I was a little surprised by the $400 electric bill, but I expected it to be high because the power company estimated the previous bill....too much snow to get to read my meter. I'd estimate my true 31 day usage was closer to $350, still a bundle. My delivered electric runs about 18 cents a KWH, and that's with a 1 cent per KWH saving by buying the power from a 3rd party. That saved me about $20 this last bill over buying from my "Utility". A family friend living in a condo, much smaller and with some protected walls and ceiling with occupied other units, has baseboard resistive electric heat and spent over $500 for the same period. She tells me she turns down rooms not in use and runs the heat in the 60s and wears warm cloths.
I have checked my geothermal and can say when the resistive boost isn't running (it runs for about an hour in the morning when I bring the house up from 60 degrees to about 66 degrees) it is giving a COP of near 4 regardless of the outside temperature - and there are zero "defrost" cycles. This makes the electric less expensive than a wood fire if I pay for delivered wood, which is about 2/3rd of what I burn. The resistive is held at 5KW, or about 17,000 btu. The design provides for a resistive boost of 10KW with the second stage in (I have that disabled) or 34,000 btus. My HP is two stage and run by an "intelligent" (microprocessor) control. The second stage HP only delivers about 34,000 btu, thus when running with 5KW resistive boost I'm getting about 51,000 btu and a total COP of about about 3, or uses only about 1/3 the electric power as resistive heat. Again, given the cost of wood (sorry I am over 70 and being a lumber jack is not outside my physical capability even though I do harvest about a cord of wood from my property - and what I scavenge from neighbors), the cost of heat with my HP is very competitive. Heat ain't cheap anymore. Yes I have figured in the cost of maintenance on the HP, I have spent about $2,000 repairs in the 17 years it has been in my home. To this add $0.00 for chimney cleaning and for periodic maintenance other than filter replacement. I suppose the unit similar to what I have would run at least $20,000 today, it cost me about $12,000 - complete, less about $2,000 in rebates from my power company.
I am running short of two year seasoned HW, and was looking at the compressed wood bricks, e.g., Tractor Supply sells EcoBrick. That looks to be a good back-up/filler at $240 or so a ton. makes the wood stove almost as easy as a pellet stove - but alas TS was out when I checked a couple of weeks back and they have the same view as my post here: winter is over, we're not ordering an more stock to winter stuff. I plan to buy a ton next year, but would like to try a small amount first.
