40 gal just not enough: Replacing water heater for 2400 sq home. Family of 2 adults + 2 children

[Paul M. Eldridge]

Hi Edwin,

Few of us realize what lies ahead. It's not just higher gasoline prices, but rising home heating and cooling costs and higher food prices as well. Just about everything we purchase will be more expensive due to increased energy and transportation costs.

In just the past two years, the price of gasoline, home heating oil and diesel has doubled and by fall that will likely be true of natural gas. Thermal coal prices in some parts of the country have just about tripled in the past year which, in combination with natural gas, will send electricity prices upward. There will be no escaping it, no matter which way you turn.

Cheers, Paul

[Paul M. Eldridge]

Hi Edwin,

Here's a discussion of home heating oil in the great state of Maine:

I expect you'll hit the $5.00 a gallon mark sometime this fall and I'm even hearing talk of $6.00, which in light of the recent run-up in crude is probably not out of the question.

I'm currently paying $1.299 per litre/$4.92 a gallon, but that price has been steadily creeping upward week after week; last year, I was locked in at $0.889 a litre or $3.36 a gallon.

In '07-'08, I used a total of 702 litres/185 gallons of fuel oil for space heating and domestic hot water purposes and now that my DHW is pre-heated by a small electric tank, my consumption this coming year should fall below 400 litres/105 gallons. At this point, heating oil prices could double or triple again and the financial impact would be minimal.

Cheers, Paul

[KLS]

Where is "here," honey? $3.99 is the best I can do in western New York, and that's at my local buyer's club, BJ's.

[S. Barker]

And _MY_ original comment that was being referred to here was about _HERE_.

s

[S. Barker]

KC

s

[S. Barker]

Well now IF you wanna talk ethanol, then i can say i'm still paying $2.84 here (for E85) . And am using the explorer almost exclusively because of it.

s

[Caesar Romano]

On Sun, 8 Jun 2008 14:36:34 -0700 (PDT), ransley wrote Re Re: 40 gal just not enough: Replacing water heater for 2400 sq home.:

Everything hurts the lower class, even prosperity (because the LC doesn't benefit as much from it as everyone else).

[RicodJour]

Your original comment:

From: "S. Barker" Date: Tue, 15 Apr 2008 10:59:17 -0500 Local: Tues, Apr 15 2008 11:59 am Subject: Re: 40 gal just not enough: Replacing water heater for 2400 sq home. I usually go by the official national average. You could hardly call CA or HI a normal place.

Make up your mind - are you going by the national average or what the absolute lowest price gas is in a 20 mile radius?

Actually, you don't have to - your opinion on where gas is going doesn't mean anything. It's also a spurious argument to rely on the lowest gas price listed on something like gasbuddy.com.

I'll check back with you in a month and see if you've learned to say, "Oops, I was wrong."

R

[ransley]

What a Joke, an Explorer E85 is rated 14 MPG HIGHWAY, e85 is cheap for a reason, and 14 mpg hwy is just dumb, what does it really get in the winter in city driving, 8? The shoe fits.

[Paul M. Eldridge]

Just to flesh this out a bit more...

Note the following quote is a little out of date:

``At $4 per gallon gas, $125 per barrel oil and $10 per million Btu natural gas, a lot of activity becomes uneconomical,'' says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com..."

Crude oil is now trading between $135.00 and $140.00 a barrel and the Henry Hub and NYC gate spot prices for natural gas are $12.71 and $14.09 per MM BTU respectively.

Cheers, Paul

[Jonathan Grobe]

Don't power companies buy coal via long-term contracts--not on the spot market?

[dpb]

...

Yes, but contracts continually expire and new ones must be negotiated at prevailing prices...

Fuel cost surcharges are standard in virtually all markets so if one watches carefully the effects will undoubtedly start to become apparent w/ time...

[Paul M. Eldridge]

Hi Jonathan,

As dpb pointed out, supply contracts allow utilities to purchase coal at a fixed price -- or at a periodically reset price if they contain escalator clauses -- but when they expire the new negotiated price will reflect current market conditions; hedges or multiple contracts that expire at different times will help soften the blow, but they can't put off the inevitable. Higher transportation costs are another contributing factor.

A year ago, my utility was purchasing thermal coal at $60 per metric tonne; today, that has risen to $130 per tonne and the general expectation is that it will be heading higher. They've applied for a

12.1 per cent increase and are negotiating with the PUC to establish a separate fuel rider, which tends to suggests they expect greater long-term price volatility.

Cheers, Paul

[<h>]

$4.15 for regular here in upstate NY.

[RicodJour]

Yeah? That was Friday, what is it now?

R

[RicodJour]

Ouch.

R

[S. Barker]

$3.79 Monday 5pm.

s

[Glenn]

$3.999 in Shawnee KS. That&#39;s getting pretty close to 4 bucks.

"S. Barker" wrote in message news:8t-dnRCwqrGHIdDVnZ2dnUVZ [e-mail]...

[RicodJour]

Yeah, but when it&#39;s $4.05 everywhere in Kansas City, he&#39;ll be telling us he buys his gas at Habib&#39;s Gas & Go, home of near beer and near gas, for only $3.85. ;)

R

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Cheap. $4.39 tonight. In MA (where I work)I can still get $3.99