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Heating & Air Conditioning

Electric or Gas heat for basement?

16 years ago

Hi--we are remodeling our 1924 basement for TV/guest and another bathroom. Our house has gas radiator heat. The heating guy said we could add "Radson" brand radiators to the main room and bathroom for $2900, not including digging a trench in the floor and patching the concrete.

We are aware that electric costs more to tun vs. gas, but the up front costs seem so different. Any advice? Any ideas on how we can "estimate" our future costs?

Comments (5)

brickeyee
16 years ago
Gas is used to generate electricity.
What would electric cost?
Why are you putting pipes under a slab?
bosun2
Original Author
16 years ago
Our heating guy thought that digging the pipes for the radiators would be a good thing to do--the rads. work better then? I'd be doing the breaking and patching.

Electric would cost 200 per radiator (3) plus the radiators, so roughly $1000 or so. This room will be used a good bit in the winter.

So the difference is at least 2000. We plan to stay here for 20 years.
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Thank you so much for your replies! This quote is from Salesman #3. He is the grandson of the man who started this heating and cooling company in 1945. His dad and 3 brothers all still work there. They were voted "Contractor of the Year" in 2002 and won an "Ethical Business Award" in our area last year or the year before. I thought they would be the most expensive, so I had him come out last, but his quote is the best. (he said he could do gas heat with heat pump,but doesn't recommend it based on our cheap electric. He said you have to set a temp where heat pump turns off and gas kicks in, same as Salesman #2) Last question - Does it seem reasonable that in this area people haven't been spending the money for a higher SEER unit because we only need to cool for 3 months or so? (it takes too long to get back the initial added cost) He said there hasn't been the demand for these units in this area, but I wonder if the stimulus rebate changes that. The $1500 rebate is pretty new, do they just need some time to catch up? Is it worth pushing him to quote me something from Rheem that does qualify? From what I can see on the Rheem website they have a 3 ton system that qualifies, in their high-end systems. It has lots of "bells and whistles" and I can't tell how much more it will cost. This contractor has said that he prefers to "keep it simple". less areas to have problems down the line. Do you think it is worth pursuing this in light of the new rebate?
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brickeyee
16 years ago
If you can put the radiator lines in the walls inside the conditioned space you will not loose any heat.
Either PEX or type L copper pipe can be run through walls in bored holes.
joeplumb
16 years ago
The cost of heating electrically would probably be at least twice that for gas, so the initial installation differential would be recovered in a few years.
Why not use baseboard heating at a fraction of the radiator costs? I'm doing that for my basement for about $7 per linear foot each of which puts out 660 BTUH @ 180 deg hot water. So for every 10 feet you would get 6600BTUH and your cost would be just $70 plus labor.
jamesk
16 years ago
If you already have a boiler and hydronic heating in your house, it makes sense to tap into the existing system and heat the basement off the same boiler. Your cost for heating the basement will be only incrementally higher than what is now costing you to heat the rest of the house. Electric heating in the basement would would probably cost many times more.

If the heating guy who gave you the $2900 price is the same guy who installed your boiler or heating system, then it probably makes sense to have him do the work. He knows the system. You might ask him if there's any other way of tapping into the existing system that might cost less. Perhaps running baseboard radiators that begin on the wall enclosing the boiler room (I'm assuming your boiler is somewhere in the basement), or something else.

If the heating guy is someone that hasn't worked in your house before, then why not get a couple of other estimates from other firms. Another outfit may offer a better solution that's less costly, or perhaps, just have lower overhead and do the work for less.

Since you plan to be in the house for many years, I'd encourage you to avoid the electric solution. What you save up front will probably cost you much more in the long run.

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