Looks like I picked the wrong year to buy two pellet stove oil prices keep dropping....

[Bioburner]

Problem with pellets is the export of them now. Russia putting the squeeze on Europe with NG. Other industrial power plants eating the supply too now.

 

[jintoreedwine]

Problem with pellets is the export of them now. Russia putting the squeeze on Europe with NG. Other industrial power plants eating the supply too now.

Hmmm, that's interesting. I would never have guessed pellets were something that's exported.

 

[Bioburner]

Hmmm, that's interesting. I would never have guessed pellets were something that's exported.

Most of the new plants in US and Canada are for export.

 

[jintoreedwine]

Most of the new plants in US and Canada are for export.

In my mind, then, that is almost more concerning than the current fall of oil prices. I read somewhere that it isn't really very economical to chop down a tree for the express purpose for making pellets -- hence -- after a certain point it seems there might not be enough waste saw dust to go around. Though, I have no idea how much raw saw dust supply there is.

 

[seabert]

I am glad I went with wood instead of pellets. Much easier to find free wood. All my wood was scrounged last season so this year my wood heat is free. I have a supply of Envi's just in case my supply runs low.

 

[Bioburner]

There is other things that can produce fiber faster than trees. I am interested in a new Canola crushing plant being built near the Canadian border or the oil producing pond scum for oils. With ethanol being produced from industrial beets instead of corn the prices of corn may stay low too.

 

[TimfromMA]

I am glad I went with wood instead of pellets. Much easier to find free wood. All my wood was scrounged last season so this year my wood heat is free. I have a supply of Envi's just in case my supply runs low.

Alot of places have regulations that forbid transporting firewood due to invasive insects. You also cant beat the convenience and ease of use that a pellet stove provides over a wood stove.

 

[canuck_22]

LOL...as a Hydro One sucker here in Ontario pellets are in my future for a long time, a 42% increase over the next 5 years, I can only hope the low fuel cost will drive the cost of pellets down as well.

 

[Pellet-King]

We probably have one of the highest propane prices on earth here on Cape Cod. They cart it down from off cape, last bill was $4.65 a gal according to my wife. But we only have a 100 gal tank and it's for cooking and hot water, the cloths dryer. We fill two to three times a year more or less and it's never all that low when we do. Funny we got rid of this company once and they bought out who we went with , so now we are stuck with them again. The last company was about a buck a gallon lower

For $1000-$1500 just to do that I would of switched all those appliances to electric...like your name implies...I'd find alternative's!

 

[alternativeheat]

For $1000-$1500 just to do that I would of switched all those appliances to electric...like your name implies...I'd find alternative's!

We do have two other gas companies off Cape, last I knew one did not deliver in our area, not sure about the other yet.. But when we found this one we were ticked, then it got bought out by the very one we were dumping !! But she just bought all new appliances recently while we had the lower rate, the good new is they are energy efficient at least...

 

[alternativeheat]

Hmmm, that's interesting. I would never have guessed pellets were something that's exported.

Yes, mostly to Europe and also mostly industrial grade pellets ( lower grade than what we burn)..

 

[jfunk138]

Maybe someone else knows, but what effect do these lower gas prices have on pellet pricing? I would think it might cause pellets to eventually drop somewhat in price as it would now cost less to move them around. Additionally, as other less dedicated pellet burners switch back to oil, that should lower demand on pellets -- thus lowering their price as well. (I'm no economics expert, that's just my theory)

Lower gas prices translate into lower costs to bring pellets to you. However, it's unlikely that savings will be passed on to you as long as the supply/demand equation is still heavily favoring the demand side. When box stores can't keep them in stock what reason would there be to reduce prices? Even though we are at or near the point, where heating oil/propane is cheaper, many will illogically burn pellets anyway. There's a human factor here.

-Some are just bad at math.
-Some won't even bother to check prices on the alternative fuel.
-Some will fall into a sunken cost fallacy (I spent 5 grand for this pellet eater, damn it I'm going to use it!).
-Some will gladly spend hours cleaning and tuning their pellet burner, but let their alternative system run uncleaned/untuned/nozzle too big/etc and then complain the calculator is broken.
-Some like burning pellets for political/idealogical reasons.

For all these reasons I'm not holding out much hope that pellet prices will correct this heating season.

 

[alternativeheat]

Lower gas prices translate into lower costs to bring pellets to you. However, it's unlikely that savings will be passed on to you as long as the supply/demand equation is still heavily favoring the demand side. When box stores can't keep them in stock what reason would there be to reduce prices? Even though we are at or near the point, where heating oil/propane is cheaper, many will illogically burn pellets anyway. There's a human factor here.

-Some are just bad at math.
-Some won't even bother to check prices on the alternative fuel.
-Some will fall into a sunken cost fallacy (I spent 5 grand for this pellet eater, damn it I'm going to use it!).
-Some will gladly spend hours cleaning and tuning their pellet burner, but let their alternative system run uncleaned/untuned/nozzle too big/etc and then complain the calculator is broken.
-Some like burning pellets for political/idealogical reasons.

For all these reasons I'm not holding out much hope that pellet prices will correct this heating season.

Well and prices zoom up but trickle back down. Besides , pellets for this years sales are pretty much in the system. I don't think you will see a scale back till next season if at all. The lower oil prices may Hold the pricing as is at least though. Then next year a whole new thing, by then oil could be headed back up. But even so generally summer pellets prices are lower than in mid burn season. I know that's when we get our one store locally to do it's pre season sale which is a fair bit lower than mid winter pricing even on a lousy year..

I'm not going to buy oil now when I have pellets bought and paid for and 3/4 tank of fuel oil.. I'm going to burn a little oil anyway because we have to heat our tenant and hopefully when we need to refill along towards later winter or maybe early spring with a little luck, the price will still be down. And next summer the price of pellets might be a tad lower than now, like last summer was compared with the shortage times in Feb..

I'm not going to speak for every persons situation. I can't make a blanket statement that says, oh ya go out and burn oil now, shut down your stoves. Who am I to tell anyone to do that.

 

[woodmakesheat]

For all these reasons I'm not holding out much hope that pellet prices will correct this heating season.

They may not, though local HD has about 50 tons sitting there along with 3 pallets open for single bag sales. Seems many have already stocked up this year, so who knows what happens if they sit unsold. I have 3 tons to burn (that I bought in Sept.), but also filled my oil tank which is helpful when the house needs a more rapid heat-up or it's below about 0 deg F. Oil is still about $2.95 here from the mainstream vendors. I may switch to a cash place though as I see no reason to pay $30-$40 more for 100 gallons due to "loyalty".

 

[alternativeheat]

They may not, though local HD has about 50 tons sitting there along with 3 pallets open for single bag sales. Seems many have already stocked up this year, so who knows what happens if they sit unsold. I have 3 tons to burn (that I bought in Sept.), but also filled my oil tank which is helpful when the house needs a more rapid heat-up or it's below about 0 deg F. Oil is still about $2.95 here from the mainstream vendors. I may switch to a cash place though as I see no reason to pay $30-$40 more for 100 gallons due to "loyalty".

Ya know combining your main heat and the stove works great. We did that for years with coal, you don't have to ring out the stove so bad and the burner it sips oil. Really I mean it really strings out the oil fill intervals. i wasn't one who turned the oil heat down just because the stove was going, in fact turned it up. I hated the house at 64 ( the outreaches with a radiant only stove), so put it up to 67 or 68 or so. Ya it came on now and then, so what. It wasn't on long or often but having cast iron radiators in the house it really warmed up the corners. I tended the coal stove trice a day. The main heat came on mostly someplace near tending time, like 3 am for a half hour, the the radiators carried it till I got up at 5 just about then the heat would kick on a second time. And maybe once in the afternoon. You can go a really long time on a tank of oil that way.

 

[mass_burner]

UHN is approaching a 5 year low at 23.50. I will probably start nibbling at the 20 price.

 

[briansol]

I'm running my stove a notch lower (sometimes) than i normally would, and running the oil a little bit. So, the oil gets the house up to temp, the pellet attempts to keep it there as long as possible.

until I can pay my oil bills for under a Grand for the season, pellets are still it for me. The last year i ran oil only was 2007, and oil was about 4.50 a gallon and i spent about 5500 on it that season. by that logic, oil needs to get near 1.75 for me to really consider it, or pellets need to SKYROCKET but, honestly, it doesn't matter for this season as i alreayd bought my stash

 

[steveg_nh]

I just got a oil delivery. It's been 35 days since the last one. They only dropped off 53 gallons. Just about my DHW usage only. Nice!

 

[Wilbur Feral]

Lower gas prices translate into lower costs to bring pellets to you. However, it's unlikely that savings will be passed on to you as long as the supply/demand equation is still heavily favoring the demand side. When box stores can't keep them in stock what reason would there be to reduce prices? Even though we are at or near the point, where heating oil/propane is cheaper, many will illogically burn pellets anyway. There's a human factor here.

-Some are just bad at math.
-Some won't even bother to check prices on the alternative fuel.
-Some will fall into a sunken cost fallacy (I spent 5 grand for this pellet eater, damn it I'm going to use it!).
-Some will gladly spend hours cleaning and tuning their pellet burner, but let their alternative system run uncleaned/untuned/nozzle too big/etc and then complain the calculator is broken.
-Some like burning pellets for political/idealogical reasons.

For all these reasons I'm not holding out much hope that pellet prices will correct this heating season.

Well said.

And our bigggest worry re: pellets is likely the export plants and their effect on supply of raw materials (waste wood products).

 

[TimfromMA]

If oil becomes more cost effctive, the pellet stove will be treated like a fireplace and lit only occasionally when we want the ambiance of a fire.

 

[CladMaster]

Oil slide --- Could we see $40.00 per barrel ? Could we ? It's possible ! Oil is now down to the $60 - $65 mark and still falling....

The good news is ..... fuel is cheap ...... for now.

The bad news ..... Oh, don't even go there !

 

[alternativeheat]

Oil slide --- Could we see $40.00 per barrel ? Could we ? It's possible ! Oil is now down to the $60 - $65 mark and still falling....

The good news is ..... fuel is cheap ...... for now.

The bad news ..... Oh, don't even go there !

Depends how bad the green bunch wants to shut down rail car transporting of fracked crude. And that's "potentially" an easier mark to nail than a pipeline. So far what's come of that though, is we see a three year plan to replace some obsolete single wall tank cars for safer true oil hauling cars.. That is not a bad thing. Though since there are some 250,000 single wall cars in operation now that's quite a goal. But on the other hand it creates real paying jobs..

Actually, I don't mind seeing some safer oil cars on the train lines since out son runs one of those trains.

 

[mass_burner]

I'm running my stove a notch lower (sometimes) than i normally would, and running the oil a little bit. So, the oil gets the house up to temp, the pellet attempts to keep it there as long as possible.

until I can pay my oil bills for under a Grand for the season, pellets are still it for me. The last year i ran oil only was 2007, and oil was about 4.50 a gallon and i spent about 5500 on it that season. by that logic, oil needs to get near 1.75 for me to really consider it, or pellets need to SKYROCKET but, honestly, it doesn't matter for this season as i alreayd bought my stash

Does it really matter when you bought your pellets? You still are better off running oil if the price is lower.

 

[maple1]

I just got a oil delivery. It's been 35 days since the last one. They only dropped off 53 gallons. Just about my DHW usage only. Nice!

That's a lot of oil for just DHW heating - think I would consider an alternative.

 

[bogieb]

Does it really matter when you bought your pellets? You still are better off running oil if the price is lower.

Depends on Cash Flow. My pellets are paid for, I don't need cash coming in to use them. I need cash to pay for propane deliveries though - and I don't have an extra 1000 to fill my tank right now (and wouldn't have the money to fill the tank if somehow propane went to $2/gallon).