When the cold weather of winter arrives in Roseville, CA, rising energy bills come with it. That prompts many homeowners to start looking for heating shortcuts to save a bit of money. That’s especially common now as energy costs continue to increase. However, some quick heating fixes aren’t as helpful as you might think. Using space heaters to heat only the spaces you occupy is a perfect example of that. While that might seem a logical way to cut heating costs, it’s wasteful in the long run. By contrast, improving your home’s insulation is a far better long-term strategy. Here’s a comparison of the two approaches.
How Heat Loss Impacts Your Home and Energy Bills
When it comes to heating efficiency, you may believe that the heater you use is the most important factor. However, how well your home retains heat and keeps the cold out can have just as big an impact. After all, even the most efficient heating solution will have to run nonstop to combat excessive heat loss. As a result, investing in targeted insulation and air sealing upgrades can be a cost-effective way to cut your heating bills.
Altogether, you can reduce your home’s heating costs by up to 20% with proper insulation and air sealing. That’s far more than you can save any other way, except by switching to a far more efficient heating system like a geothermal HVAC. And if you’re currently using space heaters to cut your costs, you’ll likely find you’re saving far less than that. Of course, that assumes you’re saving anything at all.
The True Cost of Using Space Heaters
On the surface, a space heater may seem like an efficiency upgrade versus your home’s central heating system. They’re 100% efficient, whereas the average home’s central heating system may be 80% efficient or less. However, if your 80% efficient central heating system uses natural gas, it will cost less to run per BTU than a space heater. Plus, a space heater may operate at maximum power continuously on a cold day. For comparison, your home’s central heating system will cycle on and off, reducing energy consumption.
Additionally, you’ll likely use multiple space heaters at once, unless you confine yourself to a single room. That introduces several problems. One is that it’s inadvisable to run space heaters in rooms you’re not in. If they tip over or malfunction, they could cause a fire. Also, you can expect each space heater to cost about $5.50 per day in electricity if you run them for 12 hours. If you’re using two space heaters, you’d save about $1 per day compared to a minimally efficient gas furnace. In reality, it’s more likely that your space heaters will increase your bills. That’s because the average space heater only outputs about 5,100 BTUs of heat. That’s barely enough to keep an average-sized room warm, even if the heater runs constantly.
How Insulation Upgrades Improve Whole-Home Efficiency
A home insulation upgrade can permanently reduce your home’s heating and cooling costs. That way, no matter what heating solution you use, you’ll save money. And you can increase the benefits by subsequently investing in a more efficient central heating system. To get the biggest bang for your insulation buck, however, you should target your upgrades to some specific places.
One of the first places to consider adding insulation is in your home’s attic. The average home experiences about 25% of its overall heat losses there. And heat losses through your attic can have an outsized impact on your comfort due to a phenomenon known as the stack effect. That refers to rising heat exiting your attic and pulling cold outdoor air in through other defects in your home’s air envelope. It can make your home feel drafty and even less comfortable than the indoor temperature suggests.
The next place to consider insulation upgrades is in your home’s exterior walls. The average home loses up to 35% of its total heat there. However, upgrading exterior wall insulation is much harder than adding attic insulation. It is possible, however, to use blown-in insulation to improve the heat retention of exterior walls.
After upgrading your home’s insulation, you can expect it to stay warmer for longer and reduce your heating demand. That’s because insulation dramatically slows down the speed at which heat can escape your home. Additionally, it will help stabilize indoor temperatures, reducing the swings that harm your comfort.
Short-Term Convenience vs Long-Term Savings
At the end of the day, it’s easy to see why so many homeowners gravitate toward space heaters to cut heating costs. For one, they’re easy to find. For another, space heaters cost less than investing in home improvements. Together, those advantages make space heaters seem like the perfect quick fix. Unfortunately, that’s where their benefits end.
Meanwhile, insulation improvements, while costing more upfront, continue paying comfort and financial dividends for years. A home insulation upgrade project can pay for itself in as little as two to three years. After that, the savings go straight into your pocket. Plus, improved insulation will increase your home’s value and extend the life of your heating system by reducing heating demand.
When a Combination Approach Makes Sense
It’s important to recognize that using space heaters can make sense in some limited circumstances. For example, if you live in a larger home and you don’t use most of its space, you can use space heaters as a supplementary heat source. In that situation, you’d turn your home’s heating system down to a lower baseline temperature. Then, you’d use a single space heater only in the space you’re in. You can also do the same thing while you’re awaiting an insulation upgrade.
When you’re ready to go forward with an insulation upgrade, our experts will examine your home from top to bottom. They’ll look for air-sealing deficiencies as well as the quality, condition, and R-value of your existing insulation. That will let them tell you which kinds of upgrades will yield the biggest benefits. Then they can help you estimate your potential savings and the costs involved.
Invest in Comfort, Safety, and Real Energy Savings
The bottom line is that insulation upgrades are a much better way to cut heating costs than using space heaters. They create long-lasting heating cost savings that aren’t as dependent on fluctuating energy prices. So, you’d be wise to let the experts at Environmental Heating & Air Solutions evaluate your home’s insulation before opting for space heaters. We’ve served local homeowners since 2010. Our technicians are Building Performance Institute certified, so they have the skills to evaluate your home’s overall efficiency. And we’re a Pearl certified contractor, so nobody knows more about home energy efficiency than we do. We can even offer you financing options on approved credit to help you pay for the upgrades your home needs. Contact Environmental Heating & Air Solutions today to schedule a home energy efficiency assessment.
