Burning coal and loving it
I’m a coal-burning Neanderthal. But my house is warm and my electric bill is tiny so… I’m good with it.
Back in college a professor reminded the class that burning a primary energy source for heat was always more energy efficient than electric heat. Why burn fuel to make steam to make electricity and pipe it across vast distances into your house to convert it back to heat with resistance coils while losing energy at every transfer and conversion? Isn’t it better just to burn it and get the heat out yourself?
So we do. Coal is regional in PA, and anthracite is hard, black coal that burns cleaner and hotter than Bituminous coal that is used in power plants.
The house is warmer that when we used all electric heat, and savings are about $50 / month. We’ll see after the cold season is over, but it’s looking good.
So I’m actually reducing global warming emissions by burning coal in my house and using less electricity (made from burning coal).
Yay me.
When we bought the house, there was a black stove in the far corner of the garage, that got covered with boxes for most of a year. I got the garage cleaned and saw it was a coal burning stove. Had it inspected and for a mere $400-500 they would clean and service and replace the broken part for me. So I called the manufacturer and they sent me the manual. I cleaned it and ran a little coal through it to make sure I wouldn’t burn down the house if I fired it up. All went well.
I got the coal stove running in december. Got it pretty efficient Early Jan.
Primary house heat is electric radiant ceiling coils.
Coal stove in garage vented to register on living floor.
Power bills:
Allegheny Power (Electric) 2/7/2008 $40.03
Allegheny Power (Electric) 1/7/2008 $214.13
Allegheny Power (Electric) 12/6/2007 $115.74
Allegheny Power (Electric) 11/6/2007 $62.43
About $300 in coal so far, and I have over 1/2 of it left. So, 1/3 ton burned. Turns out to about $100 month at current burn rate.
Plus the house is 5-8 degrees warmer all over.
And more of the money I’m spending goes directly to local / regional workers.
Now it shows to make economical sense as well.
