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Heating Your Home Will Hurt This Winter
Yep The New green deal and The war in the Ukraine making Europe cut off NG from Russia. Thank the governments and their leaders for the drain on your finances. Europe is going to freeze but with golbal warming the mean temp should be higher.
serf
Comments
Cost of propane's up about 80% here since 2020.
I have two years worth of firewood.
I do too and unlike some places there are no bans on burning it in Michigan. I read about places in the Northwest and East coast that have banned or are considering the banning of wood or pellet stoves. How can you be more carbon neutral than by burning wood?.Tree grows and absorbs CO2, you burn it and release CO2, trees absorb it and grow ... Ad Infinitum. Kind of a closed loop with no additional CO2 in the end. Bob
PERFECT TIMING, I gave in last year and bought a propane furnace. On the other hand, I negotiated a somewhat acceptable price by pre-paying and owning my tank(leaves me open to 'shop around' if normal supplier gets too snorty on price).
New Heat Pump is every efficient on A/C should be on heat
Heck......I'm sorta worried about electricity right now.
My 3 year old electricity contract, at 8.5 cents per kwh, expired about three weeks ago. The new 3 year contract is at 13.7 cents per kwh.........a 61% increase.
Summer can't end soon enough!!
A mini split is the way to go with D.C. drive with no duct work but just fan units and a coil in each area with the highest SEER you can afford. A Heat pump is going to mandatory for heat anyway.
I have just a A/c unit mini split for now and N/G for heat. They say Heat pumps are very dry in the winter time so better have a humidifier too up north.
serf
Heat pumps are not near as dry as gas heat. Heat pumps are also useless under about 45 degrees! Lower than that and you can NOT heat to a normal range without the auxiliary heat strips(or aux gas) which burn a LOT of electricity.
Ended up this spring with 750 gallons LP in the tank after winter, I only use LP to heat the house, prepaid for 1000 gallons this last July. It’s a 130 year old house, but I love this location and house, should last for awhile. I figure may have to think of an alternate heat source here maybe next year.
Figured this house has withstood the test of time, WWl , WWll, Cold War, and now will come the Biden attack on fossil fuel. If I do go back to burning wood like I did before I moved here 30 years ago, I’m buying a log splitter, no more hand splitting.
I know this is getting old, but dont blame me I voted for Trump.
Heat pumps were all the rage when we built here 12 years ago, pushed by the electricity supplier, builders and suppliers all of whom got rebates from the electric company. There were two types, air-sourced which was essentially an AC unit that would also run in reverse to provide heat, and a ground-sourced unit that required lots of buried copper pipes in the back yard to absorb heat from the 54 degree soil and magically use that to heat your home.
Well, they are all gone now or have been disabled and replaced by conventional gas or electric heat. The promised reduced cost of heating never happened, and neither the air or ground sourced type would come close to making a home comfortable if the outside air temperature was below about 50 degrees.
Well heat pumps are suppose to go down to 25* now but you are right the colder it gets the worst the return on installation.I live in the south and bought just an a/c mini-split with no 4 way valves to mess with,pay back for unit was less than 3 summers of operations.
serf
We install heat pumps with gas back up. Warm and not too expensive, almost free heat until temp drops to 40*. Plus AC in the summer.
Mini splits are the cats meow for some applications.
May be time for a revisit on Heat pumps if your in need of a new system. D.C. drive is the biggest reason and of course coil areas on both sides of the system. NG is going to be a dirty word one day.
serf
https://sealed.com/resources/winter-heat-pump/
Here how heat pumps have improved:
A completely redesigned compressor.
This is the big upgrade.
The compressor is the “heart” of a heat pump—it circulates the refrigerant that moves heat energy from the outside of your home to the inside. And now, new heat pump compressors can automatically adjust their speed and energy consumption when the temperature changes. They work hard when they need to (like on really cold days) and then scale back when the temperatures are moderate.
(In other words, old heat pump compressors were kind of like driving a stick-shift car, while new compressors are more like an automatic.)
This variable speed compressor technology wasn’t commercially available in heat pumps 10 years ago. Now that it is, it’s the game changer that’s made heat pumps fantastic at sub-zero temperatures.
An improved coil design.
Most modern heat pumps (and all of the heat pumps that Sealed recommends) now use grooved-copper tubing. Since the new grooved tubing has a greater surface area than the older smooth tubing, heat pumps can exchange heat with the outside environment a lot more efficiently than they could in the past.
Efficient fans.
Heat pumps now use better, variable-speed fans—and these new fans cope a lot better with common winter challenges (like restricted ducts and dirty filters).*
Better motors.
For years, heat pump manufacturers have been researching ways to make their motors work better. That research has really paid off. The new heat pump motors work great in winter but still use a lot less electricity than more common heating systems.
That’s a lot of improved technology (we could go on). But the point, ultimately, is that the heat pump you install this month is significantly different than the heat pumps that were available 15 years ago. And that new, optimized heat pump will work beautifully in freezing temperatures (especially when your home has been properly air-sealed).
Heat pumps WITHOUT auxiliary heat will NEVER be "fantastic at sub-zero temperatures." I dont care what the article says. LMAO at that one.
Subzero on Centigrade scale in Europe or Canada it's possible. Not on our temp Fahrenheit scale here however.
serf
Whomever named them heat pumps, they lied. We just replaced one of those variable speed drive air handler fans on a 3 year old heat pump. Cost was $1200 with $1000 covered under warranty. That would buy several window units.
My ECM blower motor had to be replaced yesterday........also had to use a backup ecm motor for a week, until tech finally arrived(full disclosure......I needed a "spiderman" to crawl/squirm around and under the attic mounted air handler).
Still glad I had a spare motor.........even if the ecm part was not 100%(I'll fix that situation later).
Now awaiting the BILL!!!!!
Its gonna sting!
Tells ya how good those motors are when the tech carries a LOANER fan!
You got that right!
But......after 7 days on the backup......I made sure he didn't leave their shop without a NEW motor assembly.
BTW.........the backup/temporary motor assembly is mine.
Barring a 9 month long winter, I have on hand and/or paid for more than enough propane to stay warm. I thought it was pretty stupid to discard my alternative heating source to facilitate installation for the money sucking gas furnace but that was what EVERYONE else thought was the best plan. Guess I'm just along for the ride and to sign the checks.
What was your "alternative heating source"?
Propane is gonna get even MORE expensive, but I have enough to make it thru winter too. Not sure what next summer's prices will be however! 🫣
The Germans are making wood shavings for heat this winter and coal is having a come back there too.
serf
Aux heat comes on around 18 degree. We don't see many days that cold in SC. Our old Heat pump ran many a dozen times in 15 yrs. in aux heat which is heat strips. It had a lot less seer than the new one. Our AC bills this summer and it has been hot are approx 15-20 per cent less than last yr. We still get the electric discount for a newer home..
Newer units are ALL way more efficient. BUT heat pumps are still held back by the laws of physics. Below 32F and they are WAY less effecient than at 50F. Below 32 and they require aux heat to keep up(could be elec heat strips, gas burner, oil burner, etc for the aux heat).
Im not saying your new one isnt way better, Im sure it is. Heat pumps still have limits tho. Only so much heat to transfer from 32F air!
I agree, they arent useless under 45F(little exaggeration on my part)😁 BUT they will run on aux heat below 32F and the colder it gets the more aux heat is required.
And gas heat is WAY drier than a heat pump with electric aux heat.
What is a heating bill? I have free natural gas to my home.
I have free "natural" gas too, but cant figure out how to store it up.
A lot of People are already on the cusp of getting very poor soon and the way things are going in politics then it ain't going to be pretty when society collapses with a dictator. You wil have a left or right dictatorship with an oligarchical head. In order to instill peace you will need a police state. One way or another. The facade of this America democracy with a republic is failing.
serf
A few years back there were several companies that were in the process of making NG compressors for home use. To convert a car or truck cost about a grand. The savings in gas and oil changes paid for it quickly. When running NG or propane the oil des not get dirty nearly as fast and the dirt it does have is so slight that changing oil becomes almost a total waste. I can't find those compressors now, only big $$$ commercial stuff seems to be available.
Just bought propane. It hurts now.
LP here is 2.89, cheapest, to 3.15, most expensive
BOTH are WAY too high.
FJB
Inflation is under control as long as you leave out energy cost along with Food costs! What a joke our governments has become! Those Brits are having 250% jump if not more on N.G.
serf
Bought LP this summer on prepay, most I’ve ever payed. $2.25 a gallon. All total now I have 1750 gallons, 750 in the tank and can take delivery up into spring on the 1000 gallons. Should last a couple of years, I hope.
Better buy a heavy hoodie to wear around the house and turn off the thermostat.
If I could keep my pipes from freezing, without heat being turned on, I'd wear a 3" thick wool body suit!
I know using some antifreeze would solve my problem but my Mrs. is allergic to wool. And.......and this is a very big AND......She rules the roost around here!😁
Would not a real fat woman suffice and she can do laundry too!
I'd require two big girls. Yeah I got that much love to give. Me love you long time (in short bursts).