That is cool. I had never seen wood compared to electric before. I had a guy a couple weeks ago tell me it was cheaper for him to use his heat pump instead of wood. My eyes about popped out of my head.
Well as you can see my presentation shows the amount of kw it takes to match one cord of wood. I think this data is the average of force air electric, baseboard, head pumps. Heat pump by itself would certainly be more competitive because I heard a lot of claims regarding their efficiency. I cannot testify to those claims but I know they are efficient and I know people love them because it cools in the summer and it is clean. In my neck of the woods their efficiency goes down as it hits -15 to -20 celcuis. In my opinion there is no heat like wood heat.
Here heat pumps are only efficient down to 20* F. We had some weather below zero and in the single digit for a couple weeks. There was an article in the newspaper about heat pumps. The HVAC guy (I actually have sold him wood) said less than 2% in this area are designed to work below 20.* FHC has a nice calculator but it does not include electric. firewoodhoardersclub.com/forums/resources/big-picture-btu-online-calculator.26/ You may also like the forum.
Good info, thanks GA! I subbed! I burn white birch at home here in NW Ontario. House is leaky, so I burn alot of NG as the first heat energy, but the woodstove tops it off and reduces my NG costs significantly. Burning wood is part of a healthy lifestyle, for me anyway. I have to split and stack wood, and haul loads inside every day, so its good exercise too. I live in the city and urban air quality is an issue, so I sure hope people with woodstoves upgrade to high efficiency stoves so that the cities don't ban wood burning. My high efficiency home stove exhaust is clear once the stove gets up to heat. I hear that some cities have, or are in the process of banning wood burning, and that would be tragic.
Yes. It is great work. I enjoy it as well. Man you need lots of wood in NW Ontario. White Birch is not the best wood you have to use what you have. I find it is not to bad if you don't let it sit to long. It also seems like you have to split it or it rots inside within 2 years. I guess birch bark doesn't breath that is why they use to make canoes out of it. Enjoy and thanks for your comments.
We have both, wood and two heat pumps.. 12,000 btu units.. I think we only had about 6 fires this winter, the heat pumps work great but works best if your home is open concept with few rooms. We also have one down stairs so the heat raises from the basement.. The heat pumps seem to heat the house more consistently than wood. We just have a wood stove in out living room and problem is , it gets to hot in the living room but colder in the bedrooms. We pretty much just use the wood now for those really cold days. I like having booth. Its a good combination. I would never get rid of the wood stove. Also nice to have when the power is off.. I wonder if a Pellet Stove produces as much heat as a regular wood stove? They burn clean and would be a good alternative for you Ray if the mess is an issue.
