Propane vs. Pellet Stove, which is better and more cost effective? This would be used as a 2nd heating source.

Question

I have a 2300 sq foot house (2 stories) I plan on putting the stove in front of the fireplace/ I would like to keep the oil heat around 55 degrees and use the propane/pellet to heat the house hopefully to 68 degrees. I am looking at stoves around 35000 BTU as that was what I was told would to needed to heat my house as a secondary heating source.

Answer 1

pellet stove would be the way to go. cheaper

Answer 2

Propane, pellet, wood, whatever! They all have poor and good efficiency units from 30 to 80 or 90% efficiencies. With wood or pellet, someone is going to have to be around to feed the unit whereas with propane there is a storage tank outside that you have filled and you can sit with your feet up and watch the fire instead of feeding it!

  Most of the propane fireplaces now are direct vent and you actually vent them directly through the wall. Direct vent means the unit  draws in air from outside, burns it and puts the products of combustion back outside. There is no direct communication with the air that you breathe inside the home. If you place the unit in front of an existing fireplace and run a liner up the existing chimney, you now have a b-vented appliance ( with most manufacturers anyway!). This means that the unit is drawing air from the room it is in and burning it with propane and up the chimney it goes! This type of installation does reduce the efficiency considerably and sometimes halves the btu output of the appliance. It almost renders the appliance "decorative" rather than functional. Not  a good way to go. If you can place the unit on an outside wall and vent it through that wall you will be better off than trying to use the existing fireplace chimney.

If you really want to save money, get rid of the oil furnace and put in a propane one. You should save about $0.50 per litre...

Answer 3

The pellet stove would be more efficient but requires maintenance and feeding.

Propane fireplaces are not very efficient, typically 50 -60%.

There are some models that can get to 90% but are spendy and need special venting and condensate requirements.