Lower your heating bills with simple zone heating

Savings Beagle | January 19, 2016 | Everyday | No Comments

Can an electric heater save you money by lowering your heating bills? Yes it can if you use it in a limited way. Let me tell you about a simple zone heating solution. Here in the mid west we are having a pretty mild winter this year, but the temps are falling now, so it is a good time to write about a strategy to use an oil-filled radiant heater.

Undoubtedly you have seen ads on TV for Amish fireplaces, EdenPURE or Living Pure radiant heaters, but these are really just glorified electric space heaters. You don’t need to spend the extra money for an electric space heater and space heaters have their place, but we are talking about radiant heat that fills a room to provide safe, even heat.

Electric Oil-Filled Radiant Heaters

A few years back my gas heat went out and I quickly ran to the store in search of temporary emergency heat. I took home an oil-filled heater for a quick fix. It didn’t heat up all that quickly, but once it did I was able to get heat in a decently large space of about 400 square feet. After the gas was fixed I put my radiant heater back in its box and stored it for the next emergency.
Not too long after the heat-less situation I started to think about using my oil-filled heater to supplement my whole house gas heat. I thought after I go to bed only my bedroom needs to be at a comfortable level and I could turn down my home’s heat to a lower temperature. Think about it, lets say you have a 2000 square foot home and are heating all of it all night, you might only need to comfortably heat 1, 2 or 3 bedrooms with a total of about 400 square feet. This is a form of zone heating, but a very simple one.

View a list of electric radiant heaters for zone heating
Smaller oil-filled radiant heat models can cost less than $50. Lager models routinely run around $60 to $100. The smaller units may operate at around 700 Watts or so compared to the standard 1500 Watt, larger units. Don’t want to run your heater at 1500 Watts? Don’t worry, these units usually offer different settings of 600 and 900 Watts and allow you to turn on both switches to get the full 1500 Watts.

Use a plug-in timer for greater comfort and efficiency

One issue I had was my oil-filled radiant heater took a while to warm up. To further save money I would close off the heating vent to my bedroom as I never used that room until I went to bed. Well that was too cold for me when I forgot to turn my radiant heater on enough in advance (about an hour) before going to bed. I remedied that problem with a simple electric outlet plug-in timer. I keep my radiant heater turned on to a comfortable level for sleeping and the plug-in timer comes on an hour before I go to bed and turns off a half hour before my normal wake up time (the radiator will still radiate heat after it is shut off). One thing to keep in mind, if you turn hour house heat down to say 60 degrees instead of say 68 degrees at night, your house will take a few minutes longer to warm up in the morning. You may need to adjust your programmable thermostat.

View list of plug-in timers
Plug-in timers run about $10 – $12 for simple on-off timer operation. 7 day timers will average about $15, but will help out on the weekends or specific days when your sleeping patterns might differ.

Simple Zone Heating Results

We are not suggesting cancelling your gas service, just curtailing it at certain times of the day when heating your entire house is not necessary. If you have gas heat it will usually be cheaper than other electric options for whole house heat, but give our simple solution a try and let us know how much energy you are saving.

If you really want to take zone heating to a different level, check out automated damper controllers used to open and close the air ducts that deliver your gas heat. The damper system is easier to install in new construction, but if you have access to your vents and know what rooms they supply heat to you can still upgrade your ducts to save you money.

Automated Damper Controllers

Suncourt ZC106 6 in. Automated Damper Normally Closed