Looks like the days of heating oil is over

[BradH70]

I'm having a heck of a time figuring out how to get off oil (or propane).

Two pellet stoves and an electric hot water heater got me off of oil.

Tom C.

That is the direction I am headed in. A second pellet stove on the second floor for next winter (hopefully) and replacing the furnace zoned hot water tank with an electric tank and timer. The price of oil has gone up $0.25 in the past two months in my area. At the current price of $3.85 it will cost me $1,000 a year to heat my water. I highly doubt that an electric hot water tank would raise my electric bill by $80 a month.

 

[TboneMan]

While having multiple biomass space heaters is definitely the economic and "green" thing to do, until banks recognize these things as "permanent" heating devices, people are still going to need central furnaces (or elect. base board heat) in order to sell his/her house to someone getting a mortgage to do so.

 

[BradH70]

I won't ever get rid of the oil furnace and tank, but I want to get to the point were it is just a backup. We travel to see relatives for Christmas and are gone for about a week. This is the only time the oil furnace is used to heat the house.

 

[firebroad]

While having multiple biomass space heaters is definitely the economic and "green" thing to do, until banks recognize these things as "permanent" heating devices, people are still going to need central furnaces (or elect. base board heat) in order to sell his/her house to someone getting a mortgage to do so.

This is a very good point.

 

[Weird tolkienish figure]

Unfortunately, I see a sad future of people getting rid of their oil furnaces and the oil dealers raising prices to maintain profits, so the poor schmucks who cannot afford to convert to something else get burned(no pun intended).

Still, I hope as many people as possible can get away from oil. I know I am trying to ween off of it. So far I have cut my oil consumption by 2/3. Yay!

I see a very uncertain future. I'm talking about "known unknowns" ala Rumsfeld.

While that could certainly happen, it could also be the case that there is a such a move away from oil that there is an oil glut in a few years like the 1980's. Or gas could skyrocket too.

I emphasize the word *could*. It probably won't happen, but there is still that risk.

I will maintain something: the economy almost never acts the way people think it will. Almost never. If it did, investing would be a no-brainer.

I plan to move away from oil as well, I'm just saying it usually pays to hedge your bets.

 

[Chain]

There's actually an oil glut now as it's not an issue of supply of crude oil. The problem is the damn oil companies who can control the supply of REFINED crude oil products whenever they wish to manipulate the price of gasoline, diesel, kerosine, and #2 fuel oil, etc. There so much of crude oil that the big conglomerates are now exporting more petroleum products overseas than what we consume domestically. And there's another lesson in all this. That being that whenever politicians and/or the lobbyists hired by Big Oil tell you they need more domestic production to lower the price for American consumers, chances are it's BS as that additional product may very well be for export and will do nothing to lower the prices of various fuels here domestically.

 

[md2002]

I called about getting Gas when I bought my new house... The closest gas line is 100ft away. They tell me it is $50 - $100 a foot to bring the gas line to the front of my house, they'll bring it from the street to the house at not cost and then it's about $8000.00 dollars convert the furnace and get rid of the Oil tank. In hindsight I should have looked into this more since the stove cost me $4200.00 installed. Bringing gas into the house would have been about $5-$10,000 more which I didn't have but maybe could have waited for next year??

What's really aggravating is Mass. has rebates available if you make your home more energy efficient. I went to the site the other day because I was getting a new energy efficient water heater. They only give rebates for people with Gas, if you have Oil your out of luck. There was a $300 rebate for new water heaters but since I have oil I can't get it... what a bunch of BS!

 

[Turbo-Quad]

I live on a main road, there is gas 30 feet from me, why this house wasn't gas is beyond me, but the cost to convert and the cost of pellets is well cheaper to just keep on burning pellets, if there was a free line to my house and free install furnace i would think about it, otherwise i'm happy with pellets and my electric water heater
My oil fired forced air furnace is below my bedroom, the noise is so loiud between the furnace starting and the forced air making air WHHOOSH sounds because the duct from the furnace first is a direct shot into my bedroom...really sucks.

It might be a good thing youre not hooked up to that gas line. I'm sure there would be all kinds of fees if you were.

 

[md2002]

I live on a main road, there is gas 30 feet from me, why this house wasn't gas is beyond me, but the cost to convert and the cost of pellets is well cheaper to just keep on burning pellets, if there was a free line to my house and free install furnace i would think about it, otherwise i'm happy with pellets and my electric water heater
My oil fired forced air furnace is below my bedroom, the noise is so loiud between the furnace starting and the forced air making air WHHOOSH sounds because the duct from the furnace first is a direct shot into my bedroom...really sucks.

It might be a good thing youre not hooked up to that gas line. I'm sure there would be all kinds of fees if you were.

Here in Mass., when I called anyway, they said they would bring the gas into your house at no charge, from the street to your house. The problem is getting it to the street...

 

[daveswoodhauler]

I live on a main road, there is gas 30 feet from me, why this house wasn't gas is beyond me, but the cost to convert and the cost of pellets is well cheaper to just keep on burning pellets, if there was a free line to my house and free install furnace i would think about it, otherwise i'm happy with pellets and my electric water heater
My oil fired forced air furnace is below my bedroom, the noise is so loiud between the furnace starting and the forced air making air WHHOOSH sounds because the duct from the furnace first is a direct shot into my bedroom...really sucks.

It might be a good thing youre not hooked up to that gas line. I'm sure there would be all kinds of fees if you were.

Here in Mass., when I called anyway, they said they would bring the gas into your house at no charge, from the street to your house. The problem is getting it to the street...

Similar issue here...but when I called the gas company, they said no go as there is not a main on my street. Folks like me that live in the rural area's are going to stuck with oil forever.

 

[md2002]

I live on a main road, there is gas 30 feet from me, why this house wasn't gas is beyond me, but the cost to convert and the cost of pellets is well cheaper to just keep on burning pellets, if there was a free line to my house and free install furnace i would think about it, otherwise i'm happy with pellets and my electric water heater
My oil fired forced air furnace is below my bedroom, the noise is so loiud between the furnace starting and the forced air making air WHHOOSH sounds because the duct from the furnace first is a direct shot into my bedroom...really sucks.

It might be a good thing youre not hooked up to that gas line. I'm sure there would be all kinds of fees if you were.

Here in Mass., when I called anyway, they said they would bring the gas into your house at no charge, from the street to your house. The problem is getting it to the street...

Similar issue here...but when I called the gas company, they said no go as there is not a main on my street. Folks like me that live in the rural area's are going to stuck with oil forever.

As I said above, I can get it to the front of my house but it would be costly. The gas company did tell me I can talk to my neighbors. If enough of my neighbors wanted to convert to gas, they would bring the gas line down the street at no charge and call it a project. I plan on talking to me neighbors this summer.

 

[slls]

Oil? What's dat. ;-)

I think it is something people used to put in their hair back in the 50's to try to look tough. Whatever it is, it looks like it is history.

Wild Root Cream Oil

 

[BradH70]

Oil? What's dat. ;-)

I think it is something people used to put in their hair back in the 50's to try to look tough. Whatever it is, it looks like it is history.

Wild Root Cream Oil

Dapper Dan

 

[slls]

They also make insulation, you might want to try that as well.

Right, that works.

 

[slls]

With all our trees, only 25% in Maine heat with wood, it's not really convenient.

 

[Weird tolkienish figure]

You guys are right, it's all a conspiracy. Clearly the Illuminati are involved.

:lol:

 

[maple1]

I'm still mulling over what my backup will be when I get rid of my oil/wood combo boiler to replace with separate wood unit + backup. I would need to install either a new electric or oil boiler - and it would need to supply most of my off-heating season hot water. Maybe half of it if I can light the odd fire thru the summer. Based on current electric & oil prices, oil would still be cheaper - but it would sure be nice in one way to get rid of oil all together. 'Electric boiler' scares me with thoughts of skyrocketing electric bills even if only for backup & maybe half of my DHW - or especially if something were to happend to my wood side of the equation and I would need to use my backup for more than just backup. And who knows what the future will bring...

 

[StuckInTheMuck]

I live in the side of Tiverton that doesn't have any gas lines, my oil bill in December before I bought the pellet stove was $511.


.

I'm across the river from you. The Nat Gas pipe that supplies Newport, Middletown and Portsmouth and comes from Tiverton under the river runs about 400 yards from my house. But we can't get gas here. This summer when Nat Grid was doing maintenance on the line, there was a 50-60 foot tall flame coming out of the line for 3 days straight. Sounded like a freight train. Neighbors commented that we could have all heated our houses for the entire winter with that. The company was just relieving pressure on the line so they could do maintenance. What a waste.. Good call on the Pellet stove..