Vacant apartment- turn off heat to save $?

bipbap

We have an empty top floor apartment that needs renovation and will be empty throughout a winter in NYC.

Will we save any money by turning off the radiators in that apartment? And if we did turn them off would it negatively affect the rest of the system?

Of course we’d keep the kitchen radiator on to keep pipes warm but there are 3 others in living and dining rooms and bedroom.

Also this is a single pipe steam system.
Thank you!

KC_Jones

That apartment will still present as load on the system, so instead of the "outside" being above the roof it would essentially now be in that apartment. This adds load to what is below it, which I'm guessing has no insulation between floors.

Also on steam you effectively oversize the boiler, and potentially cause system imbalance.

How were you planning on shutting them off? Turning the valves off for a long period is generally considered a bad idea as they typically don't seal well. Because of this steam can usually still get in, but the opening is too small for the water to drain back, basically you end up filling it with water.

Keeping just the kitchen (and bathroom I assume) on could be risky if the run times are such that it doesn't get adequate heat to keep pipes from freezing. If it was me and a full renovation was coming, I'd just winterize that apartment, cut off all the water lines antifreeze the drains and be done with the worry.

JUGHNE

If the rad valve does not shut off 100%, steam will sneak thru into the rad. It will condense and the rad fill with water as the 99.5% closed valve will not allow return. Rad full of water could freeze and crack.
If you need new valves anyway you could remove them and cap the riser pipes.

I would leave them on.

Jamie Hall

A further issue is humidity. If the apartment is allowed to go cold, inevitably some warmer air will get up there from the rest of the building. As it cools, the moisture in that warmer air will condense on everything in the space. If you're looking at a gut reno, this may not be a problem. Otherwise, you may have problems with plaster or plasterboard damage and mildew or mold.