Lets do a poll. Best heat source for your house. 4 choices.

[SASKFARMER]

Oh, an old poster on here from years gone by sold a wheat burning stove. Wheat was worthless so it did work as a heat source.

[Blaithin]

Guy up north burns ergot.


Why can we only pick one?

I would say my ideal home heating would be similar to my ideal power supply. Multi sourced. Why rely on one?

Wood stove helps offset my gas bill. Natural gas is cheap you say?! What’s with all this whiny carbon tax posts then. My bill is hardly astronomical yet it’s increased quite a bit. Reliable? Maybe. Power went out for a week in November a few years back. Can’t say the natural gas was doing dick all to heat the house then. Gas might’ve been there but the furnace sure wasn’t running.

Hard to beat having a stove for heat.

[Austrian Economics]

I have an outdoor wood burner that heats water which is then piped into a heat exchanger in my furnace. No need to haul wood into the house and haul ashes out.

Because the water circulates all the time, there is always a bit of heat percolating up through the ducts. When the fan kicks in, you get instant warm air.

It helps that I have a small excavator with a grapple that I use for cutting wood. I can hack up a cord of wood in a couple of hours. I also have about 20 acres of hardwood forest next to my house.

These systems are not practical in urban settings, because insurance dictates a 75 foot distance between the burner unit and any insured building. However, I don't have to pay any solid fuel surcharges on my house insurance because no burning of combustible material is done in the house.

[Taiga]

In floor heat with nat gas boiler tied to secondary wood boiler with generator backup to run the circulation pump if needed.

Would like to look into a real waste oil heater for the shop but my earlier searching was that they were very expensive.

[Partners]

Built our house in 1989.
Put a 2x6 with a 2x4 staggered walls.
R 60 in ceilings.
Natural gas with best furnace at the time.
When girls were still at home the gas water heater cost more than heating our 1710 sq ft house.

[Oliver88]

The most efficient and cleanest forms of heat will be carbon taxed the most.
Wood will be cheapest for fuel although more labour and higher fire insurance costs. (Australian Economics has a good option with the wood boiler to reduce labour and avoid high insurance.)

Fossil fuels and wood are required to stay alive in cold Canada.

[blackpowder]

We had oil then gas. Most were coal with mine close by.
Hands down gas today. Always cheapest btu. Until....
I find this strange though.
Heat for a business.
Govt took coal away.
Has full control and raises tax on fuel continuously. Not sure why some here think that's funny.
We'll go back in time to when some were using straw or wheat to heat the whole farm. Like a poor country. Now that's funny.

[Braveheart]

We have geothermal in 2 homes. It is fantastic. 1700 sq ft and the hydro cost is $120/month average. It's clean and quiet.

[6V53]

I built a grain burner about 15 years ago. Did the calculation and wheat would have to be $9.00 a bushel to make it unecanomical back then. 85 bushels provides 90% of the heat for a 2700 sq.ft house and keeps the car garage above freezing. Wish I never hooked up to NG.

[TSIPP]

Mainly wood, wheat when the basement needs to get warmed up.