Estimated Yearly Savings by Using Coal

Since my cost of electricity went up 7.4% about half a year ago but my cost for coal has remained stable, I'm presently getting 7.4% of additional benefit from my coal.

i used 6.6 ton of pellets for 2 quadrafire cb1200's in a 3,000 sq foot house... that was a mistake..

1200 bucks a year to be close to 70 isnt that bad though..

Im hopeing to be around 750$ this year and close to 80

I love reading these types of threads. We have a small ag operation that has grown a bit over the years. So looking at HDD for past winters and making some assumptions. $12,000 that would be spent on HO and kerosene is now $2800 with anthracite. That makes me a free spender in the coal world..... love that stuff. Last winter was a real eye opener.

last yr. I bought 11, 680 #'s of coal, and with what I had left I had an even 12,000 #'s. the previous yr. I used 12,000 #'s.

this yr. I am buying 5,000 #'s to refill the large bin I was using out of last yr. i'll have 4.9 tons or 9,800 #'s to start the season and don't expect to use more than 6,000 #'s max.

so i'm buying stoves to rebuild right and left with the savings and working toward getting free of the work a day grind that has been hampering my income potential.

1960s 1400 sq foot ranch with a full basement. Ran through 2.5 tanks of oil our first winter in NE Ohio and it was a mild winter. We installed a Vermont Castings wood insert as we have access to free wood and dropped usage down to about 1 - 1.5 tanks a year. At the time oil was $4 a gallon so the insert paid for itself in about 2 years.

My Yukon Husky Oil/Wood/Coal whole house furnace gets delivered tomm. I will probably always keep some oil on hand but I imagine I will drop to 150 gallons a year and with oil at $2 a gallon it makes sense to have a back up

I don't imagine oil will stay this cheap forever and my saving will come from being able to keep the whole house at a constant 70 and not hear the wife complain she's cold

I will be curious to see the savings this year. With oil and nat gas so cheap (I don't have nat gas available yet). I know with as brutal as last winter was, my neighbors were going through at least 3 tanks of oil a season at $2.25 a gallon plus all the associated "fees". I went through 1.25 tanks.

Welcome to the FORUM DJ. When ya figure out that YUKON for just coal--your oil usage should be ZERO--got friends with MUCH bigger old farmhouses that do just that with the same furnace.

i have natural gas available but I choose not to use it for heat. it costs me $30 per month just to heat hot water and run the kitchen stove. I really don't think it would be any cheaper anyways. would it be cheaper then the pellets I was using, probably but I don't think it would beat out coal. coal is a difficult fuel to beat, its fairly in-expensive and products massive amounts of heat. I for one am impressed with the performance of my keystoker 90K. I actually hate utility companies and all of their associated fees. when I look at my gas bill its not even straight forward to figure out how much I am being charged for the fuel itself. you have weather adjustment fee, multiple delivery charges, taxes ect. I don't understand how a utility company can charge a delivery charge, last I checked a national fuel truck didnt pull up to my house; the coal truck did. I paid the coal truck $20 per ton for delivery which I happily paid since a physical vehicle actually pulled up to my driveway.

not only that but I think I can control costs better. I do not have a bill showing up with a $? attached. I know how much I spent, and the coal is on the porch. I guess I just take issue with paying for something AFTER I have already consumed said product.

also don't forget the appliance itself. my coal stove is a keystoker 90K that I bought used for $800. I called keystoker to figure out how old the unit is, I found out its a 2006 model year. its a 2006 and its no-where near the end of its life. if I take care of it I could see it lasting another 20 years or more. a modern high efficiency furance is nothing like that. in order to make them high efficiency they must have thin heat ex-changers so they can heat up faster. the heat ex-changers will wear out allot faster then an older style furnace. gone are the days of a gas furnace lasting decades. they are also packed with electronics that can fail. stokers stoves are simple, reliable, and solid. I think 10 years or less is probably the norm for a modern furnace. so that's another factor you have to consider you might have to replace the furnace more often then a coal fired stoker stove.

personally I just switched to coal and I love it, it seems like its the very best source of heat for this 120 year old farmhouse. the thermostat is set to 68 degrees and its steady heat

Since I was a wood burner for 40 years before this year, and owned enough property to cut 10 cords /year for heat & hot water, the cost to heat my home was $0. Now I am a 5 ton/ year coal burner that cost me $1500/year. I plan on cutting some wood each year in the future to sell to offset my coal costs.

Well HF, so far my KS 90,000 is managing 2500' of well insulated kinda OK. The circ . fan is a little weak for that kind of duty and if the weather turns nasty I think I will have to upgrade. Trouble is I really like that little stove. In your neck of the woods I think you may need a little more punch. Annual savings - a whole lot at this stage I am sure but I am no isayre. I CN land, if you are saving a ton you don't need to do the maths.

Clousseau wrote:Since I was a wood burner for 40 years before this year, and owned enough property to cut 10 cords /year for heat & hot water, the cost to heat my home was $0. Now I am a 5 ton/ year coal burner that cost me $1500/year. I plan on cutting some wood each year in the future to sell to offset my coal costs.

Sounds like you are doing your back a big favor.

Rob R. wrote:Sounds like you are doing your back a big favor.

AMEN!! When I was doing a lot of wood the $$ saved on the health club membership were offset by the $$ spent on the chiropractor and advil, especially before I had the log splitter and was using the maul and wedge's.

Burning2nd wrote:i used 6.6 ton of pellets for 2 quadrafire cb1200's in a 3,000 sq foot house... that was a mistake..

1200 bucks a year to be close to 70 isnt that bad though..

Im hopeing to be around 750$ this year and close to 80

I know this post was in june but I really wonder about the math. pellets are going for $260 aprox per ton now. that's north of $1,700. not really sure where that $1,200 figure came from but its way off. you would have to be around $170 per ton to realize that final cost of $1,200. pellets havent been $170 in quite a while, I do remember them being that "cheap" but it must have been 5-6 years ago.

my savings last winter I was around 7 ton of pellets this winter so far I havent even burned two tons yet. I see myself having around 1 ton left maybe a little more. I started winter with 4 tons on hand. yes we had a very mild fall and that did help things. I think that if I was heating with coal last winter (it was miserable) I probably would be around 4 tons of coal.

i am heating a very old historical (lets just call it that lol) farmhouse built in 1895. it has seen some more modern windows and additional insulation but it is no where near what a modern home would be as far as being air tight.

i find coal to be WAY more efficient. the house is warmer and I am burning allot less fuel. pellets suck sorry I ever bought into them. I wasted allot of money on pellets. the first year I owned the house I bought an el-cheapo tractor supply stove. it cost $1,000 and I had that rebate at the time. out of pocket around $800 with venting. pulled that stove out because it was in-adequate sold that unit for $300 to get rid of it. I bought a harman, the dealer convinced me that it was the el-cheapo stove was the reason for not enough heat not the fact that the fuel sucks as well. I went into the Harman dealer looking at the mag stoker. he convinced my wife and I that coal is dirtier then pellets and that we didnt want a coal stove unless we put it in the basement. granted the Harman pellet was better then the el-cheapo but last the last two winters with weeks of negative temps was enough to convince me. we were buying 6-7 tons of pellets to still have a cold home. enough was enough. I sold the Harman for $1,200 and bought my used keystoker 90. what a difference even with having a few bitter, nasty spells I just turned the stoker up a little and the house was 68-70 NOT A CHALLENGE. with pellets we were lucky to be at 60 in those conditions and we were supplementing with small electric space heaters.

warm house, 1-4 ton delivery for a whole winters of heat, less filling stove, less dust (believe it or not, pellets are dirtier then coal every-time you dump a bag in the stove fines=dust. the only minus on coal is more ash, its not that big of a deal. I was able to re-use my existing masonry chimney that cannot be used for wood. coal is much safe with cool stack temps. even with the stove rocking serious heat that black pipe thermometer wont even exceed 160 degrees.

i am extremely impressed and I think I would estimate year savings to be around $7-800 bucks per year AND the house is actually heated adequately

Four plus yrs of heating with coal and the biggest savings to date is an American job! How much? I don't know but it is part of one for sure.

probably a job that pays a living wage as well, and if you own an American made stove and bought any parts there is another job. I for one am sick and tired of the direction this country has headed most of my lifetime. less and less opportunity for blue collar workers, more and more lower paying $10 per hour B.S. jobs. the white collar and uber rich well they are doing just fine