Home Building Questions - Propane - All electric - Fireplace

[3Ts]

I've had a number of utility types: NG, all electric, fuel oil, a converted coal furnace, and currently propane. To some extent your options are limited by what is available in your area. I lived with heat pumps for almost 30 years and they are nice except in the winter time. It seems like they are always blowing cold air until the emergency heat strips come on. It was recommended that we use a heat pump when we built our retirement home and we said no! We have electric air conditioning and a propane forced air furnace (90+% efficiency with a PVC exhaust vent). It is far more comfortable than the other heaters we've had. We have a Propane furnace, cook top, and a propane (only) fireplace that is sealed with outside combustion air. All other appliances are electric.

Previously, in our all electric house, we've been without electricity for 9 days at a time, so we have a whole house generator with an automatic transfer switch. It runs off propane and we have a buried tank that will run it for a week at full power if we have to. So far, just an hour here and there, so our propane tank gets refilled every other year.

We built the house with spray foam in 2x6 walls so it's pretty well sealed and insulated. One thing I would do differently because of the energy concerns lately is to have a wood burning stove as a backup to the propane. I have about 40 acres of woodlot of mixed pine and hardwood.

 

[2manyrocks]

One issue with heat pumps has tended to be when the supply air is below body temperature of 98 degrees so that it feels cool even though the supply air coming out of the heat pump might be 80 degrees. Gas furnaces supply air at temperatures above body temperature so they feel warm.

The ambient temperature in which a particular mini split will operate varies from unit to unit. Some are rated to -13 degrees. Others might only go to 5 or worse. So you need to pay attention to this when selecting a mini split unit if you intend to use it for heating.

 

[Locoweed]

26 years ago I went as far from all electric as I could get. I mainly heat with a wood stove, but I have a propane furnace as a backup, cook stove, water heater & dryer. When I get too old to deal with firewood I will use the furnace. Air conditioning is handled with a swamp cooler, but I have a central unit for the few days it is humid. I have not regretted my decisions.

 

[kenmac]

If you're thinking of going HP. don't go with a conventional HP. go with an inverter unit that can heat down to-20 + deg, without any backup heat.

These units only run at what ever heat /cooling is needed in the home.
It doesn't run all on, or all off like conventional units.
They are variable speed motors and compressors.
Mine usually runs at about 15-18 HZ, until xtra heat, or cooling is needed.

As for a W.H. You may want to look into a tankless propane.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

A few people have mentioned an induction cook stove. I may get an induction hot plate to try out at our current place to see how we like it compared to a traditional glass top unit.

 

[ddbackhoe]

i havent noticed anyone mentioning the Consumer Product Safety Commission wants to ban gas because of
“science”

Ban new gas stoves, a federal safety commissioner proposes; CPSC says no such official plan yet

The Consumer Product Safety Commission official cited concerns about potentially harmful emissions from the appliances.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

I'm also going to call and check on Geothermal vs Heat pump VS AC with propane furnace with a local HVAC company that has experience with all of them. My initial research looks like Geothermal may be out of the running because of up front cost.

 

[3Ts]

If you have a tightly sealed house with very low infiltration rate and you have a gas water heater inside that envelope, that may be a problem. When you turn on an exhaust fan in the bathroom or the kitchen, where does the makeup air come from? That gas water heater exhaust pipe is basically a hole to the outside and can have air sucked back down the exhaust pipe.

 

[RustyA]

Northern Wisconsin here. 18 seer air source heat pump/ac with two stage propane forced air furnace. Heat pump metered separate so off-peak rate for most of our spring/fall/summer heating and cooling. Heat pump programmed to cutoff below 30 degrees, can be programmed lower if propane gets stupid again. High efficiency wood hearth stove in case of power outages or silly propane prices and we can run furnace fan to circulate wood heat throughout house. Made these changes 8 years ago and it's all working like it's supposed to.

 

[Shenandoah MF1760]

As was already mentioned an on-demand hot water heater may be the way to go. These can be propane or electric, centrally located or placed at the delivery point.

Depending on the area solar water heaters can be an option, if for nothing else than preheat.

How fast you get hot water depends on how far the discharge is from the source. The ancient Ruud natural gas on-demand system I had in Cincinnati took a minute to get from the basement to the 2nd floor, but once it got there it could scald you until the utility ran out of natural gas. An electric unit placed near the discharge would probably take about as much time to heat up depending on the wattage.

And, as was also stated earlier natural gas has been demonized and could potentially be outlawed making it difficult to buy/repair devices requiring it in the future.