Wood vs Fuel Oil heating cost in Boston area....

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fire_man

fire_man

Minister of Fire
Feb 6, 2009
2,702
North Eastern MA
I figured out the cost comparison between 1000 gallons of Heating oil and an equivalent BTU value for firewood. Here are the numbers for costs in the Boston area:

$2580 Heating Oil (1000 gallons@ $2.58/gallon)
$1850 Split Hardwood (6.725 Chords @ $275/chord)
$840 Log-Length Hardwood (6.725 Chords @ $125/chord)

The calculations:

1000 gallons of Fuel oil #2 produces 134.5 Million BTUs @ 134,500 BTU/gallon

The equivalent amount of firewood is 6.725 Chords @ 20 Million BTU/Chord

I actually only burn about 900 gallons of oil, so for me I would scale these numbers by 0.9. If anyone wants to check my math I got the conversions at http://www.woodpelletinfo.com/calculator/

I figure at least with wood I can really lock in my heating cost years in advance and not worry about the price of oil changing every time there's a hurricane or some oil tyrant gets heartburn. :lol:
 
Here, on the edge of Middlesex county, you're up beyond $323 a cord.

On the other hand, I can't collect oil for free..

Careful placement of the stove also results in much more focal heating than I can achieve without re-plumbing my furnace with short circuits. Even if the price were the same, I think it would be cheaper to heat with wood.

As my wood is all free, I'm a little ahead of the game :)
 
Oh crap! At those prices, I don't think I'd buy wood! Why is the price so high in your area?

I paid $130/cord this past spring, and the guy and his brother helped me stack it!

Dunno if it's true or not, but my neighbor has a lead on a guy that's selling wood for $90/cord. I'm waiting to find out, 'cause at that price, It's not even worth my time and energy to scrounge and process it!

-SF
 
Just checked craigslist - prices are down - closest place is $375, but it drops to $275ish after that one.

Why is wood priced highly? Don't know - Boston is an expensive place, so that plays into it. We have the Asian Longhorn in Worcester, so no wood can come out of there. I still see plenty being chipped for biomass, so it's not as if there's a massive shortage.
 
I'm on the MA border (but luckily on the NH side :cheese:) in southwest NH - cordwood around here varies a whole lot. Some folks selling for just over $300 per cord, some others for mid to high $200's. Very few in the low $200's. For this year, I think a lot has to do with the ice storm last year. Central New England was hit with a whopper last mid-December - and lot of wood down. I think a lot of the lower end prices seen on CraigsList are local homeowners who cleared their mess and are making a little cash back on the trees that came down during the storm. I, of course, kept my downed trees.....
 
One thing you may have forgotten to take into account is the efficiency, a modern oil furnace is somewhere aground 80% and a wood stove is 60%.
If you have to pay $300/ cord probably not much savings..
 
I bought all my wood at $250 per cord in Northern Worcester County late last year. He went up to $275 now. You have to shop around. Also, modern stoves are more like 75% efficiency. Oil closed at $82 per barrel today so burning wood is getting to be a better& better deal.
 
These two charts have a lot to do with how advantageous wood burning is:
 

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I love the fact that I had no idea that oil had jumped up so much (except for the fact that I have a horribly inefficient tankless oil hot water heater)
 
Most people have no idea of the spot price of NG or the price ber barrel of oil. They 'see it' at the pump or when they get their monthly gas bill or go to pay the oil man. Energy prices have been rallying since late last year.

Don't worry. There is no inflation though. ;-)
 
Sawdust-made bricks (biobricks) are ~$18 per MBTU (I paid $309 for 1000 bricks). Right in between wood pellets and firewood.
 
WoodNewbie said:
Sawdust-made bricks (biobricks) are ~$18 per MBTU (I paid $309 for 1000 bricks). Right in between wood pellets and firewood.
Click to expand...

Any idea of the real-world efficiency of pellet stoves?
 
949% heat exchanger efficiency for the Europa. I'm waiting for Craig to run a "real life" heat exchanger efficiency test with some other stoves.
 
Any testing on the real world efficiency of a wood stove? I imagine that they are not always running at their published efficiency rating.
 
I'd say your estimate of 20 million BTUs per cord is low. I have a chart from the US forest products lab and it shows higher numbers depending on species. For instance red oak and beech are at 26.4 m BTUs. White oak is 27.6 m BTUs etc.
 
I kind of wondered about that being kind of low ( the 20 million BTU per chord). But my numbers also don't take into account stove efficiency as others have pointed out.
 
I keep it simple. I usually burn 800-900 gallons of oil a year, so times that by the gallon price, @ $2.55 = $2040-$2295.. I hope to use 4 cords this year at $150 per cord, thats $600 plus what little oil I use for hot water and days Im not around to keep the stove going. As long as I use less than 500 gallons of oil or less (should do this easily, Im guessing 200) and Im way ahead.
 
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