Cost effective system for small apartment wing

tim smith

You would want to verify this in advance. Tim

Bill_Mar

Cost effective system for new apartment wing.

I am building a new wing off my house in New England, which will be a 3-room in-law apartment. I could heat it & provide it with hot water directly from the boiler in my house. However, some day I might be in the position of renting this unit, so I would prefer that it has its own heat & utilities.

So, my question is: What is the most cost effective way to heat this stand-alone (attached only on one side) 750-square foot 3-room apartment. It will have a full foundation & celaar, os it can accomodate its own equipment. I am open to almost any type of fuel (except wood & pellets). I do not have access to gas in my town except propane in a domestic tank. The only other options I can thik of are oil & electric.

What are my options? Any thoughts?

ALH_4

Electric

What is your local electric rate? A Laing EPR heater might be just the ticket unless you have high electric rates.

UniR_3

Super-insulation!

"What is the most cost effective way to heat this stand-alone (attached only on one side) 750-square foot 3-room apartment."

Heating systems only replace the heat that leaks out. Get your losses small enough and electric like Andrew suggested would be an excellent energy source.

Insulation is a one time cost.

Brad White

All good advice so far

yes, do make that addition snug with sealing and insulation.

Being a New Englander myself, I know our electric rates are nothing to brag about, but getting a small heat loss well-served with any fossil-fuel appliance is a challenge- they are mostly too big!

So.... if electricity is the way, low temperature hydronic radiant floors are a great start- coupled to a water to water or ground-source heat pump. Rather than paying 18 cents a kWH for 3,413 BTUH, you can get 2-3 times that or more for the same money. COP's can be higher still. In summer you can make chilled water for AC needs while heating or pre-heating domestic HW.

That will serve heating and most domestic HW needs. If domestic falls sort on temperature as it may, at least it is pre-heated and can be finished with a regular electric HW heater.

Just another approach.

Bill_Mar

Thanks so much for the ideas!

Now let me change the question. The apartment already exists & I want to do a conversion from baseboard hot water heat, which runs off the house's maing boiler. The reason for this is so the apartment can meter & control its own heat. This will aloow me to charge separately for heat & hot water instead of continually bumping up the rent & it will give the tenants an incentive to be frugal with their use of heat. Sorry to pose the question as a new addition, but I thought that it would be less compllicated & I was interested in how people would approachy this if they were starting from scratch.

The Laing looks like it may have some real possibilities & would allow me to use the existing piping. It appears that it would have to be ordered directly from Germany. What kind of contractor would do the installation & any peripherals?

Thanks again for your thoughts.