Comparative Heating Costs

Prior to 1962 we heated our Fairbanks house cheaply using coal. It was dirty, the furnace and coal took up lots of space, but mainly we stopped using coal because our stoker quit. She finally refused to get up early, as she had done before, so that the house would be warm upon my own arising.

Investigating the relative costs and merits of electricity and oil, we chose electricity. It was relatively cheap then, clean, used no space and was economical to install. At that time it cost little more for a totally electric house than one heated by coal or oil and using a propane cook stove and electric lights.

By 1973 the situation had probably not changed greatly. In that year Professor Eb Rice published a graph showing the costs of heating with coal, oil and electricity. The accompanying graph reproduces his data and also gives the costs in Fairbanks for 1977. The graph shows that coal heat is cheapest and electricity most expensive. Coal now costs 175% of the 1973 cost; oil is 171% of the 1973 cost and electricity is 234% of the cost in 1973.

Considering the marked rise in electrical costs, it may no longer be possible to claim that a total electric house has comparable utility cost to one using electric lights, propane cooking and oil or coal for heat. Nor is there a lessening of air pollution by using electricity since, now, much of our electricity is generated here in the Tanana Valley by burning hydrocarbons.