Heating bill seems high?

Aaron Hovel

I recently moved into a house with a one pipe steam system. I am new to steam heat. Spent most of my life with forced hot air. We keep our house at 63 during the day and set it back to 57 at night. Our house is about 1700 sq feet. We live in New England. Last month (December) the average high was 41 and the average low was 21 for the month. We used a total of 243 CCFs for the month. The bill was $309.00. This is much higher than I am used to for such a mild month. The normal daily cycle takes about 25 minutes. The heat comes on at 62 and shuts of at 64. The heater is running about 27 hours a week. We keep the thermostat set at 63 during the day. The pipes in the basement are insulated except for the T’s and elbows. Haven’t found a place to buy these yet.
My Question: This energy use and heating bill seems high. Is there something wrong with my system or is this the type of energy usage I can expect.

Thanks,

Aaron

ed wallace

hi bills

could be a number of things boiler could be oversized or not piped correctly biggest thing in new england is if you have nstar for a gas supplier check your bill most of the bill is for delivery charges not for the gas used

Mark K

Wondering the same thing myself

Aaron,

I have almost exactly the same situation and the same questions. I live in the Boston area, in a 105 year-old house with one-pipe steam. This is my first winter in the house. The mains are insulated and seem to be vented properly. The boiler is a gas-fired Burnham, about 12 years old. The house is 1890 sq ft. The house has all original windows with triple-track storms outside. The system heats up quickly and the heat is very even upstairs and down, I have no comfort complaints at all.

Keyspan is the gas utility here, and they came out in October and did a blower door test/air sealing throughout the house, along with blowing 6 inches of insulation in the attic.

I just got my latest bill from Keyspan, for 37 days (12/8-1/13), and it was for 228 therms ($329.00@$1.45/therm). We have a Chronotherm setback thermostat which we set at 63 evenings/weekends, and 57 nights/middays. I, too, was wondering if this was a reasonable bill, or if my house is still an energy hog? According to the Keyspan energy audit on their website, my house is exactly average in heating costs.

Anybody else have any observations about a "reasonable" gas heating bill? I know gas prices are outrageous right now, so maybe this is as good as it will get?

Constantin

As Ed pointed out...

... the price of gas has less to do with the cost of the gas and more to do with the cost of distribution.

If you look at the line items on your bill, you'll see that of the $1.5/therm we pay up here, about $1.03 is for transportation, the rest for the fuel itself. Thus, the actual cost of gas makes up less than 1/3 of the total cost to you. Plus, as we all know, that the transportation/distribution cost component will never go down unless the regulators change the rules.

IMHO, the way the rate structure is calculated up here has to change, to the tune of ending the subsidization of large consumers and hence finally incentivizing them to save energy. The regressive cost structure of gas delivery makes it very difficult for large customers to justify spending their own dough to save energy - it usually doesn't pay off unless it gets subsidized.

Mark K

But that doesn't really answer the question

I don't think our questions were regarding the components of the price/therm, but rather, how does our usage compare to others'?

I realize that most of the cost of a therm of gas, just as with electricity, is composed of fees and customer charges, and such. What I really wanted to know, for an example, is there a similar house down the street from me which only needed 100 therms for heating, whereas I needed 228 therms for the same period? My boiler doesn't seem to run that often to keep the house warm (maybe only once every couple of hours), so it surprised me that it could have used so much gas. I've never owned an old house before, never had a steam heating system, and I've never used gas for heating prior to this, so I've got little to compare it to.

Chuckles_3

The bills are within the normal range, but that doesn't mean they cannot be reduced. Both of you have moved recently, possibly someplace larger and/or older than your former home and in a different geographical area. It may be the boiler, it may be the house.

In any case, what is needed but missing is the number of degree-days in the billing period. It may be on your gas bill. Can you calculate and post the BTU used PER degree-day PER square foot? (The number of days in the billing period is immaterial if you have the total degree-days.) There are 100,000 BTU to the therm.

In an old house, 8-10 is fine, over 15 is bad. New, well-constructed houses may be only 4 to 5 or even less.

You may also want to calculate the same ratio for your previous house (if you have the data for any winter month) and see if there is really much difference. Comparing dollar amounts is not useful because of variations in home size, home construction, gas prices and weather.

Mark K

Thanks for the Information

Hi,

Here is the information from my recent gas bill:

Average Temperature: 34 ° F
Total Usage (Therms): 228
Average Daily Usage (Therms): 6.16
Total Degree Days: 1,132
Total Usage (Cost): $329.82
Average Cost per Therm: $1.45

Mark K

Hi Chuckles,

Here is the information from my recent gas bill:

Average Temperature: 34 ° F
Total Usage (Therms): 228
Average Daily Usage (Therms): 6.16
Total Degree Days: 1,132
Total Usage (Cost): $329.82
Average Cost per Therm: $1.45

My house is 1890 sq ft. So, if I'm doing the math correctly:

(228*100,000)/1132 = 20,141.342

20,141.342/1890 = 10.66

So I guess I'm on the higher end of normal for a 105 year old house? I guess I'm surprised, considering how low we set the thermostat, and all the air-sealing that was done.

steve_77

degree days

If you live in the northeast, there is comprehensive degree day data for many cities and towns available at http://www.erh.noaa.gov/box/dailystns.shtml.

Chuckles_3

We have an 85-year-old house, and after a blower test and lots of sealing, attic and wall insulation, and a condensing hot water boiler, we're at about 11.

You may be able to reduce your gas bills a little by looking for small improvements, but if you're below 11, nothing you do will cause a dramatic change. Insulation does help; if the attic is well-insulated, doing the walls would be the next thing, but the cost/benefit ratio for that is not as much in your favor as for attic insulation, which is easy(cheap) and effective. One blower test actually makes hardly any difference in an old house, because there are so many leaks, not just the big ones. (You really have to seal the obvious leaks and repeat the blower test, and do this over and over about 5-10 times, to hunt down the small leaks.) Changing to a condensing hot water boiler will help about 20%, but you'll never recoup the cost of converting.

Anyway, I think you now have what you wanted, which is a quantitative measure. You're in the ballpark, there is no major problem.

gearjammer2005

high heating bills

this may be comparing apples to oranges as far as gas bills go but I also live in the metro Boston area and am the owner of a 1800sq ft home buolt in 1863 one pipe steam 500sq feet of radiation 26 year old wm boiler that I and a real old timer installed from scratch we built the perfect 1930 steam system. House is kept at a constant 63 temp is fairly even through out the house oil useage has averaged about 2.6 gallons a day since november 15 total useage for sept03 to sept04 564 gallons system is very quiet never runs on pressure @1.64 per gallon do the math. Who says steam isn't efficent. I also have a 100 year old victorian in the White Mountains of new Hampshire That still has the original boiler in tact also ha 20 year old Dunkirk and have been able to achieve equal results. Side note steam heat is still king in northern N.H.

Mark K

Yes, that is exactly what I wanted

Thanks, Chuckles

I just wanted to make sure that there wasn't something seriously wrong with my heating system. I know that steam systems can be finicky if not maintained properly.

As for your post, Al, if I read you correctly, it's costing you about half as much to heat your house as it's costing me to heat mine. Granted, some of that is due to the price diff between oil and gas, but do you have another secret to your "magic"?

Aaron Hovel

BTU/Degree Day/Foot

BTU = 250 X 100000 = 25000000
25000000/935 = 26737.96 BTU/Degree Day
26737.96/1700 = 15.72 BTU/Degree Day/Sq. Foot

So, it looks like I am on the high side. Any suggestions? We have new windows, but I don't think there is much insulation. Could the gas meter be off. The readings are accurate but maybe it needs to be recalibrated?

Thanks for all of you help so far.

gearjammer2005

great site

I just have to say I never realized that that so many people feel the same way as I do about steam heat. My wife jokes that my mission on earth is to rescue as many old heating systems as possible and to find homes for abandoned radiators I now have a barn full of them.I guess this goes back to my childhood love of anything mechainal.Thanxs for letting me ramble on

Mark K

Check with your gas company

Aaron,

I'd check with your gas company regarding energy conservation programs they offer. In my case, they paid 50% of the cost of the blower door test/air sealing, as well as the additional attic insulation. Getting on top of the air sealing is especially important in older homes. It's hard for me to know what my bills would look like if I hadn't done that work, but I'm sure it must be helping.

Constantin

Yup...

I did my research before gutting the place we will be living in. Corbond in the old walls, icynene in the new ones, Harvey Tru-channel windows in front of the historic glass, Marvin high-eff ones in the new part, etc.

By the calculation above, our house is expected to come out at 5.5BTU/(ft² x HDD)... and by any measure, we're unlikely to ever recover the cost of the insulation, etc. Since we don't use gas for heat, we had to do some searching to figure out how to get a blower door test. However, even oil heat can get an subsidized energy audit, if you go to the Energystar.gov web-site, fill out an application, and so on.

On the other hand, we get a nice pat on the back from Energystar, plus some rebates. The local conservation folks predict the house will get a 90 score on the Resnet scoring system, an Energystar, and that it will consume 50% less fuel than a house that meets minimum federal building standards. That's good enough for me.

Chuckles_3

Yes,it is worth trying to improve a ratio over 15. Have you had your steam system professionally checked? I know nothing about steam, but I believe it is easy for steam systems to be out of whack. Then there's attic insulation, air leaks, etc., etc.

The recipe I gave is pretty approximate...it also depends on the shape of the house...a ranch, for example, is long and flat, and so has more external surface area from which to lose heat than a four-square with the same floor area. And attics/basements aren't always included in sq ft calculations but they do affect the heat loss. In fact uninsulated basement walls are a major weak link in old houses.

Another thing to look into is getting some some IR photography to show where the heat is being lost. It was fascinating to see our house in infrared...bright chimney, bright foundation walls, but dark siding and windows (so our windows were not a problem). The bathroom exhaust fan vent stood out like a searchlight, even though the fan was not on. This process also helped identify sections of the siding that had not been insulated by the previous owner.

Weezbo

'Compared to What?'

Les McCann.

Aaron Hovel

Thanks for all of your help

The boiler was recently serviced and got a good bill of health.

I will look into insulation and sealing up the house.

Thanks again,
Aaron

Aaron Hovel

Thanks for all of your help

The boiler was recently serviced and got a good bill of health.

I will look into insulation and sealing up the house.

Thanks again,
Aaron

Mad Dog

As the others have said...........................

it could be a number of things, my friend. Insulation, thermostat, no or way-undersized main vents, oversized boiler, pressure too high, wrong thermostat like you have. A Honeywell t-87 will work best. HOWEVER, We get many calls from NEW homeowners who are in the house for the first winter who ask this question. My advice: get a Steam Professional from this site in for an evaluation. Follow his advice on improvements and do the best you can. Take before and after stats of burner run time et cetera . Sometimes well-meaning homeowners have to accept the fact that when everything that can be done is done, their gas bill will be what it will be...and they will have to live with that. Improve what you can asap, get through one full heating season and then you will have a realistic idea of what it should be. Good luck. Mad Dog

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Mad Dog

Exactly Mark....so its probably not as bad as you think

From what you describe, it doesn't sound way out of whack. Mad Dog

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Sweet_2

Well said

Well put Mad Dog

Bill Nye_2

Aaron, Mark

It may be a pressuretrol adjustment, air vents, dirty water. If there is oil on the surface of the water it can not break into steam easily. Did you do everything to seal up the obvious leaks in the house, windows , etc.,

try setting back only to 60°. I would suggest a $20 book from our esteemed host Mr. Holohan that will pay you back 100fold in savings and knowledge. try this link........

http://www.heatinghelp.com/shopcart/product.cfm?category=2-109

cut & paste or simply go to Books and More

eburke_29

don't forget eddie harris