Disappointing heating bill analysis

[DouglasB]

We've now had enough oil bills this season for me to take a first run at quantifying the effect of our new wood burning fireplace insert (Fireplace Xtrordinair 33 Elite).

During the coldest part of last winter (2012-2013), from December 4 to March 4, we used approximately 456 gallons of oil. During the same period, there were about 3072 heating degree days. So, we got about 6.73 heating degree days per gallon. (I'm focusing on the coldest part of winter since we also use oil for our hot water, so the numbers for other parts of the year aren't directly comparable.) This was also with our thermostats kept relatively low, and after having some insulation work done in the fall of 2012. We have our little kids in the house all day, so significant energy usage is kind of inevitable.

This year, from November 19 through February 18, we used approximately 434 gallons of oil. During the same period, there were about 3485 heating degree days -- a colder winter. This means we got about 8.02 heating degree days per gallon.

Another way to look at it is that, if we had done this winter at the same rate of HDD per gallon as last winter, we would have used 518 gallons so far, as opposed to the 434 gallons we have used. At our latest heating oil prices, those 83 extra gallons would have cost $325.

While I'm happy that our oil bills are lower, the savings are not quite as big as I had been hoping. In fact, once you consider the price of the wood we've been burning, it's probably a wash at best. So, unless the numbers look dramatically different at the end of the heating season, it probably makes the most sense to think of our fireplace as something that enhances the ambiance, keeps the living room toasty, and prepares us for emergencies, rather than something that saves us money on a day-to-day basis.

 

[branchburner]

Welcome to the forums.

Aside from being prepared for emergencies, I think in situations like yours the biggest factor is do you ENJOY the whole process. If so, it makes sense even if your savings are nil. But for those who find the wood-burning deal a dirty and annoying chore, saving a few bucks can easily be offset by the unwanted work that is required

My own analysis did not require much math: the furnace broke and I DIDN'T FIX IT, so I am pretty confident in knowing the wood stove is something that saves us money on a day-to-day basis!

 

[DouglasB]

Aside from being prepared for emergencies, I think in situations like yours the biggest factor is do you ENJOY the whole process. If so, it makes sense even if your savings are nil.

Yeah, we're mostly having fun with it so far. The kids, particularly, love to sit a few feet away from the fireplace to warm up. And I felt like a real man swinging the maul around this fall as we got the wood pile ready. The only real annoyance so far has been hauling the wood from the pile to the smaller stack next to the door, which I have to do about once a week or so and is not so much fun in the ice and snow.

I guess I was just hoping that it would be fun/cozy AND save money.

 

[tarzan]

I'm assuming you buy your wood. Nothing wrong with that if you must but the real savings in wood burning are if you can harvest your own. Of course even then, there are factors that play into it such as distance traveled, equipment etc.

 

[DouglasB]

I'm assuming you buy your wood. Nothing wrong with that if you must but the real savings in wood burning are if you can harvest your own. Of course even then, there are factors that play into it such as distance traveled, equipment etc.

Since I don't live on multiple wooded acres and don't own a truck, the cost (both in terms of equipment and time) of harvesting wood just wouldn't make sense. Trust me, I've run the numbers

 

[johnpma]

Funny how when you look at the numbers sometimes it can be a disappointment. When I started heating with oil in 1993 it was $0.69/gallon and we bought a pellet stove to offset the oil usage. Pellets were $89.00/ton for premium hardwood pellets.

Last week I paid $3.88 a gallon for heating oil and I saw in the stores here pellets are now $249.00/ton.....same oil same pellets (maybe even lesser quality???)

A cord of wood costs $200/delivered and $180 if you pick it up. Luckily we have acreage to cut off this up coming year.

A pair of long john and a sweat shirt costs about $40.00 per family member and its reusable. In our house the Tstat for the boiler get set at 55 and wood does the rest. Family helps cut, split, and stack the wood. Hauls it in and cleans the mess.........its just part of the routine

2100 sq ft poorly insulated farm home (but slowly upgrading making more efficient) Living room is 70-72 and the rest of the home 60-64

I despise OIL Expensive and dirty

 

[mol1jb]

Funny how when you look at the numbers sometimes it can be a disappointment. When I started heating with oil in 1993 it was $0.69/gallon and we bought a pellet stove to offset the oil usage. Pellets were $89.00/ton for premium hardwood pellets.

Last week I paid $3.88 a gallon for heating oil and I saw in the stores here pellets are now $249.00/ton.....same oil same pellets (maybe even lesser quality???)

A cord of wood costs $200/delivered and $180 if you pick it up. Luckily we have acreage to cut off this up coming year.

A pair of long john and a sweat shirt costs about $40.00 per family member and its reusable. In our house the Tstat for the boiler get set at 55 and wood does the rest. Family helps cut, split, and stack the wood. Hauls it in and cleans the mess.........its just part of the routine

2100 sq ft poorly insulated farm home (but slowly upgrading making more efficient) Living room is 70-72 and the rest of the home 60-64

I have to agree with Johnpma that if you do your own wood the numbers would be much better. A stove is more of an investment. Only under ideal conditions will it really blow your furnace out of the water with heating a whole house. After a few years the total savings numbers may look better.

 

[DouglasB]

Family helps cut, split, and stack the wood. Hauls it in and cleans the mess.........its just part of the routine

Yes! In a decade, when my then-teenaged kids can provide free labor, the analysis will be a little different, too!

 

[Nick Mystic]

Since you are new to wood burning I'm guessing you probably did not have ideal wood to burn this year. Once you get a supply of wood that has been seasoned properly you might find that you are getting much better results since you will generate more heat from your stove and thus burn less oil. Also, I'd suggest you do some brainstorming to see if you can come up with some ideas to minimize the parts of wood burning you find a chore. You mentioned the hassle of moving wood from your shed to your storage spot up near the house when there is a lot of snow on the ground. For years I have been carrying a load at a time in a shoulder sling from my wood pile to my storage bin in the screened room at the rear of our house. At the suggestion of a forum member I added a small ramp to my deck and this year I used my wheelbarrow to move my wood inside the screened room. In one trip I could move the same amount of wood that three trips with my sling would move. And with much less effort. So, you might be able to devise some easier ways to handle your cumbersome tasks, as well.

 

[tekguy]

You can buy log loads and have them delivered for 80-90 cord in Mass, well out here you can. But you still have to CSS.

Maybe I missed it but on oil only did you keep the house as warm as burning with wood? I know my natural gas bill would sky rocket if I tried that, esp this winter

 

[DougA]

I know my heating bill is at least $1,500. lower with wood heat. Part of that is I'm on electric, so my cost will be higher than yours. My house is also designed well to take advantage of a wood stove with a large, central great room and I have more than enough wood that is free - except for the cost of chainsaw, splitter, etc. The stove is 30 yrs. old so I have paid for it many times over but it needs to be replaced soon and that will start the cycle again.

I'm not sure if your stove might be undersized and you don't say how much wood you have used this winter. I had to buy wood for the first 5 yrs. as there was nothing on the property to burn and at that time, I had the same feeling as you. The stove was on for extra cold days/nights and I considered it pretty well a even trade-off. You can save money by buying greener wood in bulk and aging and storing it until ready.

The huge advantage of wood heat is when you have a power outage and you can generate enough heat to stay in your home. We've had that a few times this winter.

 

[johnpma]

You can buy log loads and have them delivered for 80-90 cord in Mass, well out here you can. But you still have to CSS.

Maybe I missed it but on oil only did you keep the house as warm as burning with wood? I know my natural gas bill would sky rocket if I tried that, esp this winter

I'm seriously thinking of doing that. There is a guy in Monson Mass that will bring you a truck load of logs for $400.00 I was told a truck load is about 5 cord. However some of the logs are HUGE

 

[DouglasB]

Since you are new to wood burning I'm guessing you probably did not have ideal wood to burn this year. Once you get a supply of wood that has been seasoned properly you might find that you are getting much better results since you will generate more heat from your stove and thus burn less oil.

I hope that's right. There are some good suggestions here about how to get cheaper wood, but even if I assumed all my wood was free, saving $400ish bucks a year on oil would result in a looong payoff time for the initial investment of the insert + installation. But getting more heat out of better wood could change the equation.

 

[Dakotas Dad]

For us, one other, and IMHO, major factor is, how warm were you? Many, when heating with "whatever" other than wood, have their thermostats set lower, some MUCH lower than the temps the house runs at when the wood heat is going.

For us, we have "averaged billing".. just looking at the pre-stove monthly bill, and say, this months monthly bill, you see about a $70 difference, for about $840 a year saved. (we have woods, so wood fuel cost is minimal).... BUT I have no clue what it would cost to run the heat pump at a temp setting that our home is at now with the stove.. We have a programmable, and it's set for 68 during the day, 64 at night.. with the wood stove we run 72-76 all the time. And she likes it. So.. the savings, if compared to how the house feels, would be much higher I am sure. In fact yesterday it was 68 out, and 70 in, just on solar gain.. and she came down and put on a sweater because it was so "cold" without the stove burning..

Then there is the reason WE put in the stove.. if the power goes out, we will be just as warm. You cannot place a value on that feeling.

 

[DouglasB]

For us, one other, and IMHO, major factor is, how warm were you? Many, when heating with "whatever" other than wood, have their thermostats set lower, some MUCH lower than the temps the house runs at when the wood heat is going.

For us, we have "averaged billing".. just looking at the pre-stove monthly bill, and say, this months monthly bill, you see about a $70 difference, for about $840 a year saved. (we have woods, so wood fuel cost is minimal).... BUT I have no clue what it would cost to run the heat pump at a temp setting that our home is at now with the stove.. We have a programmable, and it's set for 68 during the day, 64 at night.. with the wood stove we run 72-76 all the time. And she likes it. So.. the savings, if compared to how the house feels, would be much higher I am sure. In fact yesterday it was 68 out, and 70 in, just on solar gain.. and she came down and put on a sweater because it was so "cold" without the stove burning..

Then there is the reason WE put in the stove.. if the power goes out, we will be just as warm. You cannot place a value on that feeling.

All good points. We've been happy with our decision to buy the insert, for all the intangible reasons you and others mention.

But I'd be lying if I said that I didn't also hope for more dramatically lower oil usage when we decided to make the investment.

 

[logger]

Hmm. Our house was heated with propame when we bought and the average bill for a year of heat was about $2,400. Shortly after we moved in, I took out the propane fireplace and put our stove in. I do not run the heat at all anymore and soley heat with wood, so that has saved me close to $10,000 so far... no where near chump change. Im wondering the type and stove you run, as well as the size of your house, and about your wood supply? Do you buy your wood a year or two in advance and let it season? Most seller who claim to have "seasoned wood" are lying or dont know there arse from their elbow. Burning green wood is not effective for heating a home, nor is too small a stove, or a porrly insulated house. Just a few things one must consider when trying to heat with wood.

 

[maple1]

Factors to consider:

-How warm is the house when burning wood compared to when using just oil?
-Exactly how dry is your wood?
-Exactly how are you heating your DHW with oil?

Not familiar with your insert or how efficient it might be.

 

[DouglasB]

How warm is the house when burning wood compared to when using just oil?

Warmer. So that's a nice intangible benefit. Our thermostat settings are the same as last winter, so all the extra heat is coming from the wood. My original point though, was that I would have expected the oil usage to be lower (oil heat doesn't have to come on so long as the fireplace is keeping the temperature above the thermostat set point).

Exactly how dry is your wood?

Not dry enough. I'm planning to spend some time this spring making more room for wood storage so that I can season myself for a year or two before burning.

Exactly how are you heating your DHW with oil?

Oil boiler attached to indirect hot water tank. http://energy.gov/energysaver/articles/tankless-coil-and-indirect-water-heaters

 

[Bobbin]

We live on a very modest lot (2.65 acres) that was wooded until we carved out our homestead. I well remember the -$1/gallon days (b-bye to those!). And I well remember how we fretted over buying the Fireview 201 ($1500) as it was about double what we'd budgeted for a stove... . It took us awhile to get into the routine of wood collection, preparation, and burning. Overall, I'd say that if you don't enjoy the collection/preparation part of the deal it's easy to be discouraged by the lack of "savings". However, as you get better at those things you will realize greater savings. We trim and limb trees on our estate, we snag any wood that neighbors are taking down, we will buy wood that's green and "deal with it" ourselves. But we get a kick out of doing it and have turned a "chore" into a "quality marriage encounter". And, it's really nice to keep the thermostats set low (50s) and use the stove to "cozy up" our home. It's really nice when ol' man winter deals a "dope slap" and the juice is "out" for a couple of days! (can't wait for the snow to melt enough that we'll be able to begin splitting our carefully hoarded buried treasure).

 

[moey]

How do you make hot water? How much is consumed in August just making hot water? If your system is not running full bore and cycling to just make hot water it can be very inefficient.

 

[Doug MacIVER]

I've always looked at as a year over year comparison. I think the overall cold this year is making some of question how much it does save. most of my gain comes around the edges of winter. just using the stove wrong in real cold weather, in my case, stove to small and feeding it constantly. love soft winter days like today.

 

[DouglasB]

How do you make hot water? How much is consumed in August just making hot water? If your system is not running full bore and cycling to just make hot water it can be very inefficient.

Indirect hot water tanks are actually one of the more efficient solutions, because there is no exhaust pipe on the hot water tank and hence very little heat loss. We use not much oil during the summer months. And in any event, the numbers I posted up top are for the winter months only, when you would expect our hot water setup to be the most efficient.

 

[moey]

Indirect hot water tanks are actually one of the more efficient solutions, because there is no exhaust pipe on the hot water tank and hence very little heat loss. We use not much oil during the summer months. And in any event, the numbers I posted up top are for the winter months only, when you would expect our hot water setup to be the most efficient.

Its not that a indirect is inefficient its that your boiler is firing on a small load. Its essentially short cycling on a hot water call if there is no call for heat anywhere else in the house. This is not always true though if you have a small heating system btu output its much better. But if your at 75k btu it will be the case.

 

[begreen]

Purchased wood is very often much less seasoned than it needs to be. That means lower BTU output for every cord burned. Also, a flush fireplace is pretty much dependent on the blower to convect the heat. There may be lower gains there as well. Finally, is this fireplace on an interior or exterior wall? If exterior, was a damper sealing blockoff plate installed? If not, many BTUs could have gone to heat outdoor via the chimney.

To improve the numbers be careful about the wood you buy and when you buy it. Before accepting a load, take off a few splits and resplit them. Then measure the moisture content on the freshly split face of wood. If it's really wet reject the load, especially if it's being sold as "seasoned". You should already have next season's wood stacked and drying. If there is oak or hickory in the mix, it should be set aside for the following season. If the chimney is exterior and lacks a block-off plate, put one it. It's a cheap way to recoup a lot of heat.

 

[DouglasB]

Purchased wood is very often much less seasoned than it needs to be. That means lower BTU output for every cord burned. Also, a flush fireplace is pretty much dependent on the blower to convect the heat. There may be lower gains there as well. Finally, is this fireplace on an interior or exterior wall? If exterior, was a damper sealing blockoff plate installed? If not, many BTUs could have gone to heat outdoor via the chimney.

To improve the numbers be careful about the wood you buy and when you buy it. Before accepting a load, take off a few splits and resplit them. Then measure the moisture content on the freshly split face of wood. If it's really wet reject the load, especially if it's being sold as "seasoned". You should already have next season's wood stacked and drying. If there is oak or hickory in the mix, it should be set aside for the following season. If the chimney is exterior and lacks a block-off plate, put one it. It's a cheap way to recoup a lot of heat.

Good suggestions. We have a block-off plate and use the blower on high almost all the time. We also have a couple of small fans circulating air.

This season's wood was definitely sub-par, other than a couple of pallets of kiln-dried wood that we mix in with the cord wood. I'm planning to buy at least two years' worth of wood this spring.