switch boiler from oil to gas?
I’d like any basic advice people can provide in selecting a new boiler. My current oil boiler (a Peerless) works but is cracked inside. My basic question is: should I replace it with another oil boiler or switch to gas? The house: – relatively narrow, 4-story, 2-family 130-year-old rowhouse – I’ve gotten better windows and…
I’d like any basic advice people can provide in selecting a new boiler. My current oil boiler (a Peerless) works but is cracked inside. My basic question is: should I replace it with another oil boiler or switch to gas?
The house:
– relatively narrow, 4-story, 2-family 130-year-old rowhouse
– I’ve gotten better windows and put in more insulation, but it is always going to have some hard to seal nooks and crannies
– contains 13 radiators
– bottom floors currently much warmer than top ones, so I’m looking into different radiator valves, and into possible up-sizing a top-floor radiator and adding two electric fireplaces (I don’t want to rip up the original 130-year-old floors and mantelpieces to run gas lines)
– last year I spent about $1800 on oil
My questions:
– Is there a significant cost difference between #2 oil and gas, or any other advantages or disadvantages of which I should be aware?
– Given the relatively mild winters in NYC (I grew up in Minnesota, so this is tropical in comparison), does it make sense to invest in a higher-efficiency (and more expensive) boiler, or stick to a more basic model which will nevertheless be a huge improvement over my cracked old one? I saw a post two months ago about boilers with outdoor resets, which makes a lot of sense. How much does this cost?
– Is there anything else I should be considering?
– Who are good contractors to do this work?
Thanks in advance for you advice!
We went through this a couple of years ago. We decided to stick with oil. Historically, oil has been cheaper. It’s hard to get a straight answer on the cost – oil people claim oil is cheaper, gas people claim gas is cheaper. But one gallon of oil produces 1.4 times the amount of heat as a therm of gas, so if a gallon of oil is less than 1.4 times the price of a therm of gas, it’s cheaper. It’s also a little tough to get a handle on what a therm costs — the first one is like $10, then the next ten are something else, then after that is a different rate. You really need to sit down with Keyspan’s rate schedule (for heating, the rates are different for cooking only) and figure out how much gas you’ll use in a given month to figure it out. Also, it looked like the average oil boiler was about 5% more efficient than the average gas boiler, so you have a little more of a fudge factor there. When I did it, oil was cheaper, but I don’t know exactly where gas is these days, and oil has gone up quite a bit…
I also had an extremely old (everyone’s best guess was from the 40’s or 50’s) oil boiler before — my boiler room still has a funny smell, and probably always will, but the new boiler doesn’t reek of oil and soot, and the exhaust from the chimney is nearly clear, instead of the billowing cloud of smoke that the old boiler made. It also gives off alot less heat. If you’re going from a very old boiler to a new one, the difference is amazing. We cut our usage by about 50%; it probably paid for itself sometime this year.
One other thing to consider with the installation – not switching is cheaper and less hassle. The gas conversion would have required dealing with the city, but the oil conversion didn’t. All told, even with the discount unit from Keyspan, the oil installation was slightly cheaper (4200 versus 4500, if I remember).
For the installation, we used our oil company, Approved Oil. I was pretty well acquainted with them, since I saw them at least once a month to work on the old boiler. If you do decide to stick with oil, check into the NYPIRG co-op. I think we got a little screwed this year because NYPIRG locked in the rate over the summer, but in years past, the NYPIRG oil with Approved delivery was 30 to 40 cents less than everyone else I spoke to was paying.
Re the price thing. I don’t know if this has anything to do with the fee schedule; Gateway is my plumber. Last time they did work more me I was talking to the guys who were doing the work. They are union and told me Gateway is a union company. Now as a union member myself, I should probably hire union. I never really thought about it with local contracting companies. I know when I work on union jobs in my industry, I get health benefits, retirement benefits, better wages, safety considerations, etc. If I work on a non union job, I get none of that and genenerally get abused and have to hunt down my pay.
Maybe that is why some companies are more expensive than others.
when you have changed to gas – how do you stop the oil guys calling to offer a refil?
I just converted, here’s why I did it in no particular order:
1) Free/low cost boiler from Keyspan
2) NG appears to be slightly cheaper at the moment although that can always change
3) No more oil tanks in my basement
4) Cleaner – my boiler room was alway filled with soot and smelled with oil, maybe that would have been fixed with a new oil boiler as well buy my perception is that Nat Gas is cleaner
5) Less mid-east dependence
6) Resale perception – as pointed out above
7) No more dealing with fuel delivery guys
what’s that expression…oh yeah…you get what you pay for…
best contractors in any skill are not the cheapest…
Gateway is overpriced …don’t use them
There are a couple of threads on this forum with similar questions and good answers on the relationship between gas and oil. I’ve faced this similar issue with my 4 story, 20×50 brownstone that has a 60 (!) year old oil boiler…i went back and forth on gas v oil, replacement costs, environmental concerns, on and on…the question was ultimately answered for me by my real estate agent, strangely.
We are likely to move (for work reasons) within the next 5-10years and are doing maintenance renovations like this keeping in mind re-sale issues. I’ve now spoken to two agents that both agreed that nat gas systems add value to the house, whereas oil, whether or not the boiler is relatively new or not, will be something that most people will want to use as a reason to subtract value from the house. Right or wrong, broadly speaking, buyers seem to want natural gas, 9 times out of 10, b/c of perceived issues with volatility/shortages/oil dependence, etc. Also, nat gas, in my readings, have a better expansion capabilities if you are someone that wants to eventually put in ductwork for forced air and/or air conditioning. We’re not one of those people, but i’ve read that in several places.
On whom to use…we’ve not yet begun to bid out the work yet, to replace boiler to nat gas that is, but there are several disussion threads that discuss. From what I can tell, people generally recommend John Hlad and Gateway plumbing, and a few others, whose names i cant recall right away. We have used Vigilante in the past, and they are RIDICULOUSLY overpriced, but they seem to do good work…but I wouldn’t use them again based on their unreasonable fee structure.
keep me posted on your decisions as we’re in the same process.
breukelyn@mac.com
Are you heating your home with steam or hot water?