[N/A] Gas or Electric

Hang 4 said:
Google "Mass Gas Explosion". (Massachusetts).
Goofed up updating gas lines and blew up a 40 houses within a short time span. Having said that, I like cooking on gas way better than electric.
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I was going to comment about PG&E in California blowing up a chunk of San Bruno, but then their electric division lit the state on fire.
 
Matthew said:
For all the damage, I was sort of surprised at how the FD got into the garage. I never really thought about how they'd do it, but they had taken a rescue saw and cut a small section out of the top of the door where the operator attaches. Then they could roll the door open.
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We have all kinds of tricks. We are never locked out.td1xFT5MVVY1zuST2CgfmXhbvQKYFzD4fC7TivZknYw.jpg
 
Most residential locks and doors are really not that hard to defeat if you have power tools and no need to hide your actions.
 
cowman said:
Most residential locks and doors are really not that hard to defeat if you have power tools and no need to hide your actions.
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Hydraulics can usually make short work of door jambs. In the case of the house behind me that burned down, the garage was where the explosion apparently occurred, and it sent most of the garage door into the neighbors side yard, so no need for any special entry tricks for first responders. They did cut a crude rectangular hole in the upstairs siding (to vent smoke I assume).
 
Growing up electric was much more expensive than gas.. so my dad hated all things electric and I grew up with this notion that electric=evil. All my housing has always been gas for stove, water heater, dryer, heating, etc. AC and lights are, obviously, electric

As I get older I care less and less. And there is something to be said for not having the lingering "do I smell gas?" feeling

Though cooking on gas is nicer.. nothing worse than ruining perfectly good steak, eggs, pancakes, by turning the knob from 7 to 3 only to have the range still put out the thermal equivalent of a small nuclear reactor for the next 20 minutes.
 
California and soon Massachusetts plus I'm sure other states make up your mind for you. You are only allowed to heat with electricity for new houses, not sure about replacements.
 
Tantalum said:
Growing up electric was much more expensive than gas.. so my dad hated all things electric and I grew up with this notion that electric=evil.
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I wonder how a solar powered house would affect his feelings.
 
We have quite a combination going on in this house. The first floor has a dual fuel furnace/heat pump/AC unit. If it's above 40 degrees it's running as a heat pump, lower than that it uses gas. The upstairs unit is a conventional gas furnace/electric A/c unit, while the basement has a heat pump. The water heater is tankless gas, the dryer is gas, the cooktop is gas but the oven is electric. And last but not least, the grill outside is natural gas. I had that put in about 20 years ago and I think it was around $800 to do, but it's wonderful. We probably use the grill 100 times or more per year, and we never have to change a tank or worry about running out in the middle of doing a pulled pork.

And to confuse things further, I drive a plug in car.
 
FormerHangie said:
We have quite a combination going on in this house. The first floor has a dual fuel furnace/heat pump/AC unit. If it's above 40 degrees it's running as a heat pump, lower than that it uses gas. The upstairs unit is a conventional gas furnace/electric A/c unit, while the basement has a heat pump. The water heater is tankless gas, the dryer is gas, the cooktop is gas but the oven is electric. And last but not least, the grill outside is natural gas. I had that put in about 20 years ago and I think it was around $800 to do, but it's wonderful. We probably use the grill 100 times or more per year, and we never have to change a tank or worry about running out in the middle of doing a pulled pork.

And to confuse things further, I drive a plug in car.
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Does schizophrenia run in the family? ;-)
 
Gas is about 1/3rd per BTU than electricity. Several years ago, we replaced our electric dryer with gas and had a gas line for it installed. Our energy bill went down a lot. The washer was also replaced; both new units are energy efficient so I’m sure that also helped.
 
Crashnburn said:
Gas is about 1/3rd per BTU than electricity. Several years ago, we replaced our electric dryer with gas and had a gas line for it installed. Our energy bill went down a lot. The washer was also replaced; both new units are energy efficient so I’m sure that also helped.
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Which means a heat pump needs a COP of about 3 to keep the cost the same as Gas which is not too far off from an average air source heat pump on a yearly basis. But that doesn't help clothes drying or cooking. (Which makes me wonder if I could instrument my Mini Split with a power sensor and then intake and exhaust temp sensors on the inside units and some way to measure the fan speed to get CFM if I couldn't figure out what my COP was.)
 
denverpilot said:
I’ve usually gone with...
Whatever the house had when we bought it. :)
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Yep. that's my MO too.

Hard to throw out a perfectly good appliance, especially when it's a perfect match with the other 15-year-old appliances. :D Stainless steel is soooooo overrated.
 
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