Oil to Natural Gas Conversion Costs

[Pete C.]

>

I don't have specifics handy, but I'm sure you can find them with a search.

numbers or is

They are out there on one of the government sites. Certainly the ratio of hundreds of gas explosions to zero oil explosions should be pretty obvious. Someone was killed in a gas explosion at a motel just a month ago, and no, I don't count the deliberate gas explosion suicide in NYC.

America, not hostile

How does it compare to the 50% or so of oil that we import? The general public seems to think we get 99% of our oil from the middle east which certainly isn't true.

It was Connecticut Natural Gas as I recall. I don't know the details exactly, but their "Clean, Safe, Dependable Natural Gas" campaign only lasted like six months before mysteriously becoming the "Clean, Dependable Natural Gas" campaign.

My definition of safe would be free from threat of catastrophic and potentially fatal failures i.e. explosions.

opposing electric

heater, gas

efficient furnace

Electric service is rarely without some usage. With gas service it is not uncommon to have periods of zero use. Certainly this is not true in every case, but again, this is only one of many reasons to not use nat. gas, not the sole reason.

When the low end gas furnace is only required to operate from November - February it will clearly have a longer service life than the same unit required to operate from September to April.

Check with any gas company for the cost of extending gas service to your street in say CT vs. OK for comparable distances.

When I was in CT I watched the town blast for three days just in the few hundred foot stretch in front of my house to install storm drains. I also watched weeks of blasting when widening the main road down the street. I've watched major construction in my new location in TX as well and there was no blasting required.

I've also dug a 650' trench in CT for conduit and an 80' trench in TX for conduit and I can assure you the TX trench went far faster and easier per foot and required much smaller equipment than the CT trench.

of advertising

They market to get you locked into their nat. gas monopoly. They market to those that use other energy sources.

No handy online reference, but a low end gas furnace installation is at least a thousand dollars less than a low end oil furnace installation. The low end gas unit will also have a service life expectancy about half of the oil unit. Both will be blow the service life of the average units in each class, but the oil still last longer there as well though the ratio is not as extreme.

Pete C.

[John]

Yeah. Decades of living with natural gas and never one service interuption. Real unreliable. Houses are just blowing up all over the place that have natural gas too. I guess everyone is keeping that a big secret from the home insurance companies. Service life? My furnace has a lifetime warranty on the heat exchanger. How many oil furnaces have that? The blower of course will die sooner, but I believe oil furnaces have a blower too.

You mean your argument. A FUD one at that.

That's nonsense. Where do you come up with this crap, now you are claiming "50 yr old oil equipment" comparisons. Compare an average highest efficiency gas furnace with an average highest effiency oil furnace. Which is more efficient and wastes the least amount of energy so that it can heat your house instead?

How many gas interruptions did your neighorhood have in Connecticut?

Good for you.

Are you nuts? You have never heard of automatic standby generators connected to a gas line? If your electric service is crappy enough to warrant it, that's the way to go. No fuel to have to worry about storing and engines last a long time with nat. gas, maintenance is very low too.

Purging a gas line takes seconds or minutes.

When was that? Where was that? What was the cause?

[John]

Too bad gas service doesn't involve refineries.

Why do you think that so much electric production is being shifted from OIL to GAS? Hint: Price, Cleanliness, Reliability.

No, that is waste gas from oil production and is not the same cleanliness that you will find in a natural gas system plumbed to a house.

[Pete C.]

Well, no, it means that the furnace sends 96% of the energy in the gas to it's output as heat, whether that actually becomes heat in your home is dependent on other factors. A good oil fired boiler I looked at was

86.8%, I don't have numbers handy for oil furnaces at the moment. Again, there are multiple reasons to choose oil over nat. gas.

Pete C.

[Pete C.]

are now

Anywhere outside urban and close suburban areas. There are vast areas without nat. gas service and many of those areas are also in colder climates where backup is more critical. There wasn't gas service where I was in CT and there isn't gas service where I am now either.

To a large extent yes. Warm air also rises so you aren't going to get warm air from upstairs going downstairs. Indeed waste heat from the furnace is rejected into the surrounding area and that warmer basement air will rise and warm the floors above slightly.

Pete C.

[John]

So since this is so easy, safe, and common, which oil equipment manufacturers recommend this service as a customer done item, like changing light bulbs? (and lighting pilot lights in the old days)

I've never heard an oil furnace, even brand new top of the line, that was even close to silent. Even thirty years ago natural gas was nearly silent (except the ho hum blower motor and maybe the click of a relay and gas valve opening).

Cast iron would rust in a high efficiency (condensing) furnace.

What town was that in? If natural gas service was really that unreliable, I'd be looking at propane.

And gee, why is so much electric production being shifted away from oil and to natural gas?

You said you are dislike gas because it is a regulated monopoly utility. You said you dislike gas because it has nominal fees for minimum usage per month. Electric service has both of these qualities. Therefore, your arguments are also in opposition to electric service.

[John]

states are now

combustion

Well obviously if there is no nat gas service and propane isn't feasible, oil would be a way to go in climates too cold for heat pumps to work well. Oil. Cleaner than Coal.

Wow! I've never seen a house where the basement air was sealed from the house air. It's nice to know that the air "consumed" into the oil burner wouldn't need to be made up from air leaking into the house via window gaps, exhaust fans, cracks etc.

[John]

>

When I lived in Pennsylvania, the gas heat there worked just as well as anywhere else. What is your issue with natural gas service in Pennsylvania and New York?

These are newsgroups. Discussion happens, and you cannot "STOP" it on demand. Sorry

Of course.

[John]

your heated

Not true. Heat that goes up the chimney or out the exhaust is not included in AFUE. It would make AFUE pretty pointless if the heat being measured in its rating wasn't used to go into the distribution system. (I am assuming that all heat in the duct system goes to the house and that you aren't running ducts outside, through an ice cellar, or through a cold attic).

"The Annual Fuel Utilization Efficiency (AFUE) measures the amount of fuel converted to space heat in proportion to the amount of fuel entering the furnace. This is commonly expressed as a percentage. Energy Star labeled furnaces must meet or exceed 90% AFUE energy-efficiency ratings."

[trader4]

When you provide links or other credible references that show nat gas is unsafe, unreliable, unclean and has a short service life, then I'll say it's based on fact, rather than emotion. I've had 25+ years of nat gas heat and not a single outage do to eqpt failure or lack of nat gas supply. I've lived in homes with oil burners that failed right and left over similar time frames. I've also provided you with many links that completely refute your claims. Other than you own assertions and observations, you've provided zippo to support any of your arguments.

I asked before, if nat gas is so damn inferior, why is it that it's continuing to gain market share vs oil heat and only 4% of new homes today use oil heat? Is everyone stupid except you?

Only according to you of course.

Whoppee de do! And what percent of people have requirements that need a backup generator? Again, in 40+ years, I've never had one or been in a situation that would justify it. What percentage of homes have backup generators, that also come with their own whole set of issue? I'd bet it's less than 1%, so why drag this into it?

More theoretical BS. In practice, 25+ years and I HAVE NEVER HAD A SINGLE GAS OUTAGE. You don't even have gas, so how the hell would you know how reliable it is? And again, where do you live that the nat gas system is so poor that outage is such a big deal?

Sure it can happen. And with your jaundiced view, I'm sure if there was a nat gas leak in Croatia, you would take note of it and chalk it up. While if you neighbors were out of power for 3 days, well that goes unnoticed. Or better yet, if their oil furnace quit in the middle of the night.

Yeah, so you do think everyone else but you is stupid. It figures. And in all my years, I never heard anyone say they are going with nat gas because it avoids buying foreign oil. They do it because it's either cheaper or competitevly priced, more reliable, burns cleaner, and avoids having any oil tank issues or delivery issues.

Note, I'm not saying oil heat isn't a valid choice for some people. If I didn't have nat gas available, I would probably use it too. But to claim that nat gas is unsafe or inferior is total BS, unless you'd like to supply some real world data.

Now it really gets silly. Everyone but you is so stupid they just fall for nat gas marketing? Or is it that only nat gas companies can do marketing? I hear plenty of radio commercials promoting oil heat.

You can't get away from the fact that despite all this, oil heat is available virtually everywhere. Anyone with a nat gas line passing their house can still choose oil if they like. Despite this, only 4% of new homew opt for oil. Yeah, I know we're all stupid cause we don;t prefer oil heat.

Yes we do have alternatives: showers and any other floor material. So everyone that has a tub or tile floor must be stupid too. Or is it marketing?

[John]

"Pete C." wrote:

> >

Oh, I thought you knew what you are talking about. Now you want me to go on an egghunt for your claims.

the numbers or is

Oh you know the numbers are out there. Since you know, which sites did you find them on?

Zero oil burner explosions? Here's a recent one in New Jersey (nobody was killed in this case, thank goodness!)

On March 21, 2005 at 8:44 p.m., the Teaneck Fire Department (TFD) responded to a report of a loud explosion and smoke in the house at 501 Rutland Avenue. Upon arrival, responding firefighters were guided into the basement to investigate a problem with the boiler; however they could not find an odor or smoke. The firefighters, who combined have more than 100 years of experience, began investigating the area. They found that the emergency switch of the boiler had been shut off and later learned that the mother living in the home had turned it off. The basement of the home was sectioned off to provide for various uses of the area. There was a large portion that was used for a recreation/family room, an area that contained two beds that were usually used by the house keeper and one of the children, and two small rooms; one containing the oil fired boiler, the other utilized as a laundry room. After investigating the basement area, the responding firefighters determined that a ?blowback? of the oil burner had caused the reported explosion and smoke. ?Blowback? occurs when an accumulation of vaporized fuel oil in the combustion chamber suddenly ignites due to a delayed ignition. This causes too much pressure, which results in a loud bang and the release of smoke. The firefighters found multiple problems with the boiler, including closed water valves, a low water level, a non-functional low-water cut-off and a dirty flue pipe. Fire personnel made the necessary adjustments to restore the boiler to a safe and operable condition and advised the owner of the problems that were found. The owner was also directed to have the boiler serviced as soon as possible.

compared to

America, not hostile

The best numbers I have are the US produced 539 cubic meters in 2003, (exported

24.19 cubic meters) and imported 114.1 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Compare those ratios.

No it's not, nevertheless middle east oil production has a huge impact on our foreign policy and national spending.

On their web page, I noticed that it is "What can Natural Gas offer over my existing fuel? Dependability. Versatility. Affordability. Convenience. Efficiency. Plus, it is also environmentally friendly! "

So oil heat is not "safe" under your definition.

opposing electric

water heater, gas

efficient furnace

Well yeah the reason not to use natural gas is to save a few bucks in non usage charges (similar to what you get with electric service) to save far more in higher efficiency. Besides even in those "zero use" periods, I'm still making hot water, and if I'm home there is a good chance I'm eating (using the grill, stove) or doing laundry (dryer.)

Oh I see. Good thing that same furnace wouldn't be needed for a/c in those climates.

You made the claim. Which gas company(ies) did you check with?

I'm sorry, I thought we were discussing natural gas lines, not huge storm drains, which often have to be buried much deeper for gravity flow reasons anyway.

So if I could find an area in Texas where blasting WAS required, and some other area in Connecticut where blasting was NOT required, that would pretty much "proove" the opposite, wouldn't it? :)

Well there you go. Irrefutable proof that installing gas lines is always more expensive in Connecticut than Texas.

of advertising

So why does that no-colluding oil heat lobby advertise about "today's oil heat" and how hot it is, blah blah blah. Keep in mind this is not one dealer advertising against other oil dealers, but an obligarchy of many/all oil dealers.

If you say so.

[zero]

And the average Oil burner in a home that is not serviced properly is JUST as dangerous.

No disrespect intended, Pete.

This whole thread seams to be diminishing the attention due to oil burning equipment.

A delayed ignition that has not left the confines of the combustion chamber may not be an explosion according to some, however it is an unplanned event.

What you learn in a classroom is fine. It prepares you to go into the field. Once you've been in the field for 3-4 years, you realize just how little you knew that first year.

Many things go wrong with oil burners. YOU may know to stop resetting your protectorelay after the third time, however most DO look at it like an elevator button.

Most are filthy. Just have a fly on the wall look-see at most HVAC shops and watch the service techs try to casually avoid the oil service calls.

Oh, by the way, standing in front of a 750 HP boiler (30,131,000 btu's per hour./ 215 gal. per hour) while it huffs itself out for .5 seconds, and then back into high fire with out shutting off the main fuel valve will forever makeup ones mind on weather or not an oil burner can or cannot explode.

-zero

[John]

Be careful!! That tank and gas line and range could blow at any moment! Look out! :)

[Robert Gammon]

in 28 years here in Houston TX, not a single gas outage EVER. Electricity has failed, several times a year for a few seconds, occassionally a transformer will blow and we'll be out for a few hours. Longest service outage came during Hurricane Alicia where the eye came directly over the top of the house in the first year after it was built. Power was out for about 9 hours.

Live near a natural gas pipeline, within 500 yards. Live near a railroad that carries upwards of 30 trains a day (only one or two passenger trains) and that has had one or two significant derailments in

28 years. Never an evacuation here.

Natural gas is clean, and MORE reliable in delivery HERE than ANY other heat source!!!! Propane comes a close second. A quick web search turns up entries for folks that service the refining industry and not a SINGLE residential heat oil delivery firm. Course this is far from conclusive so I searched the 1200+ page local yellow pages. Only 9 entries and checking those out, it will be DIFFICULT to find a reliable supplier of home hating oil even here in the heart of the Texas refining area!!!!

[John]

I'd

Oh I always turn off the water too. After all any furnace (including oil with that big red RESET button) could sense a fault and shut down or the power could fail, or everything could work perfectly and a pipe breaks etc etc. Someone posted a neat picture (link in this newsgroup I mean) of a house that had been vacant in the winter and the oil company had not filled the tanks with the expected amount of oil and the pipes froze in zero degree F weather. Cool glacier coming down the garage doors.

A natural gas generator could keep you going too, offer auto start (and auto charging the batteries weekly, monthly, whenever you prefer) and burn much cleaner than a diesel engine. :)

That would be nice but unfortunately there is more to geo heat pumps than just putting coils below the frost line.

[John]

Not just oil heat of course, but "Today's Oil Heat." "Heat is Warm. And inviting...Blah blah"

As if a 70 degree warm house heated by one source would be any less warm than a

70 degree warm house heated by another...

[Paul M. Eldridge]

Perhaps "cheap" is a relative term. I paid $750.00 CDN for the installation of my indoor tank four years ago and this was a discounted price that required a minimum one-year commitment with my fuel oil supplier (Scotia Fuels).

More to the point, good friends of mine own a ski chalet in northern Nova Scotia. Their oil tank was located outside and two years ago someone had been stealing their heating oil by disconnecting the bottom feed line. Unfortunately, they didn't properly reconnect it and some 500 to 900 litres of heating oil leaked into the ground and contaminated a number of neighbouring wells. And as luck would have it, they also stole from the church next door, with the exaxt same consequences.

So, the long and the short is that they were sued and the insurance company covered only part of their legal and clean-up costs and now they can't buy homeowners insurance. Moreover, they're can't sell their home because there's still evidence of ground contamination (which might very well be from the neighbouring church). Needless to say, you don't discuss "the high cost of home heating oil" in their presence.

For more information on heating oil tanks and the potential risk of oil spills, see:

Cheers, Paul

[Robert Gammon]

>>>>

an egghunt for your

the numbers or is

find them on?

killed in this case,

compared to

America, not hostile

(exported 24.19 cubic

foreign policy and

existing fuel?

opposing electric

water heater, gas

efficient furnace

usage charges (similar

Besides even in

a good chance I'm

climates.

drains, which often have

the opposite,

Blasting IS required in the Hill Country of texas where rock is frequently only a few feet below the top soil.

[Paul M. Eldridge]

Natural gas here in Nova Scotia is available to probably less than

1,000 homes at this time (virtually all of the natural gas produced in this province is shipped off to New England, which is kind of a sore point for many Nova Scotians).

Be that as it may, according to Heritage Gas, our local distributor, natural gas currently costs $11.31 per GJ. On a heat content basis, that's said to be the equivalent of paying $0.43 per litre for fuel oil, $0.29 per litre for propane and $0.0407 per kWh for electricity.

Source:

On Friday, my heating oil supplier (Scotia Fuels) quoted me $0.819 per litre, which puts the relative cost of home heating oil at nearly twice that natural gas. As of my last propane delivery this past January, I paid Superior Propane $1.009 per litre, which places propane at roughly 3.5 times the cost of natural gas. Lastly, Nova Scotia Power charges $0.1013 per kWh, so electricity works out to be about 2.5 times more costly (conversion efficiency aside).

Cheers, Paul

[Pete C.]

None that I know of since as I indicated the population as a whole has lost a lot of skills and common sense over the years.

close to

Perhaps the comparison is better between gas and oil boilers which I have more experience with. Even so, with current oil furnaces the difference isn't that significant. Old units were certainly louder.

Yes, it would. Oil furnaces don't do the condensing thing (yet) due to cost factors mostly. If a fair increase in upfront cost would be tolerated by the market they could bump the efficiency up further that way with more expensive materials.

Look to the northwest corner of CT.

Because it hasn't? Very little electric production was ever oil. It's gone to nat. gas from coal and of course nuclear because of both political and economic reasons. Nat. gas used to be a lot cheaper before those peaking plants were built, which is one reason they were built to begin with. The siting and permitting for the relatively small nat. gas peaking plants was also easier which also led to the increase.

I *also* said nat. gas is less safe and less reliable than oil. All those factors combine to give more than adequate reason to avoid nat. gas.

You are also incorrect with your electric service analogy. I have more than a dozen electric suppliers I can choose from, only the distribution is a monopoly. Electric also is practical to provide backup for during outages where nat. gas is not.

Pete C.