Heating Cost per Hour of Five Fuels

[Wood Doctor]

...including firewood. I used no efficiency variables, just plain heat content. I thought you might like to see your heating costs based upon various fuel prices and usage rates. For firewood, ash is very close to the heat content that I used. The average wood stove can comfortably deliver 50,000 BTU/hr. I have never seen a table showing heating costs per hour of alternative fuels, so this is probably published nowhere else.

Please comment and discuss. I welcome suggestions for improving the table, and ways that it can be used, recognizing that some of you pay prices outside the ranges shown. Thanks for looking and perhaps this will be helpful.

 

[coostv]

It came fairly close to the cost of my wood compared to what I would have been paying for propane.

I averaged roughly 1000 gallons per heating season. My last cost per gallon earlier this month was 2.74. This would be costing me around $2740 + to heat just my home. I now heat the house and the garage for $560 (7 cord) about 1/5 the cost of propane and I now heat my shop! I built the shop and installed the OWB at the same time, so I have no idea what I would be using to heat the house alone. I would venture a guess it is split 5 cord house, 2 cord shop. If that is correct, this would equate to roughly 1/7 (2740/400=6.85) the cost of propane (rounding up). Using your chart this puts me at: 70,000 BTU propane @2.29ish versus .33 for wood or 1/7 (2.29/.33=6.93) the cost (again, rounding up).

Of course there is some guess work involved in my example, but I think I am close.

Chris

 

[Rookie1]

Very cool list . Thanks for posting.

 

[ray benson]

I have seen charts that give the btu content of the different fuels. But none in your format. Nice comparison. Checked our utility bill and electric was .12/kwh and natural gas was $2.30/therm or $23/mcf. The gas cost has risen about 50% since april 08.

 

[Wife'nHubby]

Ugh! Sounds like we need an insert in our fireplace to avoid those $2,400/yr. oil heat bills! Thanks for the chart!

Shari

 

[ktm rider]

The chart doesn't list coal. I have multi fue boiler and burn 90% coal and 10% wood. I live in a 3,500 sq. ft log home right smack dab on top of a very cold, snowy and windy mountain on the Md. Wv border. If I had to heat this place with propane or oil i would be broke for sure.

I burned right about 7 ton of coal all last winter with cost me just about $400. I get really long burn times and believe it or not it is a bit easier burning coal than wood. once you get the fire going good of course. Just shovel it in and close the door.
The boiler is in my garage and the coal bin is right beside the boiler....

I used to have a OWB ( wood only ) and it worked me to death. I would burn around 15 cord a year. that darn thing wore me out and the wife HATED going outside in the cold blowing snow/wind and tending the fire when i was at work. The coal boiler is WAY easier and WAY more efficient..

 

[Wood Doctor]

The chart doesn't list coal. I have multi fue boiler and burn 90% coal and 10% wood. I live in a 3,500 sq. ft log home right smack dab on top of a very cold, snowy and windy mountain on the Md. Wv border. If I had to heat this place with propane or oil i would be broke for sure.

I burned right about 7 ton of coal all last winter with cost me just about $400. I get really long burn times and believe it or not it is a bit easier burning coal than wood. once you get the fire going good of course. Just shovel it in and close the door.
The boiler is in my garage and the coal bin is right beside the boiler....

I used to have a OWB ( wood only ) and it worked me to death. I would burn around 15 cord a year. that darn thing wore me out and the wife HATED going outside in the cold blowing snow/wind and tending the fire when i was at work. The coal boiler is WAY easier and WAY more efficient..

I'll try to get some coal prices and data and add that to the list. Mom and Dad heated with coal back in the early '50s. It worked.

I imagine coal will be close to wood or less, but that's a WAG. My wood stove can easily be converted to coal but nobody around here delivers it that I am aware of.

 

[wdchuck]

I'm sorry Wood Doctor, but that chart only enable CAD even more, you are a terrible enabler and should be buried in split, seasoned, stacked locust.

That chart shows a justification for an AMS-25 with extended tongue and plenty of coin left over for excellent snobby beer.

 

[windthrown]

It would be nice if we could get coal out here, never mind a coal burning furnace. OWBs do burn up a lot of wood, and we burned 10 cords last year in the Ex's OWB. I have since moved out, and the Ex is getting a taste of what I did the last few years living there; cutting, stacking and tossing wood into the OWB all heating season long. But her firewood is free, so the cost is low. I also designed the OWB there so that there is an overhang walk behind the carport to the boiler that is sheltered from the wind and snow and rain most of the time. There is also enough space in the carport and under the eves to store 3 dry cords of wood. So we would rotate wood in from under the tarps into the dry area carport racks as we burned through it. Yah, you have to go out there two times a day and feed the wood boiler. But then it was nice and warm inside, 70+ degrees. She saved $300 a month the first year, and this year will be about $400 a month saved in electric heating bills.

The chart doesn't list coal. I have multi fue boiler and burn 90% coal and 10% wood. I live in a 3,500 sq. ft log home right smack dab on top of a very cold, snowy and windy mountain on the Md. Wv border. If I had to heat this place with propane or oil i would be broke for sure.

I burned right about 7 ton of coal all last winter with cost me just about $400. I get really long burn times and believe it or not it is a bit easier burning coal than wood. once you get the fire going good of course. Just shovel it in and close the door.
The boiler is in my garage and the coal bin is right beside the boiler....

I used to have a OWB ( wood only ) and it worked me to death. I would burn around 15 cord a year. that darn thing wore me out and the wife HATED going outside in the cold blowing snow/wind and tending the fire when i was at work. The coal boiler is WAY easier and WAY more efficient..

 

[WidowMaker]

Here's a link to an on-line calulator that allows you to enter your own variable.


oops forgot the link, try this

http://www.**********/econtent/index.php/articles/fuel_cost_comparison_calculator/

 

[windthrown]

Very cool link there. Coal is by far the cheapest. Hardwood is better than softwood, even with the price differential ($240 a cord vs $200 a cord) here. I used 40% efficiency for wood heat, which is about what I measured in the OWB (directly compared to electricity used the previous year).

If the wood is free the rate goes to zero though.

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Is this chart just besed on the cost of the fuel alone, efficiency of the appliance/furnace/boiler as well?

of course it really doesn't matter!...having the OWB just made the wife feel better turning the fuel oil delivery driver away on Tuesday!

 

[habanero]

It's a very nice chart and calculation, but if you don't include efficiency it's not really of much use. It's a pretty simple correction to make. I think the best wood stoves are no more than 80% and I would say most older stoves (still EPA-certified, though) are in the 70% range. Older natural gas/propane furnaces are in the 80% range, while the highest efficiency modern gas furnaces (PVC-vented) are in the 90-95% range. So just as an average you could put wood heat at ~75% and gas furnaces at 85%. Of course OWB's are a whole other story so that would have to be calculated separately.

 

[Zodiac45]

The chart doesn't list coal. I have multi fue boiler and burn 90% coal and 10% wood. I live in a 3,500 sq. ft log home right smack dab on top of a very cold, snowy and windy mountain on the Md. Wv border. If I had to heat this place with propane or oil i would be broke for sure.

I burned right about 7 ton of coal all last winter with cost me just about $400. I get really long burn times and believe it or not it is a bit easier burning coal than wood. once you get the fire going good of course. Just shovel it in and close the door.
The boiler is in my garage and the coal bin is right beside the boiler....

I used to have a OWB ( wood only ) and it worked me to death. I would burn around 15 cord a year. that darn thing wore me out and the wife HATED going outside in the cold blowing snow/wind and tending the fire when i was at work. The coal boiler is WAY easier and WAY more efficient..

I would imagine that coal is pretty easy for you get in your location KTM. We used to get it up here via railway but that's a done deal now. There's a guy intown selling coal stoves though who has this "low dust" coal in 50lb bags. Got too be pricey that way though? Prolly like a pellet stove I'd guess? My cook stove will take both wood/coal, so I might grab a bag and see how it does. I like the long burn factor and would only use it at night during the last load.

 

[oldchuck]

I've burned coal in our combination wood-coal furnace. It has its pluses and minuses. A big problem for me is ash and clinkers. You end up with poison. Can't use it on the garden or comfortably dispose of it anywhere. I wouldn't use it again.

 

[irishcountry]

I have been trying to find coal in bulk here in Mi. and no luck if anyone know how to get it post it!! I am also curious what is poisonous about coal ashes I mean I figured it would have some by products in it do you have any specifics my mother grew up in Ky. and they burned coal they put the ashes on the garden I told her that seemed crazy but she claimed it didn't hurt anything it was good for the garden so I exclaimed "So thats whats wrong with me"!! HA

 

[habanero]

...I am also curious what is poisonous about coal ashes I mean I figured it would have some by products in it do you have any specifics my mother grew up in Ky. and they burned coal they put the ashes on the garden I told her that seemed crazy but she claimed it didn't hurt anything it was good for the garden so I exclaimed "So thats whats wrong with me"!! HA

About the only thing I can think of is some coal can contain pretty high levels of mercury and other heavy metals that may be concentrated in the ashes. I'm not sure if it's enough to really worry about or not, though. Otherwise, the ashes can have high sulfate levels, but that isn't usually too much of a concern on most gardens.

 

[Wood Doctor]

It's a very nice chart and calculation, but if you don't include efficiency it's not really of much use. It's a pretty simple correction to make. I think the best wood stoves are no more than 80% and I would say most older stoves (still EPA-certified, though) are in the 70% range. Older natural gas/propane furnaces are in the 80% range, while the highest efficiency modern gas furnaces (PVC-vented) are in the 90-95% range. So just as an average you could put wood heat at ~75% and gas furnaces at 85%. Of course OWB's are a whole other story so that would have to be calculated separately.

I would have to disagree with this one. Efficiencies are so variable that to include them makes little sense and complicates the table immensely. They muddy the water, and many people do not even understand them or know what their heating appliance efficiencies are. So I left them out on purpose so that we could just compare whatever the fuel can deliver to the heating appliance (the burner tip as we used to say).

What I find most interesting is that wood is now by far much cheaper than any of the other four, even if you throw in a 20% penalty for lousy efficiency. Only natural gas is competitive. That was not true 30 years ago when natural gas was piped to your house for $3.00/mcf, propane was less than a buck a gallon, and electricity was $0.035/kwh. These rates have almost tripled since 1980. It no longer surprises me that people everywhere are examining wood heating today more carefully.

If you are a wood supplier, you can use this table to compare your delivered price against the top alternative fuel competitor in your area. That will vary depending upon where you are located.

 

[mtfallsmikey]

True. #2 fuel oil furnaces/boilers for example range from 70-80% combustion efficiency, but overall system effieciency can be much less.

 

[LadyToysDream]

OP,
I was not able to open your file/attachment in your opening post.
My computer is almost 10 yrs old and cranky at times.

I do have this pellet site calculator saved to check every so often.
Just plug in the $$ values for each type of fuel, and it will do the
calculation for you.

http://www.pelletheat.org/3/residential/compareFuel.cfm