So I have a bunch of electric baseboard kicking around that was removed from a remodel project.
My Sante Fe has perplexed me by the fact that it does not heat my 672 square foot mobile home completely and I am really doubting the stove is living up to the manufacturer's specifications. Or maybe it is a fuel problem. Anyway averaging a bag and a half a day to heat 672 square feet is quite a lot of btu per square foot. 770 per square foot if 345000 per 40lbs is correct.
So I started installing electric heat. It took 14 feet of baseboard to duplicate the results of the pellet stove. By this I mean the same temperature in every room.
Turns out that now I have some numbers to work with. Electric baseboard uses 250 watts per foot. 14 feet of baseboard equals 3500 watts or 3.5 kilowatt's. Take that 3.5 kw and multiply by 3,412 and the btu potential is 11942 btu per hour.
So I started reading the electric meter over the last few days. The last two days I have used 55kw per day to heat the place.
At .16 per kw that is $8.80 per day. Pellets are 5.98 per bag.
That 55 kw represents 119560 btu used per day to heat 672 square feet and the electric heat is 100% efficient. The Sante Fe using 1.5 bags for the same time frame would use up 517000 btu and at the rated 80% efficiency would toss 103500 up the chimney. If the stove is only operating at 75% then that is 155250 btu up the chimney.
I can heat the place for the amount of heat lost up the chimney.
The the 3500 watts of baseboard represent 17.77 btu per square foot and would equal a stove with a high output of 11942 btu.
I am going to mix the numbers with degree days and see what that looks like.
So can this be correct?
My Sante Fe has perplexed me by the fact that it does not heat my 672 square foot mobile home completely and I am really doubting the stove is living up to the manufacturer's specifications. Or maybe it is a fuel problem. Anyway averaging a bag and a half a day to heat 672 square feet is quite a lot of btu per square foot. 770 per square foot if 345000 per 40lbs is correct.
So I started installing electric heat. It took 14 feet of baseboard to duplicate the results of the pellet stove. By this I mean the same temperature in every room.
Turns out that now I have some numbers to work with. Electric baseboard uses 250 watts per foot. 14 feet of baseboard equals 3500 watts or 3.5 kilowatt's. Take that 3.5 kw and multiply by 3,412 and the btu potential is 11942 btu per hour.
So I started reading the electric meter over the last few days. The last two days I have used 55kw per day to heat the place.
At .16 per kw that is $8.80 per day. Pellets are 5.98 per bag.
That 55 kw represents 119560 btu used per day to heat 672 square feet and the electric heat is 100% efficient. The Sante Fe using 1.5 bags for the same time frame would use up 517000 btu and at the rated 80% efficiency would toss 103500 up the chimney. If the stove is only operating at 75% then that is 155250 btu up the chimney.
I can heat the place for the amount of heat lost up the chimney.
The the 3500 watts of baseboard represent 17.77 btu per square foot and would equal a stove with a high output of 11942 btu.
I am going to mix the numbers with degree days and see what that looks like.
So can this be correct?