Electricity is traditionally the most affordable source of energy in the Russian Federation, and gas is the cheapest. Therefore, in their absence, heating a private house without gas and electricity becomes problematic. The main methods of heating a home are passive house systems or boilers using wood or diesel fuel. Let's consider the possible methods in more detail.
Alternative cottage heating
The maximum discomfort during the operation of the building is caused by the lack of gas and electrical energy. Therefore, the owner needs not only without gas and electricity, but also to generate 2-10 kW of electricity for domestic needs. There are not many power supply options:
- generator - usually diesel with the maximum possible resource;
- thermoelectric generator – generates current from thermal energy, the leading manufacturer is Kryotherm.
There are many more ways to heat a building, from a classic wood stove air heating to alternative sources (heat pump, solar panels). But for high efficiency alternative systems heating, for the operation of compressors in their composition, also requires electricity.
Solid fuel boiler
Heating of a private house without gas and electricity can be organized using solid fuel boilers. Modifications provide maximum comfortable operation long burning with natural draft:
- loading into them is carried out from below, the afterburning chamber is located at the top;
- after heating the lower firebox to 200 degrees, a mechanical damper blocks the access of air to the combustion chamber;
- pyrolysis (release of flammable gases) from smoldering coals begins inside it;
- gas enters the upper chamber and burns to release energy;
- it is heated in jackets or pipes passing inside the boiler;
- passes through the registers, giving off heat, and is fed to the next cycle.
IN pyrolysis boilers with top loading are used, in bunkers it is necessary to rotate the worm gear for regular feeding of pellets into the combustion chamber. Therefore, this equipment can only operate with a generator.
Use of liquid fuel
Another way to implement heating is to heat a private house without gas or electricity using liquid fuel boilers. The cheapest energy source is diesel fuel, but diesel boilers have a significant drawback - the fuel must be stored in compliance with the fire safety of the home; during combustion, a characteristic odor is formed that does not disappear.
Air heating is provided by stoves or fireplaces. Classic stoves are:
- Russian – heating + cooking;
- “Dutch” - mounted in an opening, heats several adjacent rooms;
- universal – cooking on removable rings hob+ room heating.
They are made of brick, steel, and equipped with chimneys, ensuring the safety of passage through floors and roofs. Devices for generating electricity from heat from Kryotherm are easily integrated into the furnaces. In addition, the manufacturer produces sauna stoves, allowing you to illuminate the room until the walls of the heating device cool down.
Helpful information! The safest is a bio-fireplace, which does not require a chimney. By making adjustments, you can achieve a minimum operating budget; combustion does not produce harmful products, soot, or soot.
Passive house
Heating of a private house without gas and electricity can be organized by “passive house” systems. In this case, modern thermal insulation materials are used, which reduce energy consumption to 7 - 10%.
In other words, such a dwelling must have enough thermal energy generated by the family in the process of life. The building has compact dimensions, an external insulation contour, a layer of thermal insulation under the foundation and blind area. The following must be taken into account:
- cardinal directions - living rooms from the south, functional premises protect them from the north;
- wind rose - heat loss is absorbed by verandas and kitchens on the windward side of the site;
- layout – should ensure high-quality air exchange by recuperators.
Related article:
Have you ever thought about how well your home is insulated? Or maybe you are just starting to build a home? In any case, you need to become familiar with the concept of "thermal conductivity".
In addition to these activities, we use alternative sources energy (thermal + electrical):
Related article:
Until recently, solar panels seemed like something futuristic. However, they are already available to everyone. Don't believe me? Read our detailed publication.
- geothermal heat pump.
Related article:
This type of heating is gaining popularity every year. Let's calculate how much such a system will cost and how profitable it is.
There are “active home” systems that, in addition to reducing heat loss, are capable of generating additional heat accumulated by the central home network. The main disadvantage is the high installation budget for such equipment and long payback periods.
Helpful information! When choosing a “passive house” it is made forced. Instead of window supply valves airtight double-glazed windows are installed. Ventilation is carried out only by recuperators.
Heating a house without gas and electricity (video)
Operating principle, device, pros, cons
Thus, for heating a private house without gas and electricity, the simplest schemes are:
- stove + bio-fireplaces – the first heating device heats the kitchen and one adjacent room, allows you to prepare food, bio-fireplaces in the remaining rooms improve the interior, are used as needed, the problem of electricity is solved with Cryotherm devices;
- boiler - long-burning solid fuel with natural draft or diesel fuel.
Hot water circulates inside the heating circuits of a private house without gas or electricity, using standard registers. When choosing a pellet bunker boiler, which allows the device to operate on one filling for 4 to 11 days, electricity will be required to drive the dosing equipment (worm auger). Therefore, to generate electricity, the following are used:
- Cryotherm devices - hung on the hot walls of boilers/furnaces or placed inside the firebox, heating circuits, generate a current that is sufficient for lighting and electric drives;
- solar panels - mounted on the roof of a home or utility room, they charge batteries, the energy of which is consumed as needed.
Heat pumps extract heat from natural sources ( geothermal heat soil, above-zero groundwater temperature, warm air energy). The circuits of heat exchangers, inside which inert gases (usually freon) circulate, are placed horizontally below the freezing mark or vertically inside the wells, which allows maintaining the working area of the site.
For your information! Any heat pump will require electricity to run. Another thing is that energy consumption is low; a low-power diesel generator will cope with the task.
When choosing heating with boilers for a private house without gas or electricity, you need to consider the following factors:
- propane-butane mixture in cylinders or bottled for filling a gas tank is five times more expensive than natural gas from centralized systems;
- the electricity generated in generators should be used only for equipment and lighting; electric convectors should not be connected to these networks;
- diesel fuel is four times more expensive than coal, the boiler room has a characteristic smell;
- peat and pellets from pressed sawdust are one and a half times more expensive than coal;
- firewood is the cheapest energy source, but it requires high quality wood (low humidity + hardwoods without resinous substances).
There are household wind generators from domestic manufacturers GRC-Vertical, Wind Energy, Sapsan-Energia with a capacity of 1 - 35 kW, consisting of a mast, blades, turbine, rotary mechanisms, fastening elements, control automation. They produce 12 - 24 V, the energy is accumulated in 50 - 100 Ah batteries, which are enough for a cottage.
The disadvantage of the technology is the complex design, since forecasting windy weather is impossible in principle. The payback period for solar collectors is very long, so the accumulated electricity is usually not used for heating needs.
Thus, there are quite a lot of options for heating a home in the absence of gas/electricity. The choice of the best one depends on the specific operational and climatic conditions of the region.
Heating using heat pumps (video)
Heating a private house outside the city these days can be organized in different ways. In this article we will consider in some detail methods of heating a home that do not involve the use of electricity, as well as main and liquefied gas.
Furnaces made of metal and brick - work without electricity or gas
The most convenient type of fuel is natural gas. With its help you can heat houses of any size, public buildings and even huge ones. production facilities. It is not surprising that the vast majority of private home owners choose gas as a fuel. What to do in cases where there is no way to connect it? Freezing in a country house? Use electric heaters, paying enormous monthly sums for the kilowatts consumed? Of course not! There are many options that make it possible to organize high-quality heating of a private home without the use of gas and electricity.
Heating a country home can be done by:
- heating stoves (made of stone, brick, metal) and fireplaces;
- solid fuel units;
- heat pumps;
- natural renewable heat sources (wind turbines, solar panels).
The easiest way is to build a classic brick stove in your house and use it for heating. It is important to correctly place such a structure in the home. Ideally, it should stand in the center of the house so that its walls open into different rooms. The stove can be heated with coal or wood. The first option is more rational. Coal burns for a long time and emits a large number of heat. There will be more hassle with firewood. You will have to harvest them yourself or buy them in large quantities, since the wood burns very quickly.
Let us immediately note that a common person He is unlikely to be able to build a brick oven with his own hands. Its installation requires the creation of a foundation - a dirty, time-consuming and labor-intensive procedure. And it will not be easy for a home craftsman to make the correct brickwork. A reasonable alternative to classic heaters are ready-made stoves made of metal.
Specialized stores offer a chic assortment of cast iron and steel potbelly stoves. They have a high rate useful action and a great view. Thanks to this, factory-made metal stoves make it possible not only to heat the house economically, but also to make the residential interior original. It is easy to equip both a conventional stove and a ready-made potbelly stove with a coil. It will heat water, which can be supplied to radiators installed in different rooms Houses. With this approach we get economical heating, powered by wood or coal.
Fireplaces can also be used to heat homes. But only if the home has a small area. Big house with many rooms and utility rooms. The fireplace will not be able to heat the rooms. In most cases such heating structures play a decorative role.
Solid fuel boilers - an advanced version of a traditional stove
According to experts, the most reasonable heating option country house, not connected to the gas supply system, consists of installing a solid fuel unit. Moreover, for the dwellings we are interested in, it is recommended to choose simple boilers, produced in a completely non-volatile design. In such installations there is a special thermostat (mechanical), equipped with a basic chain drive. It is this device that controls the air flow that ensures the fuel combustion process.
Solid fuel boilers are economical and easy-to-use equipment, but potentially unsafe. Therefore, when installing it, the following mandatory requirements must be observed:
- 1. The pipe to which the boiler return is connected is always located below the incoming pipe. Often, to comply with this condition, you have to dig a special pit. And install the solid fuel unit in it.
- 2. Particular attention is paid to the organization of the chimney. It is built so that the natural draft in the pipe is perfect in any weather.
- 3. The heating system is made strictly gravity (in the language of professionals - gravitational). An open expansion tank is installed at its highest point.
- 4. The unit must be equipped with a safety group.
- 5. Heating systems with a solid fuel unit must be designed by specialists who correctly select pipes of the required diameter and calculate the required slopes. Only in this case will the boiler and the entire heating complex operate trouble-free and durable.
In solid fuel units it is allowed to burn coal and firewood, as well as sawdust and other waste from the woodworking industry, special pellets, and peat briquettes. There is a wide choice of fuel. Each owner of a country house has the opportunity to choose the most suitable option for himself. Note that the efficiency of solid fuel boilers reaches 70–80%. But for conventional ovens this value does not exceed 55–65%.
Heating without fuel - is this possible?
Modern science has also invented a completely unique option for heating private homes, which does not require burning wood, coal and other types of fuel. This method involves the use of a heat pump - a truly environmentally friendly, economical and efficient device. The uniqueness of this unit is as follows. It doesn't produce thermal energy. But it only extracts it from ground and soil waters, soil, air and transfers it to the house.
A heat pump is a structure consisting of a compressor, throttle and heat exchange compartments, as well as tubes with freon. The unit works like the most ordinary household refrigerator:
- tubes with freon are immersed in a body of water or in the ground;
- in water or soil, freon turns into gas, which rushes upward;
- in the compressor, the resulting gaseous compound is compressed, which leads to its heating to 75–80 ° C;
- Then the heated freon transfers energy through the heat exchanger to the heating system.
After this, the gas is directed to the throttle compartment. In it, the temperature and pressure of freon decrease. It turns back into liquid, which goes back into the water or earth. Then the entire above cycle is repeated many times. As a result, we have a constant source of energy used to heat the house.
Heat pumps come in different varieties. They are usually divided into:
- 1. Air.
- 2. Earthen.
- 3. Water for heat extraction from underground sources or from ground-based reservoirs.
A heat pump uses electricity to operate. At the same time, the consumption of the latter for the functioning of the installation we have described is small. In numbers everything looks like this. To extract 9–11 kW of electricity from water or soil and transfer it to the heating system, it is necessary to spend about 2.5–3 kW.
These kilowatts will have to be taken from the home electrical network or obtained from renewable energy sources. We will talk about them further. But first, we note that heating using a heat pump requires considerable initial financial costs for the purchase of expensive equipment and its installation. For this reason, fuel-free heating technologies have not yet become widespread.
Wind turbines and solar panels – we generate electricity ourselves
Heat pumps and energy-dependent modern boilers require electrical energy to operate. Without it, high-tech units will not function. You can obtain energy yourself without connecting to a centralized power supply. True, in this case, we will again have to spend a lot of money on installing special equipment - solar panels or wind turbines. The former allow you to receive energy from the sun, the latter from the wind.
Structurally, windmills are simple devices. They consist of a generator, a special spinner that captures wind energy, and a battery. But independently building an efficient windmill that generates enough electricity to heat your home is not at all easy. It would be wiser to purchase a ready-made design. And use it for a long time, recouping the money spent.
A similar situation is observed with solar panels. Homemade installations are not able to generate the amount of energy required to heat the house. And purchased equipment is not cheap. For this reason, both windmills and solar collectors are most often used as auxiliary sources of “free” electricity. Their power is not enough to fully heat a country house. But they allow you to save on energy bills.
Thus, if there is no gas in your country home, do not panic. You can heat it different ways– and classic (potbelly stoves, brick stoves), and using modern technologies. Choose suitable option, and let your home always be warm and comfortable!
When starting to build a private house, you should decide in advance how the room will be heated. Many areas cannot be connected to gas. Therefore, their owners have to think about how to provide heating for a country house without gas.
Wood heating
This type of heat supply system has not lost its relevance in the construction of a private country house. At the location country house Often there is no gas pipeline. The buildings are located far from the gas main. There is no way to connect to it. Therefore, heating boilers operating on wood remain relevant, and the installation of a wood-burning heating stove – convenient exit from the current situation.
The principle of operation of a wood-burning stove - heating without gas - is as follows: firewood is placed in the stove, set on fire, the stove equipment heats up, and the heat thus obtained begins to heat the room.
This type of heating is primitive, however, it is characterized by a number of significant advantages:
- fast heating of a wood stove;
- there is no need to install radiators or lay pipes.
Among the wide variety of modern boiler models that are used to organize a wood-fired heating system, it is recommended to choose domestic pyrolysis boilers. These boilers are gas generators and operate on the principle of combustion of pyrolysis gases. They operate without the presence of electricity.
Flaws
- large dimensions of the furnace installation;
- availability of a constant required supply of firewood;
- the need for proper installation of the stove, organization of smoke channels;
- danger of combustion products;
- uneven heating of the room.
Coal use
Efficient heating without gas or wood can also be achieved using coal. This method is typical for areas where there is no access to gas mains, and coal is easily accessible and in large quantities. Modern solid fuel boilers have a modernized design along with regulation sensors temperature regime, with high efficiency and low emissions harmful substances.
Boilers operating on solid fuel are characterized by a simple design. It is presented:
- the furnace, where the coal combustion process itself takes place;
- a heat exchanger where coal is heated;
- grate.
Housing materials
The heating heat exchanger can be made of cast iron and steel. According to this solid fuel boilers presented on the market in steel or cast iron. Steel boilers are inferior in cost to cast iron ones. Cast iron boilers do not have an expiration date. Breakdowns occur only due to improper use or strong mechanical damage. Coal-fired boilers have their own characteristics. The system is completely energy independent, beneficial since the boilers have high heat output. Coal is convenient to store, use, and transport.
Solid fuel boiler
Its popularity is very high for the reason that such units are capable of providing enough high level heat in a private home at relatively low operating costs. Heating a cottage using such boilers makes it possible to achieve the highest level of safety for the life and health of family members.
An important factor is the low cost of using this equipment - it is possible to install solid fuel boilers in both commercial and residential buildings. Using solid fuel boilers for heating country houses without gas is characterized by reliable and easy-to-use equipment, the service life of which is very long.
Liquid fuel boiler
Another way to organize heating of a private house without gas is to use liquid fuel boilers. Diesel oils are most often used as fuel, which is why such boilers are also called diesel.
Construction of a liquid fuel boiler.
There are boilers that operate on other liquid fuels, which include rapeseed oil, kerosene and other petroleum products. Depending on the design features distinguish steam and hot water boilers, and the first models boast easy installation and relatively small sizes.
The main positive qualities of heating a house or cottage using liquid fuel boilers include a high level of environmental friendliness and safety. In addition, installing the boiler is not very difficult, because there is no need to obtain numerous certificates and permits.
The most important thing is the high efficiency, which reaches at least 92%. For this reason, such liquid fuel equipment can be used to heat both large and small buildings.
Pellet system
This heating system without gas appeared on domestic market relatively recently, however, due to its numerous advantages, it has already managed to gain a huge market share.
Speaking about the pellet heating system, it is worth highlighting the following positive traits, as an opportunity to heat a country house or cottage using environmentally friendly and safe products. In addition, they can be stored almost anywhere in your home, since they do not have a bad effect on the human body and do not emit harmful substances. You should know that the installation of such a heating system will not require contacting special services or departmental commissions to obtain the necessary permission.
Electric heating
Heating a cottage with a coolant such as electricity is becoming increasingly popular today. The advantage is that this heating system can be installed quickly. This is convenient for workers and for owners of the house or cottage. If you use a cheaper night tariff, you will get a fairly economical solution for heating your home.
On this moment There is a huge number of different types of equipment that allow you to use electrical energy for heating a cottage. The most popular electric convectors, which can be installed in any room of your cottage.
Electric convectors
Heating convectors boast high power, as well as the ability to be mounted directly into the floor, which frees the room from the presence of these devices and increases the free space in the room.
Infrared panels
The leading position is occupied by electric infrared heating in private dacha. The use of infrared panels allows you to raise the temperature in any room to the required level, moreover, such panels can function automatically, even if the owners are not at home at that time. Therefore, your home will always be heated and heated to the required temperature.
Thus, heating a house without using gas is due to a high level of safety and environmental friendliness, and is also quite economical due to the capabilities of various heating equipment. If you need high-quality, reliable and safe heating, then your choice is alternative gasless heating.
This article is about how to heat a house if there is no gas. In it I'm going to talk about possible alternatives gas heating, evaluate them in a series key parameters and offer the reader the most profitable and practical solutions. Let's get started.
Gas is the cheapest source of heat. But it’s not available everywhere.
Can you see everyone?
Here is a complete list of possible heat sources for a home without gas:
- Solid fuel (wood, coal, pellets);
- Liquid fuel (diesel fuel, used motor oil);
- Electricity;
- Solar heat recovered through solar collectors;
- Liquefied gas (from a gas tank or cylinders). If your locality is not supplied with main natural gas, this does not mean that you cannot use a gas boiler for heating or.
What we evaluate
By what parameters do we compare possible solutions?
There are only three of them:
- Minimum operating costs (that is, the cost of a kilowatt-hour of thermal energy);
- Cost of equipment;
- Ease of use of the home heating system. It should require as little attention as possible from the owner and work offline for as long as possible.
Comparison
Operating costs
Here's how our participants line up when assessing their cost-effectiveness:
- Unconditional leader - solar heat. Collectors convert it into heating coolant completely free of charge. Electricity is consumed only by circulation pumps;
As a rule, solar collectors are used only as an auxiliary heat source. Their problem is fickleness. thermal power: It varies depending on the length of daylight and the weather.
- In second place is a solid fuel boiler that runs on wood. Yes, yes, I am aware that we are in the 21st century. These are Russian realities: in the absence of main gas and with short daylight hours, firewood is still more economical than all other heat sources and provides a cost per kilowatt-hour of 0.9 - 1.1 rubles;
- Third place is shared by pellets and coal. Depending on local energy prices, a kilowatt-hour of heat obtained by burning them will cost 1.4-1.6 rubles;
- Liquefied gas from a gas tank provides a kilowatt-hour cost of 2.3 rubles;
- The use of cylinders increases it to 2.8 - 3 rubles;
- Liquid fuel boilers running on diesel fuel produce heat with an average cost of about 3.2 rubles/kWh;
Used motor oil with the same calorific value costs 5-6 times less. If you have a constant source of waste, this type of fuel can successfully compete with main gas.
- Obvious outsiders - electric boilers. The price of a kilowatt-hour of heat obtained by heating water with a heating element or any other direct heating device is equal to the cost of a kilowatt-hour of electricity and, at current rates, is approximately 4 rubles.
Let me emphasize: the so-called economical electric boilers (induction or electrode) are fiction. They, of course, work, but the method of heating the water does not in any way affect the cost of a kilowatt-hour of thermal energy.
Induction electric boiler. Its undoubted advantage is reliability. But in terms of efficiency, it is no different from a device with heating elements.
Installation costs
How much will it cost to install heating in a country house or country house?
In order not to cause confusion due to the variation in the parameters of the heating system, I will compare the average cost of heat sources of the same rated power - 15 kW.
- Gas boiler - from 25 thousand rubles;
Without a gas main, the owner will have to invest in the equipment of a gas station or gas holder, which will increase costs by another 150 - 250 thousand.
- Pellet boiler - from 110,000;
- Electric boiler - from 7000;
- Solid fuel boiler - 20,000;
- Liquid fuel (diesel or exhaust) - from 30,000;
- Solar collectors with a total power of 45 kW (a threefold power reserve compensates for downtime in the dark) - from 700,000 rubles.
Obviously, only wood and coal provide a reasonable balance between the cost of a kilowatt-hour of heat and the heating equipment itself. A good alternative to them - used oil - cannot participate on equal terms in our competition due to the inaccessibility of this energy carrier.
Free solar heat turns out to be prohibitively expensive at the installation stage: the cost of a thermal energy accumulator will be added to the exorbitant costs of the collectors themselves.
Ease of use
Laziness, as you know, is the engine of progress. You want to heat your home not only cheaply, but also with minimal costs time and effort.
What do you have different options heating with autonomy?
- Electric boilers are leading. They work indefinitely and require no maintenance at all. The coolant temperature can be adjusted automatically using a remote electronic thermostat. Electrical equipment allows you to program daily and weekly cycles (for example, reduce the temperature while you are away);
- Gas boiler with gas holder provides autonomy for several months, or even a whole season. It differs unfavorably from an electric boiler in the need to remove combustion products, so the location of the device is tied to the ventilation, chimney or external walls of a private house;
- Autonomy liquid fuel appliance limited only by the volume of the fuel tank;
A separate room must be allocated for a diesel boiler. The reasons are the high noise level when the burner is operating and the smell of diesel fuel.
- The use of several parallel-connected cylinders reduces the autonomy of heating equipment by up to a week;
- A pellet boiler can work approximately the same amount of time on one load;
- Solid fuel boiler needs to be refilled every few hours and periodic cleaning of the ash pan. This period can be increased by limiting the thermal power with a covered air damper, but in this case, incomplete combustion of the fuel will reduce the efficiency of the device and, accordingly, increase the owner’s heating costs.
What's the result? But in the end, comrades, we have to choose between the limited autonomy of a pellet boiler with its rather high cost, the continuous kindling of a solid fuel appliance and the sky-high cost of thermal energy from an electric boiler.
the main problem solid fuel heating- frequent kindling.
Loopholes
How can you heat a living space, combining acceptable autonomy with low operating costs?
We can go one of two ways:
- Try to increase the autonomy of the system with a solid fuel boiler;
- Minimize electric heating costs.
Now - in more detail about each possible solution.
Pyrolysis boiler
This is the name of a type of solid fuel device that splits the combustion process of coal or wood into two stages:
- Smoldering with limited air access (so-called pyrolysis). Incomplete combustion of fuel produces flammable mixture volatile hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide CO;
- Afterburning of pyrolysis products in a separate firebox. It is usually located under the main one and ensures its heating to the temperature required for pyrolysis.
What does such a scheme provide?
- Flexible power adjustment by simply changing the speed of the supercharged fan;
- Maximum efficiency over the entire range of power values (since the products of incomplete combustion of fuel are burned in the second combustion chamber);
- Autonomy 10-12 hours. It is achieved precisely by limiting the combustion rate of solid fuel.
Top combustion boiler
Another step towards increasing the autonomy of solid fuel heating equipment was taken by engineers of the Lithuanian company Stropuva. They just transferred the process of smoldering fuel from the grate to the upper part of the firebox. As a result, as the filling volume increases, it is not the thermal power of the boiler that increases, but the combustion duration.
How was this result achieved?
The boiler is a vertical cylinder with a telescopic air duct ending in a massive steel disk with fins (called staskoblin). As the fuel load burns out, the air duct lowers down under its own weight, at every moment providing air supply directly to the area of smoldering fuel.
The same disk separates the smoldering region of the fuel and the afterburning region of incomplete combustion products, turning the upper combustion boiler into a type of pyrolysis boiler. A small amount of ash remaining on the surface of the firewood is carried away by the rising flow of hot gases.
Maximum autonomy was demonstrated by the Stropuva boiler running on coal. He worked on one tab for 31 hours.
Thermal accumulator
Is it possible to heat Vacation home an ordinary solid fuel boiler, without spending a significant part of the day on lighting and cleaning it?
Yes. A heat accumulator will help with this - a regular water tank with thermal insulation and several outlets for connection heating circuits. Water has a fairly high heat capacity. Thus, a tank with a volume of 3 m3, when the coolant is heated by 40 degrees, accumulates 175 kWh of heat, which is enough to heat a house of about 80 m2 during the day.
How to install a heating system with a heat accumulator with your own hands?
It forms two circuits with forced circulation:
- The first connects the boiler heat exchanger to the battery;
- The second combines a heat accumulator with heating devices - radiators, convectors or registers.
As a result:
- The boiler is heated once or twice a day and operates with the damper fully open, at rated power (and, accordingly, with maximum efficiency);
- The rest of the time, the heat accumulator gradually releases the accumulated heat to the house.
This scheme will also help to heat the house at minimal cost to owners of electric boilers, but only if they have a two-tariff meter. At night, during the minimum tariff, the boiler heats water in the tank, and during the day the accumulated heat is gradually released by radiators.
Warm floor
Underfloor heating systems transform the entire surface of the finished flooring into the heating device.
For heating can be used:
- A pipe with coolant laid in a screed;
- Heating cable laid in a screed or in a layer of tile adhesive under the tiles;
- Film heater is a polymer film with high electrical resistance current-carrying tracks. The heater is placed under a finishing coating of sufficient thermal conductivity - laminate, parquet or linoleum.
Warm floors can reduce heating costs by 30-40% compared to convection devices - radiators or convectors. Savings are achieved through temperature redistribution: the air is heated to a maximum of 22 - 25 degrees at floor level, while the temperature under the ceiling is minimal.
With convection heating, for a minimum comfortable +20 at floor level, the air under the ceiling will have to be heated to 26 - 30 degrees. Heating only affects heat leakage through the ceiling and walls: they are directly proportional to the temperature difference on both sides of the building envelope.
I used film heaters to heat the floors under my desks. With ridiculous electricity consumption (on average 50-70 watts per square meter) they provide subjective comfort during work even at a room temperature of 14 - 16 degrees.
Infrared heaters
Traditional heating heats the air in direct contact with the heating device. However, with relatively small area heating element and its high temperature Another method of heat transfer begins to predominate - infrared radiation. This is what infrared heaters use, positioned as devices for economical heating with electricity.
How infrared heating better than convection?
Placed under the flow or on the wall, the device warms the floor and all objects in the lower part of the room with radiant heat. The effect is approximately the same as when using a heated floor - below the air temperature is made maximum, under the ceiling - minimum.
Moreover, radiant heat warms the skin and clothes of people in the room. It creates subjective feeling heat, allowing to reduce comfortable temperature in the room from 20-22 to 14-16 degrees. We have already found out how the temperature difference with the street affects heating costs.
At -10 outside the window, reducing the average temperature in the room from 25 to 15 degrees will reduce heat consumption by (25 - -10)/(15 - -10) = 1.4 times.
Heat pumps
What is a heat pump?
Structurally, it is identical... to a regular refrigerator. The design of this device allows you to take heat from a colder environment (ground, water or air) and give it to the warmer air inside the house.
How is this achieved?
This is what the operating cycle of any heat pump looks like.
- A compressor compresses a refrigerant gas (usually freon), turning it from a gas to a liquid. In full accordance with the laws of physics, it heats up;
- Freon passes through a heat exchanger where it gives off heat;
- The next thing on the path of the refrigerant is the expansion valve. With a sharp increase in volume, freon returns to a gaseous state and cools sharply;
- Passing through another heat exchanger, it takes heat from the environment that is warm compared to the cooled freon;
- The heated refrigerant is returned to the compressor for a new cycle.
As a result, electricity is spent only on the operation of the compressor, and for each kilowatt of it electrical power the owner receives 3-6 kilowatts of thermal power. The cost of a kilowatt-hour of heat is reduced to 0.8 - 1.3 rubles.
Moreover, all types of heat pumps fully possess the advantages of electric heating devices:
- They do not require maintenance or removal of combustion products;
- They can be programmed for daily and weekly cycles, further reducing heat consumption.
It is useful for a potential heat pump buyer to know several things about these devices:
- The warmer the low-potential source of thermal energy, the higher the COP of the device (coefficient of performance, the number of kilowatts of heat per kilowatt of electrical power when operating for heating);
- COP also increases when the temperature of the internal (located in the house) heat exchanger decreases. That is why low-temperature heating is usually used with heat pumps - heated floors or convection devices with an increased fin area;
- The lower temperature of the external heat exchanger is limited by the freon phase transition temperature and cannot be lower than -25 degrees. That is why heat pumps operating according to the “air-to-water” and “air-to-air” circuits can be used for heating only in the southern regions of the country;
- The Achilles heel of geothermal and water pumps is the high cost of installing external heat exchangers. Vertical soil collectors are immersed in wells several tens of meters deep, horizontal ones are placed in pits or trenches, and their total area is approximately three times the heated area of the house.
A water heat exchanger requires a non-freezing reservoir or well with sufficient flow. In the latter case, the manufacturer’s instructions require that waste water be drained into another well—a drainage well.
A special case of a heat pump is a conventional air conditioner. In heating mode, it uses heat collected from the outside air by an external heat exchanger. The COP of a modern inverter split system reaches 4.2 - 5.
The main source of heat in my house is split systems installed in each room. How profitable is it to heat a house with air conditioners and how expensive will their purchase and installation cost?
Here's a short report:
- Two floors with a total area of 154 m2 are heated by four inverter air conditioners - three with a capacity of 9000 BTU and one with a capacity of 12000 BTU;
- The cost of one air conditioner at the time of purchase ranged from 20 to 25 thousand rubles, depending on the model and manufacturer;
- Installation of one inverter cost an average of 3.5 thousand rubles;
- Electricity consumption in the winter months is about 2000 kWh. Of course, electricity is consumed not only for heating: the electric stove, washing machine, lighting, 24/7 computers and other equipment.
The photo shows the external unit of the split system responsible for heating the attic.
Conclusion
As you can see, even in the absence of mains gas, a house can be heated at moderate costs and without much discomfort. As always, the video in this article will provide you with additional information. I look forward to your additions and comments. Good luck, comrades!
Most large settlements have a branched centralized system gas supply, which meets the needs of residents. In remote places, the situation is not always encouraging.
Long distances to main pipelines and significant gas costs force us to use alternative options space heating. When studying the issue it turns out that efficient heating in a private house without gas can be provided using different kinds liquid and solid fuel, and in some cases do without it at all.
Gas saving
IN climatic zones With harsh winters there are additional reasons for concern. Too low outdoor temperatures cause the need for high gas consumption, which significantly increases the financial costs of maintaining comfortable conditions.
Heating payments in winter make up a significant part of a family's budget. There is a natural desire to reduce the volume of payments where possible. Therefore, attention is focused on everyone possible ways saving gas without compromising temperature conditions.
Insulation of the house
Heating costs can be significantly reduced in advance during construction. Proper thermal insulation of walls, foundations, and roofs will prevent thermal energy from escaping into the atmosphere. Upcoming heating costs will be acceptable. If the house is no longer new, you can insulate it at the renovation stage.
There is a wide range of materials that provide thermal insulation of buildings in general, individual apartments and houses in particular. Qualified professionals will help you choose an effective and economical solution insulation of the house. In addition to working with walls, floor coverings, and ceiling structures, window and door openings should be carefully sealed.
Additional sources of savings
When building and technically equipping a house, it is important to correctly calculate the required boiler power. Excessive equipment capacity will lead to excessive consumption of gas fuel and an increase in the amount of payments.
Proper layout of the thermal piping can reduce costs by up to 15%.
Installation allows you to save your budget collector system coolant distribution. In the bedrooms you can increase the heating at night, in the living room - during the day. It is advisable to install automated temperature sensors in the house or country house. You need to do this once, enjoy the result constantly. When the outside air temperature drops, the gas supply and the operating intensity of the heat boiler increase. The sensor can operate remotely, which is especially convenient for adjusting the heating of a country house.
It allows you to significantly reduce gas consumption for heating modern version ventilation devices. Installing a recuperator, in which hot air leaves the room through the inner pipe, and cold air enters through the outer jacket, warming up at the same time, allows you to heat the house with minimal fuel consumption.
You can install heated floors in living areas. This is an economical way to raise the air temperature in your home at minimal cost. Of course, you need to install gas consumption meters. They help to significantly save money on heating.
How to do without gas
In a country with enormous resources, there is always an alternative choice of fuel. It is possible to inexpensively organize home heating without gas or electricity. There are several options, the choice of which depends on the specifics of the place of residence, the availability of one or another organic raw material.
Solid fuel
In many houses in the villages there were wood stoves. The tradition has been preserved to this day in the corners of the forest zone of the country, which has no problems with the delivery of wood. In addition to firewood, other raw materials can be used for heating.
Exist modern designs boilers with automatic device, intended for the use of various types of solid fuel:
- firewood;
- straw briquettes;
- peat;
- coal;
- pellets from various raw materials.
In many regions solid fuel- the cheapest source of heat. Sometimes boilers are made for a specific type of raw material, but universal equipment is popular. This autonomous heating method involves the need to constantly monitor the operation of boilers, add organic raw materials, regularly remove ash and clean chimneys.
The use of coal stoves is not environmentally friendly; a lot of harmful gases are released. It is best to use pellets or briquettes as fuel.
A good option for heating a private home is to install a fireplace. In addition to conventional fireplaces that heat one room with warm air, you can build a pipeline system with coolant that can heat completely without gas country house. Water entering the radiators or air, distributed to all rooms through air ducts with adjustable dampers, are used as a heat carrier. Fireplaces have a high inertia, so you will have to wait until the entire home warms up. Some inconvenience of heating is compensated by the special comfort that the fireplace creates and pleasant aesthetic impressions.
Liquid fuel
You can heat your house cheaply and without gas using liquid raw materials. The efficiency of liquid fuel boilers and stoves is high, although they are large in size and weight. To install heating stoves, you need to provide a separate room with good ventilation and a smoke waste removal system. How heat sources can be used:
- kerosene;
- fuel oil;
- diesel fuel;
- waste fuels or lubricants.
Liquid fuel has a strong, unpleasant odor; a separate facility must be built for storage. Outdoors at low winter temperatures, flammable liquids will freeze, so the storage room must be heated or be prepared for the fuel to be brought to the required condition before use. Taking into account all the difficulties of heating wooden house liquid fuel only makes sense if there are no other available options.
Electrical heating
Regardless of your geographic location, you can use electricity to heat your home. There are many models of electric heating equipment on sale that work effectively without any gas and are easy to use. It will not always be possible to save money. Costs are comparable to gas heating costs, which makes us think about other technologies.
However, if you use infrared film heaters, your energy consumption will be more economical. Sometimes heating with gas or wood is combined with the installation of electric heating devices, making living conditions more comfortable. Using electricity, separate areas of the room are heated, portable heaters are installed in utility rooms, at the dachas.
Modern alternative
There are completely different approaches to using energy for heating purposes without the use of gas. The choice depends on your readiness to take the equipment seriously new system, financial capabilities of the home owners.
Heat pumps
An as yet unusual option for organizing home heating is the use of a heat pump, the operating principle of which is based on converting the energy of soil, air or water into heat. The unit takes low-temperature potential from the environment, heats the coolant in the evaporator and transfers it to the heating system.
The energy source can be:
- soil located close to the surface of the earth;
- wells;
- heat from non-freezing reservoirs.
In the first case, the contour is laid horizontally under a layer of soil located just below the freezing level. This occupies part of the local area. After installation of the heating complex is completed, the soil can be used to grow plants with small roots.
Wells are made in deep systems. Curved collectors made of polyethylene pipes. The number of wells and their depth are determined by calculations. Installation of the heater can be done quite quickly.
Laying polyethylene heating pipes on the bottom of a reservoir is more difficult to do. The fasteners should not only firmly fix the pipeline under water, but also weigh down the plastic structure. There are unsuccessful examples when, due to savings on fasteners, polyethylene fragments of the collector floated up, broke, and the coolant poured into the reservoir.
You can take regular air from the street to operate the heat pump. This is the simplest option, which is economically justified only in places where frosts do not exceed 20 ° C.
All types of geothermal heating equipment are environmentally friendly. For their operation, a compressor is needed, it is good if it can be powered not only from the central power supply, but also from a mobile generator. Heat pumps are more than three times more efficient than gas boilers, but first you need to invest a considerable amount of money, which will not pay off right away.
Biofuels
Increased environmental literacy and the level of general awareness of the population make it possible to use non-traditional energy sources, an example of which are various types of biofuels. Biological materials produce gas as a result of fermentation. The combustion of gaseous products produces energy that can be used to heat a private home or greenhouse.
Any organic waste from animals or plant origin. Most often, they take manure and mix it with sawdust, peat, fallen leaves, straw, and other plant waste. This must be done in a sealed bunker or pit. To initiate fermentation, the mixture is heated to a temperature of 35 ℃. After the start of the reaction, heating continues spontaneously, organic gas is released, which must be sent into the pipeline system and used for heating as regular gas fuel. It is important to take into account that the composition of biological gas differs from natural gas. Therefore, the burners must be adjusted to operate under the given conditions.
Most often, biofuels are used to heat greenhouses and utility rooms. The popularity of the technology is growing, the benefits are obvious. In the near future, biological fuel will begin to be widely used for heating homes.
Solar collectors
The possibility of using solar energy for heating purposes is interesting. There are systems that convert solar energy into electrical and thermal. The former are called solar panels, the latter – collectors.
Batteries powered by the sun are rare in our country. But heating collectors are gaining popularity every year, although they also have their own characteristics that complicate their widespread use.
It will not be possible to install heating without gas throughout the entire country using solar collectors. For this purpose, in winter there will not be enough daylight hours and radiation intensity. However, from spring to late autumn, the sun's energy is quite sufficient to heat water as a coolant. The heat accumulated in the collectors is forced to circulate in the system due to the operation of the pump.
There are gravity-fed models that operate completely autonomously without the use of electricity. A pump is not needed in such heating systems.
Any types of solar collectors cost a lot. Additional costs are required for the purchase of a storage tank. They will pay off in at least 10 years. In the southern regions, the use of solar energy for heating is justified by high solar activity. It is quite possible to do without gas here.
Innovative and traditional technologies make it possible to consider alternative sources of energy supply for heating without the use of natural gas. In addition to those listed, there are heating systems using wind and geyser energy.
When planning the construction of a new house or the refurbishment of an old home, you should study the issue thoroughly, assess the availability of a particular source, and calculate the fuel consumption for heating the entire area. In this case, you will be able to save significantly on heating and do without gas.
