On Fri, 14 Apr 2006 12:46:44 GMT, Godzillarama
wrote:

Greetings. I used Google to see if there had been any *recent* discussions
of this and it appears that there hasn't.

I live in the Kansas City area and my natual gas bill level pay is $127.00.
I'm betting it shoots way up once we have a REAL winter instead of the
pretend winter we just had.

The wife is not too keen on our hot water heater. It was here when we
moved in three years ago. She's afraid of it, frankly. For one thing, the
pilot light tends to get snuffed when we run the attic fan. It 's old.
It's an off brand. And in general she's just plain apprehensive of, well,
US BLOWING UP for whatever reason.

We just replaced a door and several windows, as well as all of our bulbs
with those nifty flourescent things, and the light bill went way down.

Either way, it's time to do something about The Hot Water Heater Issue.
I'm inclined to get an electric hot water heater instead of gas. We have a
220 line nearby so the wiring wouldn't be too bad. We have 2300 square
feet and four baths. Previously posts on this topic are consistent that
gas should be cheaper; but is it still? What would you do?

Your thoughts. Thanks for commenting.

Ignoring, for the moment, the psychological issues, the sensible thing
to do would be to get either your gas-provider or some other
HVAC pro to come see why the existing heater isn't working properly.

If you've decide that you're abandoning gas reguardless of what
makes economic sense, then the next cheapest option is oil. And it's
going to STAY oil until someone builds a nuclear plant near you. Of
course, oil probably will require a different flue-liner.

If, in spite of that, you still decide to go electric, the existance
of another 240V circut near where the heater is isn't going to help,
the WH is going to want it's own dedicated line.