Difference between ELectric floor board heaters and Gas Furnace?? is one a lot more efficent and cheaper?


Question:how much so

Answers:
I’m assuming you mean baseboard heaters.

Electric rates vary a lot from state to state, but electric heating is generally more expensive than gas heat. Unless you compare central gas heating with individual room controlled electric heat and practice some energy management. With central heating, you are heating your whole house, whereas with electric heating, you control each room individually; heating only the rooms when they are used.

The equipment cost of baseboards is much less than that of a gas furnace, but you have to look at what you have presently. If you currently have a central gas furnace, the cost of re-wiring your house would probably more than cancel the savings. If your house does not presently have baseboards, you will probably also need to change the main fuse panel. Electric heat also means putting in an air exchanger and that can ruin your savings if you put in an inefficient one. If, on the other hand, you currently have baseboards, then the cost of running ducts will far outweigh any potential savings.

In one of my houses, I replaced an old gas forced air furnace (about 65% efficiency) with a new high-efficiency unit (about 95%) and realized great savings.

In an other house, I converted from radiant gas (60% efficiency) to electric heat (100% efficiency) and saved. In this case, I was doing a whole house renovation and was replacing the fuse panel anyway. The walls were also open so the wiring cost came down to the cost of the wire itself. The savings came from installing individual programmable thermostats in every room and setting them to turn down the heat substantially whenever the room was not in use. My decision was still driven by the installed cost and space constraints.

In my current house, I installed a wall-mounted heat pump (up to 400% efficiency depending on outside temperature) to realize savings. If the coldest it gets in winter is never below 17F, then a heat pump will work all year long; otherwise, you will need a back-up heating system.

If you chose to go with electric heat, consider using convectors instead of baseboards. They take up less wall space and heat the air more efficiently. See the link below for the ones that I use. If you still want to use baseboards, mount them a few inches above the floor and ¾”–1” away from the wall to increase their efficiency. Also, consider using programmable, electronic, proportional thermostats (see link).

In summary:
·Electric heat 100% efficient
·Gas heat up to 95% efficient
·Electric heat low equipment cost
·Gas heat high equipment cost
·Electricity generally costs more than Gas BTU for BTU
·Retrofit gas heat to electric without major renovations is very expensive
·Retrofit electric heat to gas without major renovations is very expensive

Good luck!


gas will be alot cheaper to operate, say twice as much heat for half the price..
baseboard heaters get damaged to easily costly to run

I do have all electric heat in my home it is heated floor on off peak saved a huge amount over gas. used easy heat XD cable that stores the heat in the cement slab turns on at 8pm off at 8 am enough heat stored to last all day. get half priced electric during the night.
I don't know where you live but the price of fuel has went up so much here that it cost more to heat with gas then electric.

Baseboard heaters are not the best way to go though. It is worth the extra expense to use central air if you can afford it.

The floor heaters are a good way to go but is a big remodel job.

Gas is the warmest felling in my opinion though.

A wood burner is cheap but a lot of work & a lot to keep clean.

I'm very happy with my wood burner but I think in the next house I will put in one that burns outside.

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