I live in a house with only a fireplace. Its SoCal but it starting to getcold.
I need a space heater option that will heat a whole room and not break the bank when the power bill comes. Any suggestions?
I live in a house with only a fireplace. Its SoCal but it starting to getcold.
I need a space heater option that will heat a whole room and not break the bank when the power bill comes. Any suggestions?
Electric space heaters are limited to 1500 watts or roughly 5,000 BTUs and that doesn’t heat a large room effectively, depending on outside air. And electric is expensive. Check your rate per KW and figure the hours to know the cost.
Gas space heaters come in vented and unvented. Even if unvented is allowed, don’t do it for health reasons. You will be breathing the contaminants of combustion and have less oxygen. Yes, they have O2 sensors to keep you from dying, but you want a healthy life. Vented heaters need to be mounted on an outside wall or someplace with a vent to the outside. They can come in an output much higher than 5,000 BTUs and would easily heat a whole room. Don’t oversize because you want the heater to run steady and blow around the room rather than cycling on/off continually.
Any decent sized star will do, out to a range of one astronomical unit or so.
For electric space heaters basically the cost to run it to heat that room will be the same across the board. The real option is how you want to heat that space, some heaters may allow you to more easily concentrate heat in a small section of the room (where you are) and you may save some money there, or use the heater in a larger space then it can heat up fully.
Heaters that glow orange use radiant heat that is directional. Here heat travels as light and warms what it falls on (much like the sun). This is good for situations where it is drafty and it’s hard to keep hot air in the room, you point this heater at the person. This is also pretty good for cold bathrooms where you want instant heat for a short time.
Some others use fan blown hot air. This can also be used for the above mentioned bathroom breaks, and also to heat a small space, like you sitting on a couch.
If the goal is to heat the entire room however, it is probably better to get a reliable oil filled electric heater, it’s quite does a decent job in even heating of the room if given enough time.
I think there now are window a/c’s that can be used as heat pumps, which should cost less then space heaters to run, but much more to buy.
Other then that you have options of gas (natural gas or propane) heaters, kerosene heaters, both vented and unvented. If you have the extra cash you might consider a wood pellet fireplace insert or wood pellet stove, most likely your cheapest option in terms of fuel costs, but pretty pricy up front cost and requires refilling with pellets about 1/day or so
The top-rated ones in Consumer Reports reviews are below. The fourth one is the type that looks like a radiator and is filled with oil. I had one in a basement apartment once and it’s effective although it does get hot, so don’t touch it if you get one.
Honeywell HZ-817
Type: Electric Convection Models
Price as tested: $100
Soleus Air HM2-15R-32
Type: Electric Convection Models
Price as tested: $80
Honeywell Low Profile Convection Heater HZ-519
Type: Electric Convection Models
Price as tested: $85
DeLonghi ComforTemp MG7307CM
Type: Electric Convection Models
Price range: $72.18 - $74.95
Vornado Vortex Heat TouchStone 500 EH1-0032-28
Type: Electric Fan-Forced Convection Models
Price range: $126.00 - $159.99