Hi Edwin,

When comparing the cost performance of gas and electric water heaters,
we need to consider two things: one, the cost of the fuel and,
secondly, the respective operating efficiencies of these tank units.

The EF or "energy factor" rating of a conventional gas water heater
falls in the range of 0.50 to 0.65 (the upper end representative of a
high efficiency power vent model); that means between one-third to
one-half of the propane consumed is effectively lost up the stack or
through the tank walls. By comparison, an electric water heater might
have an EF of between 0.85 and 0.95 (no stack related losses and, in
this case, 100 per cent conversion efficiency).

For propane, if we take 1 and divide by 0.575 (our mid point in
efficiency), our fuel multiplier works out to be 1.74 and in the case
of electric, 1 divided by 0.90 gives us a multiplier of 1.11.

With these adjustments, our propane costs per 100,000 BTUs (net) would
be $5.79 and for electric, it comes to $5.27. Reasonably close, but
with electric holding the advantage.

Cheers,
Paul

On Wed, 14 Feb 2007 03:24:40 GMT, "Edwin Pawlowski"
wrote:


"lp13-30" wrote in message
...
If you are using that much propane for water heating and nothing else in
the house uses propane, you would probably be better off switching to an
electric water heater. I was using somewhere around a gallon/day for
mine (1 person), and when I switched to electric, I barely noticed any
increase on the electric bill. Larry

You must have cheap electric. Where I live the same amount of energy from
electric will cost 35% more than propane. Oil is considerably less that
either so I'd look at that option first.
For 100,000 Btu of heat here in CT, the cost is as follows
Electric 4.75
Propane 3.33
Oil 1.86

I don't know the cost of natural gas right now.