Estimated yearly savings by using coal

I locked in on oil this past August at $4.39/gallon. That was a mistake so I had to do something. Being in the heating and air conditioning business, I bought a Biasi 3 Wood/Coal burning boiler and all materials to install it wholesale for $3500. We normally burn 1200 gallons of oil per year for heat and hot water which equals about $5300. We first burned wood this year at 270/cord and burned 2 cords then went to coal at 300/ton and just finished the first ton 1/18/09. I will use another 3 tons at 300/ton and have the oil burner shut off. If you do the math, I should break even the first year and hopefully make some money next year!!

I can't even figure it out.
My primary heat source is a heat pump. In SE pa (PECO Electric) you get a discount on electric during the winter if you have electric heat, and a heat pump qualifies as electric heat. My electric bill peeks in july/Aug, then Dec/Jan, both around the same amount. The heat pump does not have Electric backup elements, the backup is Oil heat. I have the cut over set at 20deg, but once it's getting that cold I use wood or coal. Wood is free, but as others say it's work cutting/splitting it, plus the storage requirements are pretty large if you plan on having dry wood during the winter.

When I was just oil heat, I used to burn 400-500 gallons of oil to keep the house at 68deg. Since I installed the Heat Pump I am only using 75 gallons per year. I have always run computerized thermostats, cutback 62 in day (nobody home) and 65 at night. in the peak of winter, my electric bill is maybe $100.00 higher then the spring/fall. Since my heat pump/AC coil is mounted on top of my Jenson 24 stove, my electric savings by burning wood/coal is only from not running the outside AC compressor. Out of that $100 extra per month electric cost, can I assume the fan cost $25.00 to run, and compressor cost $75.00?

Now I have been burning 50 lbs of coal per day (and could use more if I put my mind into keeping it running)
50 lbs @ 7.50 bagged x 30 days $225.00 + the above $25.00 to run the stove fan = $250.00.

anyway I look at it, it cost me more money to burn coal then use the heat pump/oil backup.
what am I missing? Sure I could buy coal by the ton by picking it up (I live just south of coal towns), but even at $140.00 per ton that's $105 per month for coal and $25.00 to run the fans = $130.00. Sound like break even if you add a couple gallons of oil in the mix.

Now once electric deregulation screws us all, coal will be the king!

Last season (07/08) I saved $2700 when compared to oil. This season so far, I'm over $3K. I'm so glad I went to this coal boiler.

For this heating season at todays cost of propane ($2.39) I will save over $2,700. The savings will continue to build, as I will run the AA-130 all summer long too. I love it. I just came up from filling the hopper, and figured that for every two bags of coal I carry, it saves me $18.

Mike

Complete Heat wrote: I just came up from filling the hopper, and figured that for every two bags of coal I carry, it saves me $18.Mike

What an original way to look at it! Now I have to figure out how much I'm saving for every bag I carry.

Complete Heat wrote: I just came up from filling the hopper, and figured that for every two bags of coal I carry, it saves me $18. Mike

Don't forget to figure in your savings on the health club membership!!

compass will wrote:I can't even figure it out.
My primary heat source is a heat pump. In SE pa (PECO Electric) you get a discount on electric during the winter if you have electric heat, and a heat pump qualifies as electric heat. My electric bill peeks in july/Aug, then Dec/Jan, both around the same amount. The heat pump does not have Electric backup elements, the backup is Oil heat. I have the cut over set at 20deg, but once it's getting that cold I use wood or coal. Wood is free, but as others say it's work cutting/splitting it, plus the storage requirements are pretty large if you plan on having dry wood during the winter.

When I was just oil heat, I used to burn 400-500 gallons of oil to keep the house at 68deg. Since I installed the Heat Pump I am only using 75 gallons per year. I have always run computerized thermostats, cutback 62 in day (nobody home) and 65 at night. in the peak of winter, my electric bill is maybe $100.00 higher then the spring/fall. Since my heat pump/AC coil is mounted on top of my Jenson 24 stove, my electric savings by burning wood/coal is only from not running the outside AC compressor. Out of that $100 extra per month electric cost, can I assume the fan cost $25.00 to run, and compressor cost $75.00?

Now I have been burning 50 lbs of coal per day (and could use more if I put my mind into keeping it running)
50 lbs @ 7.50 bagged x 30 days $225.00 + the above $25.00 to run the stove fan = $250.00.


anyway I look at it, it cost me more money to burn coal then use the heat pump/oil backup.
what am I missing? Sure I could buy coal by the ton by picking it up (I live just south of coal towns), but even at $140.00 per ton that's $105 per month for coal and $25.00 to run the fans = $130.00. Sound like break even if you add a couple gallons of oil in the mix.

Now once electric deregulation screws us all, coal will be the king!

Coal at 140 a ton

# 2 Fuel Oil would need to be 80 cents a Gal

Electricity would need to be 2.50 A kWh

Propane 55 cents a gal

Natural gas 60 cents per therm

Corn 1.90 per 50lbs

Wood pellets 95.00 a ton

Fire wood 105.00 Per cord you need 24 x 10 x 6 of wood to match a ton of Anthracite coal

Your paying 7.50 a bag 50lbs that is 300 a ton

Now oil will have to be 1.70 a gal

Electricity would need to be 5.25 A kWh

Propane 1.20 per gal

Natural Gas 1.30 per therm

Wood Pellets 205 a ton

Corn 4.05 per 50 lbs

Fire wood 222.50 Per cord Don't forget 24 x 10 x 6 to equal one ton of coal

Hi. In SE PA a therm of natural gas cost $1.35. I'm probably going to burn 9.5 tons of coal this season. At 222 ton delivered that's $2100 in coal. More that I would've like to have paid. But its been a cold winter. I think I would've spent around $3700 for natural gas. So a savings of $1600. Unless my math is wrong somewhere. Natural gas prices dropped like a rock since late summer. And the high oil prices of last summer are built into today's coal prices. So my savings are not as great as they should be. I think...

Leo

I usually use about 2300 gallons of propane per year on average to heat my house and provide hot water. Probably 2000 gallons of that is to heat the house in winter alone. I have been running my KA-6 since the beginning of October and I have used 4 tons of coal as of tomorrow when my next delivery comes. Four tons of coal cost me just over $1000.00 with tax and delivery and lasted five months over which we had snow on the ground for most of four of those months. Even October was colder than it usually is. The propane I would have used up to this point would have cost me close to $5000.00 by now with another fill up of the 500 gallon tank coming in late March or April. With the cost of another load of coal I am still estimating that I saved close to $4000.00 this year alone and I will have about 3 tons of coal for next year. I couldn't be happier about my decision to go with coal.
My neighbor bought himself one of those large outdoor wood boilers and bragged about how he was heating his entire house with it and could get all his wood off his 16 acres of land. The day after Christmas he was out cutting more wood and told me he had less than 2 weeks of wood left to burn. Firewood soared from about $55 a face cord to $85 a face cord in a couple of months. That was probably a low price because New York has a restriction on transporting wood, it can only be transported within a 50 mile radius of it's source and some areas have shortages helping rasie the price. I'm guessing he didn't calculate the amount of wood he needed to heat his house for the winter. He hasn't been able to get back to his land since Chirstmas.

Fingerlakestoker,

I wish firewood could be had at $85/cord. It is $200/cord here in Maryland. I didn't buy any but harvested 5 cords of wood myself. Backbraking labor for an old man like me.

burned about 2.5 ton this past winter @$50 a ton = $125 for the season sounds like a steal to me.

My numbers for the year, heating 2700 square feet:

Coal >> 3.54 ton @ $505.50
Oil >>> 136.9 gal. @ $267.66

Total = $773.16

Normally with oil, I would expect to use approx. 1500 gal. for the year = about $3,000. Savings of approx. $2226.84.

New Hope Engineer wrote:burned about 2.5 ton this past winter @$50 a ton = $125 for the season sounds like a steal to me.

where are you getting coal for 50 a ton and what kind

It is run of the mine (raw coal) straight from the mine.It is large and needs to be broken down,i personally use a hammer.
I have a large potbelly stove that burns any size so it works out pretty good for me.