Saturday, January 12, 2008

Oil Heat

Interesting: look at how much higher gas prices are in Huntington.

Also, I've been chatting with someone about home-heating oil prices. He, and others have recommended keeping a little kerosene as a backup for emergencies, such as when you run out and need a little fuel while waiting for a delivery. It started with a question about using diesel fuel as an alternative to home heating oil--apparently it stinks to high heaven. Here's the explanation about kerosene:

Just 2 comments on the diesel/heating oil etc. Diesel is heating oil -- only a different grade (No. 1 through No. 6 -- with No. 1 cleanest, No .2 the typically delivered home heating oil down to No. 6 for large industrial oil furnaces with "scrubbers" to preclean and precondition before it will actually burn). In fact, the same filters are used in large trucks as are (or at least should be) on your burner.

If you run out, you're better off to get kerosene instead of diesel and add it to your heating oil tank. It works the same -- only much, much cleaner. And, you save money because you do not have to pay as much in the taxes on the kero. Diesel is $00.185 cents per galls (CPG) in federal tax and typcially another 30+ cpg in State taxes THEN add the sales and gross receipts tax. WHereas kero pays only the sales/gross receipt tax. Personally, we keep 10 gallons of kero stored in the garage through the winter -- that way if the we run out unexpectedly, I can get through 2-3 days with the kero. But more importantly, if the electric goes out for any long period, we can drain the heating pipes and use the kero in our old reliable kero heater. If all goes well through the winter, we just use up all the oil and add the kero to the tank to clean and condition the system in the Spring.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Why not just start using a B5 blend of oil. It has a higher BTU content, produces less emissions, eliminates greenhouse gases, burns cleaner, and it's domestically produced. Here at NORA I have come to research green alternatives and I have since switched over to this 'greener' heating oil. Honestly, it warms my house up much quicker and it costs about the same as regular oil. Oh, and due to the higher BTU I can use for longer periods of time. You should definitely look into it.

Check this out: http://oilheatamerica.com/index.mv?screen=bioheat

You can get more info about Bioheat on that site. That's what got me interested in the first place.