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Old 09-19-2019, 12:16 PM   #43
Biggd
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Originally Posted by ITD View Post
That sounds about right, but oil has about 140,000 btus per gallon, where as propane has about 91,000 btus per gallon. So oil, while less efficient in burners gives you much more heat per gallon.

So a simple conversion, a gallon of oil through an 83% eff burner would yield you 140,000 *0.83 = 116,200 btus

Where as a gallon of Propane through a 97% burner would yield you 91,000 * 0.97 = 88,300 btus.

(the btu values of propane and fuel oil vary from different sources, but the difference is pretty small in the variations)

In the above scenario, even though propane is more efficient, you only get about 76% as much heat, which means you need to burn more gallons of propane( more$$$$) to equal the same heat of oil. Propane typically tracks oil prices, but propane would have to be 24% cheaper per gallon to break even versus oil in the above example.
I will add, there is more maintenance on an oil burner than a propane burner but with a new system you should get many years of service with just a yearly cleaning which typically runs about $150. Add that to your oil bill and you still come out cheaper than propane.

Last edited by Biggd; 09-19-2019 at 12:55 PM.
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