On Sun, 22 Jan 2006 12:46:03 GMT, Jim Murphy wrote:

Who's got dual fuel, are you pleased with it, does this have any drawbacks I
have not yet discovered, and did you do a cost/economy analysis before and
since the install.

I have used dual fuel since Jan 98 in NW GA and I like it a lot. I did not do
a cost analysis before the install. I had planned on installing a gas furnace
for heat and all other appliances total electric when I built my house, but
the local EMC persuaded me to go dual fuel with the following incentives for
new constructions.

A Free Underground Power Drop (over 300 ft and a transformer on the ground)
A $1000 Rebate
A Free 60 Gallon Marathon Electric Water Heater

The cost of the underground drop alone was about $4000 due to the distance
and the requirement of having a transformer on the ground instead of on the
pole. An underground drop of less than 300 ft with a transformer on the pole
was free at that time with a new construction.

I only found out about those incentives when I was informed how much the drop
was going to cost and asked if there was any way I could offset some of that
cost. I was told that I could go total electric and receive the above
incentives - I countered with dual fuel and they told me dual fuel also
counted as total electric as far as the incentives were concerned. The extra
cost for the heating system was about $400-600 IIRC, so I figure I came out
ahead.

I should let you know that I didn't want to go total electric (no gas
furnace), because I know too many people who complain about their heat pump
when the weather gets cold. The gas also gives me a backup heat source if the
power is out - I can run the gas furnace with my generator (runs on gasoline
or propane - purchased so I can have water and to keep the fridge and
freezer cold during long outages) if it I run out of wood or some other
emergency forces me to.

I would suggest that if you do decide to change to dual fuel, you check with
your local power company to see if they offer any incentives for changing -
our local EMC does, but I think the incentives are offered periodically, not
all the time. Incentives could very well change the cost recovery quite a
bit.

Later, Mike
(substitute strickland in the obvious location to reply directly)
-----------------------------------


Please send all email as text - HTML is too hard to decipher as text.