Thoughts on different heat types for houses (gas, propane, electric, oil)

[DriftwoodSVT]

I'd say heat pumps or natural gas. I live out in the country and we are on Propane heat. Propane costs fluctuate depending on demand. Last winter I was paying $4/gallon, this year it was $2/gallon. Big difference when filling up a 500 gallon tank. Propane isn't terribly efficient either.

 

[Thump_rrr]

I'd say heat pumps or natural gas. I live out in the country and we are on Propane heat. Propane costs fluctuate depending on demand. Last winter I was paying $4/gallon, this year it was $2/gallon. Big difference when filling up a 500 gallon tank. Propane isn't terribly efficient either.

That's not the least bit true.
You can get furnaces up to 97.5% efficiency if you have the budget.
I'm not a proponent for ultra high efficiency heat pumps because the return on your investment isn't there but the opposite holds true for furnaces.

I would do ultra high efficiency propane furncace with fully modulating burner with 16 SEER heat pump.
The beauty of propane heat is that with a small 2000w generator you can run the heat in your entire home if the power goes out.

 

[03cobra#694]

Not many options here, so we all have just electric. Thankfully it's not needed much as it costs a small fortune to operate.

 

[Intervention302]

That's not the least bit true.
You can get furnaces up to 97.5% efficiency if you have the budget.
I'm not a proponent for ultra high efficiency heat pumps because the return on your investment isn't there but the opposite holds true for furnaces.

I would do ultra high efficiency propane furncace with fully modulating burner with 16 SEER heat pump.
The beauty of propane heat is that with a small 2000w generator you can run the heat in your entire home if the power goes out.

Not many options here, so we all have just electric. Thankfully it's not needed much as it costs a small fortune to operate.

Found out that gas isn't an option at this address

So it would be propane or oil. Or keep the electric.

I'll find out what they've been paying in electricity for the past 12 months

 

[smitty2919]

Would that be an efficient method to buy the house and convert it??? I have no clue how much it would cost to plumb and convert a house to a different heating method. I went thought this not too long ago, got our first house last Dec 19th. My wife was ONLY looking for gas houses. If it was electric, no matter how good it was, it was a no-go.

We have lived in 3 different apartments and all were electric...she hated it. I didn't see many bills, I just made sure there was money in the bank to pay them lol.

Our house is gas, had the sellers put in new HVAC system (since the units were original to the house...built in '93). We also put some cash into having them install a humidifier at the same time and on a 3 bedroom 2 story house we keep the heat at 68 max and are comfortable. And yet our stove is electric...but it would be her "want" to have it converted to gas as well.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but going propane requires one of those tanks be installed in your yard correct? Thinking about this, it is nice not to have to worry about scheduling a oil/propane refill.

 

[Intervention302]

Agent said the sellers use mostly their wood burning stove in the winter months to keep the electric bill low


Hmmm, maybe keep doing that and add a heat pump for the other months

Somebody school me on heat pumps

 

[YJSONLY]

Would that be an efficient method to buy the house and convert it??? I have no clue how much it would cost to plumb and convert a house to a different heating method. I went thought this not too long ago, got our first house last Dec 19th. My wife was ONLY looking for gas houses. If it was electric, no matter how good it was, it was a no-go.

We have lived in 3 different apartments and all were electric...she hated it. I didn't see many bills, I just made sure there was money in the bank to pay them lol.

Our house is gas, had the sellers put in new HVAC system (since the units were original to the house...built in '93). We also put some cash into having them install a humidifier at the same time and on a 3 bedroom 2 story house we keep the heat at 68 max and are comfortable. And yet our stove is electric...but it would be her "want" to have it converted to gas as well.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but going propane requires one of those tanks be installed in your yard correct? Thinking about this, it is nice not to have to worry about scheduling a oil/propane refill.

I am a propane guy.
Most cases gas lines can be ran in home that is already built. Biggest thing is "can" it be done. And at what cost. Every house is different.
But yes if natural gas is not available propane is your only choice. And yes you will have to have tank in yard or underground.

 

[GT Premi]

Do not use Wi-Fi for something as essential as a thermostat changeover in northern climates.
Two of my clients nearly froze their homes while on vacation due to Wi-Fi and router issues.
Wi-Fi communication to check in is OK but not relying on it for changeover.

I see you later mentioned they have a Nest thermostat. I was gonna say we have two Honeywell wifi thermostats running our systems and LOVE them. Wifi thermostats are great so long as they're programmable. That way you don't run into problems like your customer did.

are there different types of heat pumps? our last house here in vegas had heat pumps and could not keep the house warm when outside temps dropped below 40deg. they would run constantly and with the thermostat set to 75deg the house never got over 68deg. HVAC guys told heat pumps don't work below 40deg. seems like if you lived in a cold climate heat pumps would not be useful.
...

Same thing for us. We had a LOT of sub-30* nights (quite a few in the single digits) this winter and the heat pumps couldn't keep up. They ran constantly, including the auxiliary heat strips. That is NOT a good thing. Our electric bill has been averaging $450/mo!!! Our last house had a gas furnace and could easily keep up with whatever low temperature was thrown at it. Heat pumps suck! If you live anywhere above NC, I recommend avoiding a heat pump like the plague. We've had ours checked twice with two different diagnoses. The first guy said they were fine. The second guy said they're on the way out. We're having a third service appointment from a different company for parity and will take further action based on what he says.

Thank goodness we have a couple of gas fireplaces. We had to use those to supplement the heat pumps, and they're WAY more efficient. They're the non-vented type which are something like 99% efficient. Doesn't take long at all (less than an hour) to get the inside temp well above what the thermostats are set for.

...
Somebody school me on heat pumps

See my comment above. Stay away from heat pumps in areas prone to really cold temps for sustained periods.

 

[Thump_rrr]

I see you later mentioned they have a Nest thermostat. I was gonna say we have two Honeywell wifi thermostats running our systems and LOVE them. Wifi thermostats are great so long as they're programmable. That way you don't run into problems like your customer did.



Same thing for us. We had a LOT of sub-30* nights (quite a few in the single digits) this winter and the heat pumps couldn't keep up. They ran constantly, including the auxiliary heat strips. That is NOT a good thing. Our electric bill has been averaging $450/mo!!! Our last house had a gas furnace and could easily keep up with whatever low temperature was thrown at it. Heat pumps suck! If you live anywhere above NC, I recommend avoiding a heat pump like the plague. We've had ours checked twice with two different diagnoses. The first guy said they were fine. The second guy said they're on the way out. We're having a third service appointment from a different company for parity and will take further action based on what he says.

Thank goodness we have a couple of gas fireplaces. We had to use those to supplement the heat pumps, and they're WAY more efficient. They're the non-vented type which are something like 99% efficient. Doesn't take long at all (less than an hour) to get the inside temp well above what the thermostats are set for.



See my comment above. Stay away from heat pumps in areas prone to really cold temps for sustained periods.

Improper controls on heatpumps are the major cause of high energy bills.
I am an HVAC contractor and have no problems selling heat pumps combined with either electric or gas backup and the design temperature in Montreal is -7F.
For somebody to tell me that they live in North Carolina and tell me that heat pumps are no good I will tell you know that their contractor or service technician is no good.

If you want to either post or PM me the model number of your equipment including thermostats I will try to help you figure out your problem.
A properly sized and installed heat pump that was installed in the year 2000 should be able to keep up down to around 20F.

If you want to know more about heat pumps and control of said heat pumps just ask away or PM me.

The bottom line is that the efficiency of an air source heat pump is 3:1 compared to electric heat.
The efficiency of a ground source heat pump is 5:1 but the cost is exponentially higher.

This means that for every dollar you will spend in electric heat it will cost you $0.33 or $0.20 respectively during the periods that a heat pump is operational.

Be cautious of some contractors since they may give their guys a commission on sales of new installations.

The general rule is that if a system can cool the house in the summer the heat pump should work well enough to give heat in the winter with only a tune-up and cleaning assuming proper controls are in place.

You can read my comments on another thread also.
http://www.svtperformance.com/forums/showthread.php?1063871-New-HVAC-system&highlight=

 

[Intervention302]

Looking at a new house now. 20k more, location isnt "as" nice. Only 1 stall vs 2

However, brand new and beautiful inside and out. Natural gas and only 5 mins to my work as opposed to 20

As well as its a colonial not as opposed to a split

 

[Gravik]

My parents house uses propane. In the ~10 years they've been at that location, they haven't had any complaints.

 

[GT Premi]

Improper controls on heatpumps are the major cause of high energy bills.
I am an HVAC contractor and have no problems selling heat pumps combined with either electric or gas backup and the design temperature in Montreal is -7F.
For somebody to tell me that they live in North Carolina and tell me that heat pumps are no good I will tell you know that their contractor or service technician is no good.

If you want to either post or PM me the model number of your equipment including thermostats I will try to help you figure out your problem.
A properly sized and installed heat pump that was installed in the year 2000 should be able to keep up down to around 20F.

If you want to know more about heat pumps and control of said heat pumps just ask away or PM me.

The bottom line is that the efficiency of an air source heat pump is 3:1 compared to electric heat.
The efficiency of a ground source heat pump is 5:1 but the cost is exponentially higher.

This means that for every dollar you will spend in electric heat it will cost you $0.33 or $0.20 respectively during the periods that a heat pump is operational.

Be cautious of some contractors since they may give their guys a commission on sales of new installations.

The general rule is that if a system can cool the house in the summer the heat pump should work well enough to give heat in the winter with only a tune-up and cleaning assuming proper controls are in place.

You can read my comments on another thread also.
http://www.svtperformance.com/forums/showthread.php?1063871-New-HVAC-system&highlight=

I've been meaning to get back to this thread and give an update. We had a third company come out and check the units. (York heat pumps, btw. I don't know the models. House was built in 2007.) This company seemed to do a more thorough job. They didn't detect any leaks, but said the units were low on refrigerant. One was bone dry and the other only had 1 pound in it. They both are supposed to have 8 or 9 pounds in them. The service guys topped them off at a hefty price. Haven't had a problem out of them since.

The heat seemed to work much better in the few times it kicked on since the last service. The A/C seems to be working excellently. We've had a few days eclipse the 90* mark and the units haven't had a problem keeping up. (God bless all brick construction!) The service guy told me that if it goes out again, we can get the cores (and probably the entire systems) replaced under the home warranty since it would be multiple calls for the same thing. We'll have to wait until the Fall to see how the heat holds up, if the units don't go dry again before then.

 

[YJSONLY]

R22 is very very costly!

 

[Thump_rrr]

I've been meaning to get back to this thread and give an update. We had a third company come out and check the units. (York heat pumps, btw. I don't know the models. House was built in 2007.) This company seemed to do a more thorough job. They didn't detect any leaks, but said the units were low on refrigerant. One was bone dry and the other only had 1 pound in it. They both are supposed to have 8 or 9 pounds in them. The service guys topped them off at a hefty price. Haven't had a problem out of them since.

The heat seemed to work much better in the few times it kicked on since the last service. The A/C seems to be working excellently. We've had a few days eclipse the 90* mark and the units haven't had a problem keeping up. (God bless all brick construction!) The service guy told me that if it goes out again, we can get the cores (and probably the entire systems) replaced under the home warranty since it would be multiple calls for the same thing. We'll have to wait until the Fall to see how the heat holds up, if the units don't go dry again before then.

Do yourself a favor next time and hire another company with a better technician.
The technician should have pressurized the system with dry nitrogen up to 300psi and found the leak before charging the system.
Electronic leak detection equipment can detect leaks down to 1oz per year so not finding the leak means you will eventually be paying again for someone to come out to do the job properly.

What you will tell the next contractor is that you want someone who uses modern equipment such as digital refrigeration gauges and an electronic leak detector.
You will make it clear to them that no refrigerant will go in the system till they can maintain a static pressure for 30 minutes.
So they will put 100psi of nitrogen in the system and let it balance for a few minutes.
Once the pressure balances it should no longer go down.
If you are losing even 1 psi every few minutes it is obvious that there is a leak somewhere.
http://www.epa.gov/greenchill/downloads/RealZeroGuidetoGoodLeakTesting.pdf

 

[SID297]

Do yourself a favor next time and hire another company with a better technician.
The technician should have pressurized the system with dry nitrogen up to 300psi and found the leak before charging the system.
Electronic leak detection equipment can detect leaks down to 1oz per year so not finding the leak means you will eventually be paying again for someone to come out to do the job properly.

What you will tell the next contractor is that you want someone who uses modern equipment such as digital refrigeration gauges and an electronic leak detector.
You will make it clear to them that no refrigerant will go in the system till they can maintain a static pressure for 30 minutes.
So they will put 100psi of nitrogen in the system and let it balance for a few minutes.
Once the pressure balances it should no longer go down.
If you are losing even 1 psi every few minutes it is obvious that there is a leak somewhere.
http://www.epa.gov/greenchill/downloads/RealZeroGuidetoGoodLeakTesting.pdf

I was lucky to find a very good contractor in my area that installed a dry R22 heat pump (air handler was fine) and new zone controller for me a few months back. It replaced a late 90's model and I can already tell a big difference on the power bill. These guys had modern equipment, were very clean, and answered every question I came up with.


On another note, propane has dropped in price a lot. I just filled 2 20 pounds tanks for $14 each. Got it at the same place I buy EtOH free 93 and red diesel.

 

[GT Premi]

Do yourself a favor next time and hire another company with a better technician.
The technician should have pressurized the system with dry nitrogen up to 300psi and found the leak before charging the system.
Electronic leak detection equipment can detect leaks down to 1oz per year so not finding the leak means you will eventually be paying again for someone to come out to do the job properly.

What you will tell the next contractor is that you want someone who uses modern equipment such as digital refrigeration gauges and an electronic leak detector.
You will make it clear to them that no refrigerant will go in the system till they can maintain a static pressure for 30 minutes.
So they will put 100psi of nitrogen in the system and let it balance for a few minutes.
Once the pressure balances it should no longer go down.
If you are losing even 1 psi every few minutes it is obvious that there is a leak somewhere.
http://www.epa.gov/greenchill/downloads/RealZeroGuidetoGoodLeakTesting.pdf

I don't know what method or equipment they used. I believe one of the guys used some kind of sniffer around the air handler. One of the other crew members mentioned something about having to pressurize the system before being able to check for a leak. I assumed that meant charging it with refrigerant. Maybe they did do the nitrogen test. It did seem to take them a really long time to do the leak test. I might have to call them to get more details on how they ran the test and what they used.

edit:
Nevermind about the bill. After doing some research, that was all on me for missing the last one while we were on vacation. I'm meticulous about paying the bills. Kicking myself for missing that one! So yeah, the power bill is on the decline.

 

[YJSONLY]

I was lucky to find a very good contractor in my area that installed a dry R22 heat pump (air handler was fine) and new zone controller for me a few months back. It replaced a late 90's model and I can already tell a big difference on the power bill. These guys had modern equipment, were very clean, and answered every question I came up with.


On another note, propane has dropped in price a lot. I just filled 2 20 pounds tanks for $14 each. Got it at the same place I buy EtOH free 93 and red diesel.

Propane is cheap right now. I suggest anyone that has a big propane tank to fill it now! Inventory is high demand is low.

 

[03'Darin]

Just ran across this thread and interestingly enough I'm headed home early to help my buddy who's an HVAC tech and business owner do some "pimping out" of my system.

I've lived in houses with electric baseboard, oil with forced hot air, heat pump with oil backup, oil furnace with hot water baseboard and now geothermal with propane how water backup. Other than when the price of heating oil sky rocketed the electric baseboard is the most expensive heat I've used. Electric baseboard is CHEAP and easy to install, that's why builders used to do it but it's incredibly expensive to run.

I've also had wood stoves in two homes and put everything in my new home to install one, but haven't yet. Wood stoves are great because of the heat they produce but have many draw backs such as ability to circulate the hot air through the house, dirt and dust, time needed to cut, split and stack the wood, cost of the wood if you don't have the property, chain saw expense and upkeep and so on.. Don't get me wrong I love to cut and split wood but it's extremely time consuming. Wood pellets don't have as many draw backs as firewood but are more expensive.

Believe me the people were probably mostly using wood because they couldn't afford to go full electric, especially last winter.

I moved in my new home February a year ago. It's brand new so it's insulated well, caulked, has good windows and good doors throughout. So the house itself requires much less effort to heat and cool. So keep the age and construction of the home in consideration. Last winter was an EXTREMELY cold winter for our area. But due to some issues I was having with my hot water heater I never had the backup heat hooked up and the temps in the house never went below the t-stat setting. So as mentioned above design and setup of the system has a huge effect on operating effectively and efficiently.

It's MUCH easier if you can find a home that fits your budget, needs and doesn't need immediate upgrades. With that being said you can always modify an existing home if you want to take the time, money and effort to do it.

If you do consider buying a house that you'll be changing the heating system look into the tax refunds available for installing certain efficiency units. I received a huge rebate (30% of the entire system cost) for my geothermal plus a small rebate for doing my demand hot water heater (which is a dual stage unit for domestic hot water and backup for the geo).

 

[YJSONLY]

Just ran across this thread and interestingly enough I'm headed home early to help my buddy who's an HVAC tech and business owner do some "pimping out" of my system.

I've lived in houses with electric baseboard, oil with forced hot air, heat pump with oil backup, oil furnace with hot water baseboard and now geothermal with propane how water backup. Other than when the price of heating oil sky rocketed the electric baseboard is the most expensive heat I've used. Electric baseboard is CHEAP and easy to install, that's why builders used to do it but it's incredibly expensive to run.

I've also had wood stoves in two homes and put everything in my new home to install one, but haven't yet. Wood stoves are great because of the heat they produce but have many draw backs such as ability to circulate the hot air through the house, dirt and dust, time needed to cut, split and stack the wood, cost of the wood if you don't have the property, chain saw expense and upkeep and so on.. Don't get me wrong I love to cut and split wood but it's extremely time consuming. Wood pellets don't have as many draw backs as firewood but are more expensive.

Believe me the people were probably mostly using wood because they couldn't afford to go full electric, especially last winter.

I moved in my new home February a year ago. It's brand new so it's insulated well, caulked, has good windows and good doors throughout. So the house itself requires much less effort to heat and cool. So keep the age and construction of the home in consideration. Last winter was an EXTREMELY cold winter for our area. But due to some issues I was having with my hot water heater I never had the backup heat hooked up and the temps in the house never went below the t-stat setting. So as mentioned above design and setup of the system has a huge effect on operating effectively and efficiently.

It's MUCH easier if you can find a home that fits your budget, needs and doesn't need immediate upgrades. With that being said you can always modify an existing home if you want to take the time, money and effort to do it.

If you do consider buying a house that you'll be changing the heating system look into the tax refunds available for installing certain efficiency units. I received a huge rebate (30% of the entire system cost) for my geothermal plus a small rebate for doing my demand hot water heater (which is a dual stage unit for domestic hot water and backup for the geo).

What on demand water heater (combo boiler ) you put in?

 

[Mr. Mach-ete]

I'd install a natural gas forced hot air modulating 98% furnace with a inverted compressor solar tie-in heat pump. If you have a roof that gets good sun, install 8-10 solar panels with micro inverters and tie them into the outdoor unit. We've done multiple system installs with this set up, customer's energy bills are almost nonexistent. Check out Lennox XP25 solar ready equipment. It's the only heat pump that qualifies for a Federal tax credit and can be tied directly into a solar array. Mind you, it is solar assisted, not solar reliant.