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bri_ohio

Geothermal vs. natural gas for our new home

9 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago

Input is much appreciated!

My husband and I bought a lot to build on out in the country, and to our knowledge, only propane was available. We were pretty sold on geothermal because it's efficient, and my husband the engineer thought geothermal would make adding things down the road like solar panels fairly easy. However, we just found out from our electric provider that there is now natural gas available in our area. Here's what we're looking at price-wise:

Geothermal: ~$30,000 for vertical minus a $10,000 break from our builder and whatever the tax return is = <$20,000

Natural gas: Usually a no-brainer as the less costly alternative, but in our case, we're building 650 feet off the road, so our tap fee is $1650 for the first 100 feet and $4/foot after that = ~$3,850. The high efficiency HVAC system we were looking at for the natural gas option was estimated at around $15,000 (all the bells and whistles).

So all things considered, we could be looking at a $5-12,000 difference after a tax rebate. We're wanting to do radiant flooring as well if that makes a difference. Recommendations?

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