I live in an an area of the US East Coast where there are a wide variety of home heating methods in use.
Many older homes have furnaces that are oil fired, although natural gas dominates where the pipelines are available. Heat pumps (and backup resistive emergency heat) are mostly found in newer homes where gas pipelines do not reach.
My questions are (1) Is it feasible to switch most home heating to electric? and (2) How can older housing stock in the 50-100+ years old range be improved to take advantage of electric heat? It seems enormously expensive and disruptive for a homeowner to tear up their entire house in order to seal up and insulate everything.
People tell me that electric heat is expensive, but that the superior insulation and windows in newer construction keeps the cost down.
The people with oil heat seem to suffer the most in terms of cost and cost fluctuation. When heating oil was $3-4/gallon the cost was very painful for people with oil heat.
Many older homes have furnaces that are oil fired, although natural gas dominates where the pipelines are available. Heat pumps (and backup resistive emergency heat) are mostly found in newer homes where gas pipelines do not reach.
My questions are (1) Is it feasible to switch most home heating to electric? and (2) How can older housing stock in the 50-100+ years old range be improved to take advantage of electric heat? It seems enormously expensive and disruptive for a homeowner to tear up their entire house in order to seal up and insulate everything.
People tell me that electric heat is expensive, but that the superior insulation and windows in newer construction keeps the cost down.
The people with oil heat seem to suffer the most in terms of cost and cost fluctuation. When heating oil was $3-4/gallon the cost was very painful for people with oil heat.