Gas and Oil Home Heating Furnaces - electric heaters

My home is heated with a natural gas forced air furnace. The price of my natural gas just went up 98%. The price of electricity is still rather low, so I am considering buying and using some portable electric heaters. The heaters would be used in the living area, to keep the furnace from kicking on so often. What type of heater will be the most energy efficient? I have seen oil filled and convection style heaters on the market. Thank you.

I can help you on this question a little bit. That is on the cost side. If you plan to stay in your home for a few years(ie..5 years or more) please consider this idea for I've just completed this in my home. My heat is a Forced Air Heat Pump system - All Electric. And your right, Electric currently is cheaper than Gas or Oil. Anyway, here's what I did. I put in an Off-Peak meter in my house. Had my brother, an electrician, install at cost. (100 amp, 12 circuits) Put in about 2 or 3 outlets in my home that only run off the off-peak meter. I live in PA. the cost for 1 kilo-watt hour is approx. 12 cents, with the off-peak it's at approx. 5 cents. about 60% savings per kilowatt. Go buy some "space heaters" or baseboard design heaters and run them off the off-peak. You'll make up for the cost of installing the off-peak meter in your electric bill in no time. Plus, you can put other appliances that are electric on them.(ie...electric water heater, dishwashers, washer/dryer, outside lighting, spotlights) The only disadvantage is that your electric is limitted - weekends/holidays are always on, but week days off for a couple of hours. Consider the off-peak....

If you go this route the heaters will have to be 115 volts.Unless you have 220 volt outlets availible.I would purchase heaters that draw no more than 10 amps.Remember,other devices and/or cicuits may be on the same breaker.Choose something that will blow or circulate air,or use a floor fan to circulate air.KEEP THIS IN MIND,TAKE A SQFT READING OF ALL CLOSETS IN YOUR HOME.ADD THE TOTALS.KEEP CLOSET DOORS SHUT IT IS LIKE HEATING AN AVERAGE SIZE ROOM.IF YOU HAVE SPARE ROOMS YOU ARE NOT USING SHUT SUPPLY VENTS OFF.I know the others on the forum may have some added ideas.PDF

Two things come to mind. 1. Electric space heaters can be an ignition source for structure fires, (esp. around chlidren) Long term reliance is not advisable. 2. Elecric resistance heat is electric resistance, that is they are all 100% efficient in that there is no "stack loss." There are 3.413 btu's contained in each watt, no matter the heater design. However, heaters with blowers will help the room air circulate past the elements, supplementing the natural convection process & carring the generated heat further from the appliance. You can compare the btu listing (OUTPUT) of your fossil fuel furnace to the wattage of your heaters by multiplying wattage x 3.413 then adding the total of all space heaters used, to see how close their output & the ele. heaters output differ.

Example: If you use six space heaters rated at 1200 watts each you get: 1200 watts x 3.413 btu/watt = 4095.6 btus per heater. Multiply that by the 6 heaters & you get 24,573 btus TOTAL heat output. If gas furnace was an average 75,000 btu input furnace with an 80% efficiency rating its btu output would be 64,000 btu.TOTAL.There a wide gap betwee 24,573 btu and 64,000 btu So more heaters would need to be used or lower temps accepted, or heated space reduced to compensate. Take care.

Electricity will soon be on the rise like the fossil fuels.
Even in areas with hydroelectric generation there still is a need for electricity that is produced by steam.

We are in TVA country but I know of two plants under construction using gas turbines.

It is gonna be interesting to see the sales tactics put in use by the various electric and gas utilities along with heating and ac contractors as they all fight for your heating and water heating dollars. It will be all lies ya know but will be interesting to see their tactics.

My gas bill skyrocketed this past month, it more than doubled, I cannot afford to replace my furnace with electric
heat pump but will along with many other screwed over consumers just have to bite the bullet and see what happens.

Being pessimistic.It is not going to matter if electric,gas,fossil fuel prices keep going up.There is no way it can be stopped.Older people on fixed incomes will still freeze to death,the prices will still keep going up,and we will have to pay the prices,OR DO WITHOUT HEAT.I DO NOT LIKE THE situation either.PDF

Do you know the new price for natural gas? Do you also know what your paying for electricity. Post the prices and I'll give you a comparision. Also post the size of your furnace if you know it.