Archive for the ‘Good Investment’ Category

Best Heating System You can Get

Thursday, November 12th, 2009
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Do you think I regret my decision in purchasing a waste oil burner at all when my natural gas bills come in?

Its the best heating system I could have every gotten.

As you can see from the picture below my total heating expense for this month was $9.00.  I live in the coldest state of the the country and my gas bill is only nine dollars!  Sometimes I cannot believe this whole idea of mine actually worked.

How do you think I am able to do this?  The answer is I bought a waste oil boiler back in 2007.

I have a company that generates tons of used waste oil and it was becoming a pain to get rid of it.  I was having a company come by and pick it up every other week and it was becoming a huge pain.  At times they wanted to charge me for it as well even though they planned to re-sell it to companies who make asphalt.

October Natural Gas Bill

October Natural Gas Bil

So as you may already know every furnace or boiler has an oil burner in them.  Some of them run off natural gas, some run on electricity, but most of them throughout this country (especially on the east coast) run off heating oil.   I  had found out, from doing a lot of research, that you can purchase oil burners especially designed to run off used motor oil.

I was skeptical as usual (its very hard to convince me of anything) but the idea of being able to completely heat your home, office, or any building you own off a product that’s considered waste by most people was just too tempting to pass up.

I live in Alaska and as you may or may not know winter in this area lasts for six to seven months.  And as you might have guessed it gets extremely cold (duh!). So you can also imagine how much a person stands to save if he could totally erase a heating bill from his monthly expenses.

I have already saved thousands by purchasing my Energy Logic waste oil boiler.  Every ounce of heat I use now is absolutely free.  As of now I can run my home and garage at 80 degrees or 60 degrees and it does not matter.

As I have stated before every winter the gas company have become suspicious of me tampering with the meter.  I have told the meter guys over and over again that I am not running my home off natural gas.

They do not seem to believe me.  Most people have no idea that this type of alternative energy technology even exists.  Those guys have every home in their grid on their computer system and cannot accept the fact that I only owe them $9.00 a month when its -20 Fahrenheit outside.  I think its hilarious.  If I were in their shoes I would think the exact same thing.

So I know for a fact that once the weather dips down to bellow zero (its actually been fairy warm for November) I’ll be seeing some of the meter guys come wanting to talk to me and ask me all sorts of questions because they think I am lying to them.

Investing in my waste oil burner for my boiler has helped me become more self sufficient and has allowed me to reduce my heating bill to absolutely nothing (well, $9.00 for the hook-up fee).

I have not had any problems with my set-up at all.  I have taken the time and funds to maintain my expensive machine and it has never given any problems whatsoever.  You have to filter the oil, make certain no condensation gets into your burner, and do annual tune ups every years.  If you do this I can almost guarantee that you will have the same results.

Is An Oil Burner Worth The Cost?

Monday, August 3rd, 2009
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I get many questions throughout the month from people asking me two questions.  They are a) what do waste oil boilers/ burners or furnaces cost and b) are they worth that cost?

I think these are very good questions to ask.  Many people today are interested in various forms of alternative energy heating but they also want them to be economically feasible and give some sort of reasonable return.

I can assure you that this form of heating will do both.

How Much Do They Cost?

oilboilerfrontview

This is will depend on what type of structure you want to use your boiler (or burner) for.  Are you are going to be heating a home, office building, or small shop?  You are going to find that many companies that make waste oil boilers will have at at least three models for heating small, medium, and large areas.  The larger the area you have the larger your hot water output (for boilers) or air flow (for furnaces) will have to be.

The prices can range from $5,000 all the way to $10,000 for your waste oil boiler, fuel tank, and several optional accessories.  That does not include the installation and set-up.  That alone could cost you an additional $2,000.  Here is the breakdown of my total costs for my personal waste oil boiler.  My basic package was $5,698 but once I added a hot water coil, a 250 gallon workbench holding tank with a furnace stand, a plumbing and hardware package, and tank gauge the total cost came out to be $8,000.  I then had to pay an additional $2,000 for shipping.  Keep in mind that I live in Anchorage so my shipping will be a lot more than everyone else.  So the total cost I paid for my Energy Logic El-200 model ended up being $10,000.  Following that expenditure I still had to pay another $2,000 for the installation of my machine including connecting all the thermostats, pipes, hydronic lines and tubing to my house and my newly build 1,700 two story garage/shop adjacent to it.

There are some lessor models like Lanair that you can get for $4,000-$5000.  Keep in mind that that is just for the base package and you will need to add at least $1,500 to whatever base package you see to make it workable.  I would strongly recommend going with some of the top brands.  These devices are extremely delicate and if you get one of the cheaper models you can be sure to have problems.  I personally am a big fan of Columbia and Energy Logic but there are others that are just as good.  Beckett makes a lot of the components for these companies as well as some add ons you can get like the Beckett heat manager (also known as a fuel economizer).

Is the Cost for an Oil Burner/ Boiler Worth It?

Absolutely!  I have save thousands of dollars in heating cost by having one.  I would not trade mine for the world.  My oil boiler has enabled me to have $10 heating bills in February.  If I had not purchased one that bill with my home and shop would have been at least $400 a month during the wintertime especially when you consider the fact that we had to coldest winter in the last ten years.  I saved at least $1800 just this last winter and because all my heat was free and I had an abundance of waste oil I had the temperature in my home and business at 80 degrees all the time.

I would say that I have gotten all my money back and for many of the people who live in this country the ROI will be fast because your costs of shipping an installation will be lower.  Depending on where you live you should be able to recoup all your money in two to three years.  Your return could be greater if natural gas and heating costs continue to rise at their current levels.