assessment of Radiation Exposure in Native American Communities from Nuclear Weapons Testing in Nevada.
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January 15th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
93+% Efficient Forced Air Natural Gas Heater for a 2000 square foot house.
Energy Saving Tip: At night we turn the thermostat down to 58. The house never gets below 59 so the heater does not come on during the night. This has been a real cost saver for us.
During the day it’s set at 68 and 2 hours in the morning and night at 70.
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January 21st, 2009 at 12:26 am
Can any one tell me what gasses are exhuasted from wood pellet stoves. besides co2. also what chemicals are in the ash suchas sodium,nitrogen. I would like to know. Please
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January 21st, 2009 at 10:44 am
You can find basic information about wood stoves on EPA’s Web site at http://www.epa.gov/woodstoves/basic.html If you can’t find the specific information, use the “Contact Us” link at the top of the page to submit a question or contact the person listed.
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January 22nd, 2009 at 3:48 am
It is good practice to have CO2 detectors installed in the same room or lower rooms due to the chance of carbon dioxide poisoning. Next when cleaning the ash been. It is good practice to use a dust mask to prevent respiratory problems later in life. Even though they are cleaner, they are still dirty you never know just were the wood came from. Ain’t that right Ian. Sorry, but I could not control the government and did not know of this doings. Maybe with the new transparency laws in effect it will help prevent such things from happening EVER AGAIN. Kids you just can not leave them alone for a minute. I hate distruction and waist.
I am hooking up a suction system to the ash clean out of my pellet stove to feed a Algae bioreactor for clean fuel and to scrub the CO2 before it is returned to the atmosphere. I learned of even more since then. Thank you
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January 22nd, 2009 at 4:00 am
Ian just to say I have been disabled because of the effects of what we do to our planet. But let me say .
The world to day just needs to clean up its act. What I mean is there are better ways to a cleaner environment. With existing technology until a new one is set in place. To my knowledge this planet is getting too small for what we are doing on it. Just to say it does not bother me if some body is smoking out side but when you confine them to one room and you go to enter it you become overwhelmed. But the people inside the room have no idea as to what you are talking about. It is to my believe that the planet is getting too small for what we do on it.
This is the best site for the right answers so far. Thank you and keep up the good work. It is desperately needed our existence depends on it. It was the ruination of many nations and empires such as Easter Island , Sodom and Gomorrah , Egypt , Rome and so on. We must increase our knowledge or suffer the consequences. It is the reason that religion and the Bible were developed. A better life style for were everything else just seemed to fail. Keep records and write them in stone so others maybe able to over come the trials of life’s tribulations.
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January 26th, 2009 at 5:09 am
good work
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February 2nd, 2009 at 10:51 am
Unlike oil, gas and coal, wood is a renewable resource, and as long as forests are properly replenished, we can heat homes with wood without depleting the earth’s natural resources. Wood is also a more economical means to home heating than relying solely on an oil or gas furnace. Gathering wood is a healthy activity, adding a level of exercise to the day. And of course, huddling in front of a smoldering fire after coming in from the cold is one of life’s small pleasures. Burning wood is allot of work and can be a little dirty but there is a major gratification to seeing that low heating bill and knowing that your house is as warm as you want it with out turning up that thermostat. I recently took the grate out of my fireplace and replaced it with a grate heater and now I’m heating my whole house with my fireplace. A fireplace is about 5% heat efficient and this they claim makes it a 120,000 BTU per hour furnace and I believe it you can’t make too big of a fire or you will run you’re self out. I bought the grate heater on ebay it was called insertafurnace it was the only one with a screen.
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