OT: Supplemental electric heat to save $$$

[Mike Ioco]

This might be a dumb question, but I'll do anything to save money on heating costs this winter. Here in Michigan, our energy costs are expected to double.



I have a small two story house, and the first floor where the thermostat is at, can get 5-10 degrees cooler than the upstairs, when the furnace is on.



So I was thinking, is it worth it to buy a small electric heater - use it right now when it's not cold enough to have to turn on the furnace, just a little brisk on the first floor. I think it's 66 right now there.



Then in the winter, if the upstairs is comfy, but the first floor is a little cool, I could kick on the electric heater to warm up the first floor a little more, without cranking up the furnace.



Is it worth it to do something like that? I would think that the cost of the electricity to power the heater for a few hours, would be cheaper than running the furnace higher.



Your thoughts?

 

[Kevin Palmer]

In the end you'll probably find it to be a wash due to the additional electrical load. But you may be more comfortable so it would be worth that......

 

[troy malone]

why not close the vents up-stairs so most of the heat goes downstairs?



troy

 

[Nelson Atwell]

My first suggestion is the get a programmable thermostat. Program it to lower your home temperature about ten degrees while you are at work, and sleeping. You can set it to resume normal temperatures 45 minutes before you come home or wake up. A programmable thermostat can lower your heating/cooling energy usage by up to 30%. You can buy these for about $40, and they are easy to install by yourself. I did mine in 10 minutes..



You also should replace your normal light bulbs with high efficiency fluorescents. Wal-Mart now sells them in a package of six for $10. Lighting is a big portion of everyone's electric bill, and these bulbs use 13 watts to produce 60 watts of normal lighting. These buldb also last about 10 - 20 times as long as normal bulbs. I haven't had to replace any of mine yet.



Your space heater idea is good for small applications, such as bathrooms. There's nothing like a toasty bathroom when you are getting out of the shower. However, I wouldn't use it for an entire floor of the house, because it would be inefficient.. If you have a way of circulating the warm air upstairs to the lower level (i.e., a ceiling fan in a foyer near the staircase) that may be an option. Otherwise, I would suggest wearing a sweater to stay warm. Also, on sunny days, you can open the curtains on the south-facing windows to take advantage of solar heating. I do this, and it makes my bedroom toasty warm., even on cold days. Just make sure you close the curtains before the sun sets.



I've provided a link below to an energy saving guide from Lowes. It has many more ideas to save energy.

 

[Mike Ioco]

Troy - Done. I keep most of the upstairs ones closed except the bathroom and one in one bedroom, but all the heat travels up the stairwell.



Nelson - I do have an automatic thermostat set as you suggest. I also do keep the blinds open all day and close them at night. Ceiling fans I don't have though.



I have some weatherstripping to add to my front door, and I have all new Wallside windows, so I think I've done what I can to conserve energy. I was just hoping to have something to supplement the furnace downstairs, so that I didn't have to turn it too much, where upstairs get's too hot.



I'm also looking at adding a new humidifier upstairs to increase the ambient temp.

 

[Gerald Pierce]

My first suggestion is the get a programmable thermostat. Program it to lower your home temperature about ten degrees while you are at work, and sleeping. You can set it to resume normal temperatures 45 minutes before you come home or wake up. A programmable thermostat can lower your heating/cooling energy usage by up to 30%. You can buy these for about $40, and they are easy to install by yourself. I did mine in 10 minutes..

A word of caution if your heat is provided by an electric heat pump, when the temp differential between set temp and actual becomes to great, they have heat strips that kick in and greatly increase your electric usage until the temp comes back in line. I had a good friend that set his thermostat down during the day while at work and at night when sleeping as Nelson describes, and his electric bill almost doubled from it. He had several heating and ac folks come look at it and basically was told that on a heat pump, leave the thermostat pretty much alone, they are better at maintaining a temp than they are at rapidly warming to meet a temp requirement. YMMV, I am sure there are some folks here that are more knowledgable in HVAC than me

 

[Mike Skolnick]

Cruzrtwdgt is right, it's okay to lower the temp maybe 5-10 degrees when you're not home or late at night, but if you have force hot air/ac your unit will be working harder and longer to get the house to the right temp. Also electric space heaters in bathrooms are a bad idea even when plugged into a gfi !!!!! Does your house have an unfinished basement? Chech insulation in the attic and in basement...



hope this helps.

 

[Johnny O]

Depends on what your electric rates are. Mine are the third-highest in the country last I heard, so for me there's no point in using an electric heater.

 

[Richard L]

I would close all upstairs heat ducts, or shut off the radiators (depending on if you have hot air or hot water heat). Enough heat will rise up to keep the upstairs comfortable. I lived in Germany for 8.5 years and got used to sleeping in unheated bedrooms and find very comfortable and have less colds and other respiratory bugs. My daughters used to sleep in PJ with the feet in them and with an extra quilt or blanket and they had no problems either.

My landlord use to sleep with their bedroom wind OPEN during the winter if it was not snowing or raining! That was a bit too much for me. :wacko:



For the upstairs bath, you could use an electric heater that can be used when taking a shower or bath to keep it warm until you are done. Then shut it off to save energy. It might be worth investing in a special wall or ceiling mount electric heater with a timer that you can set and it will shut off automatically if you forget to.



If your stairway is enclosed by walls, you may be able to install a door at the bottom of the stairs to prevent your heat from rising up the stairway. Even better would be a door at the top and bottom of the stair way if possible.



If closing off the starway is not possible, I would look at some sort of fan an duct work to pump the warm air from the upstairs to the downstairs. Collect the hot air from near the ceiling on the second floor and pump it back downstairs to exit near the floor. A sneaky way to do this if you have a closet above another closet. You only need to install vents in the doors and a vent in the floor of the upstairs closet with a fan in the ceiling directly below in the first floor closet. The fan will draw the warm air from near the ceiling of the second floor and draw it into the closet through the high mounted vent, down through the floor/ceiling into the first floor closet and out the vent in the closet door. You can still used the closets just keep clothes and boxes away from the vents.



It's also possible to do the same thing using an interior wall cavity between the wall studs. This can be very effective and unabtrusive, however it will require cutting into the sheet rock, wall plates and flooring between floors. You may also need to remove any fire blocking in this one wall pocket. This technique is frequently used for quick and inexpensive cold-air returns.



I don't think electric heaters in normal living areas is practical in your area.



...Rich