Estimated yearly savings by using coal

So how much are you saving and what was your previous fuel?

Not sure yet but I was spending 2-3 hundred bucks every 2-3 weeks on Propane last year and still runiing Kerosine heater all the time. Should save a bunch though.

I burn propane, I heat a ~4000 sq.ft. old farmhouse, a ~600sq.ft. apartment, and a 2400sq.ft shop.

On propane I'm not extravagant, the house was kept at 60* [sweaters and longjohns], the apartment about 50* [not in use in winter] and in the shop I keep the floor at 50*, this gives me about 35-45* air temp, good enough to work in.

Last year I built and installed an outside boiler, and piped the hot water into the house. I use water/water heat exchangers to transfer the heat to my house hot-water heat, and domestic hot water.

Compared to the previous year, I saved ~1800 gallons of propane, about $2800.

This year I will install pipes to the shop and heat the floor with the coal boiler too. This will save about $1500 this season, depending on how cold the winter is.

I have bought coal for this year, and probably will have left-over in the spring, Cost for my coal this year about $1100, So for this winter season '06-'07 I expect to burn ~$1000 of coal, and NOT burn about $4500 in propane.

And the real bonus?? When heating the house with coal, I can keep it at a comfortable 68-70* and have unlimited hot water for showers and laundry

Greg L

I would burn $3500-4000 in oil easy this winter if not for coal.

I bought 3 tons of rice in June for $575 delivered to NJ for the winter. How can you beat that?

This winter I got a stoker instead of the hand fired unit, boy am I in love with that thing!

I live in a 3,500sq. ft log home on top of a mountain @3,000 ft way back in the sticks ( just ask Ls Farm ) and the wind is brutal in the winter time. When I built I planned on heating with coal and wood so I only put in electric forced air because it was the cheapest to install and the bank said I needed some type of conventional heat source. I knew I would never use it anyway.
After reading these posts I can just imagine how much it would cost for me to heat with propane or oil. Last year I burned 5 tons of bituminous coal in my AHS multifuel boiler at a grand total of $250 !!!! So needless to say I will be burning coal for years to come. would rather give my money to American coal miners anyway.

I have some good data from using different fuels over the past 28 years here are my current numbers:

Fuel - Annual Heating Cost
--------------------------------------------
Coal - $735
Wood - $788 (not including extra handling)
Pellet - $858
Oil - $1,160

KTM, you'd have to pay a premium to get propane or oil up on your mountain!!

Great building site, Very nice house. One heck of a driveway!!

Greg L

Hard to say the exact savings as I have an all elec. house and have never gone w/o supplemental heat (not that brave).
I do know that since I installed a coil in my stove I save an avg. of $20 per month on the elec bill - my elec. bills are lower in winter than summer so the stove is doing a good job. I know people who rely on elec. only and have $300 + per month elec. bills. My elec. bills have been averaging $110/month.
We try to conserve energy where we can. The stove keeps it at least 70 downstairs and we can keep the elec. heat off down there. Upstairs we keep the thermostats set at 65, and it will kick on when it gets cold enough out. I believe that if I would install a register to the upstairs that would help some too.

We paid $1,700 last year to heat a 2300 sq. ft. farmhouse with oil- we kept it at 64 deg. during the day and 59 at night! This is our first year with the Alaska coal stove. We've been given estimates that we'll use between 4 and 5 tons of coal. That's $800-$1.000 this year in coal. Since oil's gone up over last year (although it's down right now before the election) we probably would have spent at least $2,000 on oil- a month ago it would have been $2,300. That's a $1,000 per year savings (approx.)- our stove should pay for itself in 2.5 years. Not to mention our house is at 70 during the day and 65 at night.

At current oil prices, we would spend $2,500.00 on oil for heat and hot water. My coal for the season was $700.00 so that's an annual savings of $1,800.00. When I bought the Harman boiler, I calculated that it would take about 4+ years to pay for itself. With rising oil prices, it paid for it self in about 2+ years. My wife had to be "convinced" to buy the coal boiler but now admits it's the best move we ever made as far as a cost savings home improvement. Plus the house is nice and evenly warm from basement to the second level. I don't have to become a hot water nazi when my teenagers are in the shower for ever either.

Location is NE of Scranton PA, at approximately 1,200 ft elevation. Most house surface area is north and south exposure (long and narrow). Built in 1912 and renovated in 2000 (renovation was not the best though, lots of air leaks around the new windows).

House is two story, 2,200 SQ ft with an additional 600 SQ ft finished basement (below ground so doesn't take much heat). Four year old gas hot water heater and natural gas hot water boiler (120,000 btu) with baseboard heat, two zones. Also have one ventless natural gas radiant burner (35,000 btu). Year before last (before 70% increase in Natural Gas the season (Nov through March) cost an average $300 a month (low was $145 and high was $430). Electric bill was average $75 a month. Kept the house 68 degrees F average.

Last year used minimum natural gas heat and supplemented with electric space heaters. The house was never over 65 degrees F! Cost was $250 a month average for Natural Gas, Electric was an average $225. I also added a 800 SQ ft garage with 13 ft ceiling, but did not heat it last year due to cost (I estimated it would be at least an additional $300 per month with Natural Gas).

This year I purchased a used Alaska Kast II stoker (5,000 to 75,000 btu) for the house ($800), and added an SWG direct vent ($280) and a Coal-Trol thermostat ($349). For the garage I purchased a used Direct Vent Keystoker 90 ($880). With installation pieces and all the little odds and ends I spent a little over $2500 to get both stoves set up and working properly.

This is the first season heating with coal so am unsure of the exact use rate. Have a guess based on daily consumption during one night that was down to 24 degrees F (40# for a 24 hour period). Probably will use three tons for the house and an additional three tons for the garage. Will also keep the boiler/radiant heater ready to run if needed, but hope not to use them.

So all told I estimate it will cost $750 for the season to keep the house and garage at a toasty 72 degrees F. This is compared to a projected cost of over $3,000 for gas heat (not including hot water). So guess this all will pay for itself in a little over a year. Will let you know next year!

Wow that is an awful lot of words, but I guess I needed to get it all down so I could figure out just what I'm doing........... nah that'll never happen! nfire:

Matt...really curious to see how your set up works for you. Have you ever burned coal before??

Hi davemich,

I have exactly one week experience burning coal so I am not a model for how to do things right! I can say I have been having lots of fun getting everything set up (I'm an engineer by trade so a good science project is right up my ally!).

The Coal-trol on the Alaska is awesome! the only problem is that the Tri-burner having only one motor for both combustion and stoking is not exactly the hot set up for saving coal when the T-stat is not calling for heat. There is a little more unburned coal than I would like when the outside temps are in the 50s. I have an on-going science project to add a seperate 60 cfm Fasco blower for combustion air and remove the blower wheel off the Tri-burner. I am also adding a 3 inch out side air vent ducted directly to the combustion intake. Am waiting for the manometer I just purchased to arrive so I can make sure I don't upset the static pressure of the stove with all my wildness! The nice thing is that with the power vent I can adjust the draft to match my changes in combustion air coming in.

The Keystoker is a great unit and am considering getting a Coal-Trol for it as well. Since it has seperate combustion and feeder motors it is more suited to the mild temperatures and corresponding feed rates. No observed unburned coal in this unit!

So overall in answer to your question everything is working excellent!

:USAribbon:

Last year I used $3300.00 worth of heating oil. This winter my heating budget would have been $3750.00. I thought that I could get a stove and pay for two years worth of coal for that price.
I installed my LL Hearth stoker stove last weekend and started it five days ago. I guessing that I'll pay for the stove in the first year and at current oil prices save about $2800.00 a year in heating. As I beat my head against the wall I keep saying, "I should have done this years ago"!!
warm and toasty in Pa.

Current House is around 1600 sq. ft and we can heat it with coal stove exclusively, gets a bit chilly upstairs (low 60's), but we can live it.

Our new House (yet to move in - Hopefully in a few weeks!) is an older 1890 Victorian with 2500 sq. ft, we will see if our Keystoker will keep up, otherwise, we will have to get a larger unit for the basement. I contacted the gas company for the new house and it is $140/month on the budget (Hmmm $140 x 12 = $1680!! that's alot of coal!) even doubling our usage from current house approx. 4 ton x $200/ton = $800. We will keep you posted on the new house heating, once everything is switched over.

Attached is our current gas usage over the past year or so....and you can see when we switched over....!!