All heating and cooling systems use energy that comes from burning some type of fuel, be it gas, oil or coal.  The only exceptions to this are the various renewable sources such as wind, solar, hydro and nuclear.  However, even these renewable sources still will use fuels for making the machinery and facilities and for transportation.  As such, no source of energy is truly “carbon free”

For homeowners, there are usually three areas of interest associated with using various fuels for heating and cooling systems:  the fuel costs per unit of heating (or cooling), the cost to install the equipment and the carbon footprint of using this energy.

Energy Costs:

As the primary use of energy in Wisconsin is for heating rather than cooling, we will look at that in more detail.  The following table lists the energy available in the various types of fuel:

From this table it would seem that natural gas is by far the cheapest way of heating a structure.  All of the other fuel source have comparable energy costs.  If we now take into account the efficiency of the various heating appliances and use the highest efficiency of these appliances general utilized, we get the results shown in this table:

Thus, taking into account the efficiency of the appliance, geothermal heat pumps will have the lowest energy costs.  This is the case because heat pumps do not generate the heat, they just transfer it from one place to another.  In the case of a geothermal heat pump, the heat is transferred from the ground into the structure when in space heating mode.  When in cooling mode, heat is transferred from the structure into the ground.

Carbon Footprint:

While from the above information, it would seem that geothermal heat pumps are the most efficient, one must also look at the “carbon footprint” of using these various fuels.  Each type of fuel has differing amounts of carbon contained in it which is emitted into the atmosphere when it is burned.  While electricity does not have carbon in it, it must be generated somewhere.  In the United States, the largest fraction of electricity is generated by burning coal, followed by nuclear energy

The following table shows the amount of carbon that is emitted by using various types of fuel to generate a given amount of energy:

If we take into account the efficiency of the various heating appliances, we will get the following carbon footprints:

Thus, from a carbon footprint, any non coal burning electrical method is good.  But since coal based electrical generation provides the largest percentage of electrical power in the United States, resistance heating will emit the most carbon.  Even using geothermal heat pumps with a COP of 4.5, the carbon footprint is only a little better than natural gas.

Costs:

The installation and maintenance costs for propane, natural has and heating oil based systems are very similar.  Electrical resistance heating is somewhat cheaper to install than fuel burning appliances.  The cost of geothermal systems is substantially more that for any of the other systems.  Actual system costs will depend on the exact installation, but will typically add $6,000 to $15,000 to the system cost.  This additional cost must be amortized over the life of the equipment through savings in energy usage.

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