How do you heat your house?

seanR

seanR

Want to puff on my pipe?
NAXJA Member
Location
29°58'28.9"N 99°15'15.5"W
My gas bill came today.
We have been on the 'budget plan' since 2003.
Every month last year we paid $52.00 / month.
This bill?
$123.00 is my new budgeted amount.
Piss on that!

What do some of you use to heat your houses?
I am looking for alternatives......
 
I know a few people that use heat pumps, but they're not terribly efficient once it gets real cold.

radiant floor heating has always intrigued me as an effiecient way to heat things. I especially like that you can configure "zones" with that.
 
Forced air gas. My budget bill started out at $93 three year ago, went to $123 a year and a half ago, and is now at $145. Not much I can do since I rent, the landlord's home owner insurance won't let us have a wood stove.
 
I am on LP and it has killed us this winter. Our cheapest month has been $300. Our worst has been $800. Damn cathedral and 12' vaulted ceilings!!!!!!! There is no budget plan for that :(
We heat approx 1900 SF, two story, attached garage.
 
Oil... But I would love to switch over to a central forced air pellet/corn furnace.

Dang Woody! I won't complain about our fuel costs then! Our most expensive was just shy of $500, and that was cecause of a mis-adjusted burner!
 
Wearing coats and using heavier blankets at night. Never tried it in REALLY cold, but it works down to the mid 30's at night. :D
 
Heat Pump which really sucks unless you install an inline humidifier. I did that 2 years ago and it made all the difference in the world,... no more bloody noses, dry skin and static electricity. This year I installed a programmable thermostat which I'm hoping will save some energy by automatically doing what I always forget to do which is a) turn the heat down at night and b) turn the heat down while I'm at work.

I heat a largish 3 story townhouse and hit almost $200 on the highest bill this past winter. Alot of people including myself do not like the fact that the air coming out of the vents is significantly lower in temperature than gas or oil heat but as stated above, the humidifier made a huge difference in terms of overall personal comfort,... and this is coming from the perspective of someone who has a low tolerance for the cold.
 
Why the hell would I want to make the house hotter?

You're an odd one Sean.
 
We have a natural gas boiler and hydronic baseboard heat. We heat a 4200 sq. ft. house here in Colorado for around $500 a month in the really cold months.
 
I heat with forced air electric. In my opinion it is the only way to go aside from a more natural source (wood, coal, corn, free gas). It is 100% efficient, and cheaper than any other source at this time (aside from the listed above). My electric bill for my 900sf apartment didn't go over $135 all winter. My father used to heat with wood when we was growing up, but said between the hassle of it and the trasportation costs it actually became cheaper to use the electric base boards once the price of a cord of wood started to rise )IIRC it's around $70 for a p.u. load now around those parts and he averaged that a month). He is now using corn, and he says he is heating his approx 1600 sf house for about $10/15 a month, but he is growing his own corn.
 
We have electric baseboard heat, came with the house. The house faces somewhat southeast and we have about 300 sqft of glass in that front wall plus two skylights, the sun heats it pretty good even in winter to where we have to reverse the ceiling fan to get the heat down from the catherdrel ceiling [that took me 3 days to paint last year]. We supplement with a 30,000 btu kero heater in the cellar, burn approx 1 gallon a nite and it keeps the house pretty comfortable as long as you are wearing long pants and long sleeve shirts. Good drapes over that front glass section made a really big difference, we leave them open during the day and close them around 4pm [whoever gets home first]. Our whole house is electric so we get a good discount.
We also have a heatolater fireplace with vents but the only time we use it is during a power failure of long duration of say 2 days or more, rare. I built an insulated whiteboard insert for that that the kids used to draw on with dry erase markers when they were little, now we leave notes on it.
I also replaced all the original builders windows with good quality andersons low E windows, that cut our electric bill by 66%.
 
If I was to do it again I would do a geothermal heat pump. Geothermal heat pumps use about 40-60 percent less energy than a standard heat pump. They cost alittle more to set up, but it will pay off in 3-7yrs or so. My parents have had it in there 2 story house in So. Dak. for the past 25 years. Very cheap heating and cooling bill.
I have a standard heat pump, my highest bill this winter was $100. February was a little cold this year.

91woody-WOW $800 Do you have any window in your house? If I had a heating bill that high I would be moving.ASAP
 
Last edited:
Oil fired hydronic baseboard heat, this year my oil costs were about $1000.00 (have 550 gallon capacity, usually one big fillup and one or two top offs a year.) We also dont keep the house super warm. We dont like it all that warm, so with a progammable thermostat, we keep the house at 60 when we are away, run it up to 65-68 in the am and at night - seems to work out ok.
 
We have 2 heat sources, heat pumps and gas hot water base board. We use which ever energy souce is cheaper each year.

Our system is dual source and dual zoned in the house. We just put in 2 new high efficiency heat pumps and exchangers as well as energy efficient replacement windows, doors and lights.

Saving a little bit more but not a lot yet.
 
Rev Den said:
Update your furnace if its more than 10 years old.

Seal up them windows.

Insulate.

BIG difference.....trust me.

Rev
Click to expand...


Or buy a bunker with 13" thick concrete walls...

:D
 
Ive got three sources of heat that I use for different reasons.
Ive got an electric heat pump that I use for heat in the fall and spring when the temps are moderate (around 40-50). Heat pumps are very inefficient when the temp gets down below that. The heat pump also doubles as A/C in the summer.
When the temps get lower, I use electric baseboard. I like electric baseboard because its the least expensive to install and maintain. A few hundred bucks gets it installed and maintenance is basically $0 from then on.
Ive got a wood stove that I burn when it gets down right fridgid or when the power goes out.
This system has worked out well for us. When I build another home, I'll use the same system.
 
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