We got real lucky and got our LP tank filled about a week before the prices jumped. Our winter fill was $2.25/gal. Prices are well over double that in this area. Meanwhile, we're burning as much wood as possible, as well as keeping the electric baseboards running 24/7. We have a goofy system. Our house has been built onto several times over the 100 years since it was built, so it's a mismatch-hodgepodge mess of whatever it takes to keep the old, inefficient place warm.
In the basement, is the original gravity-feed ducted wood furnace, giant and inefficient, but wood is cheap. All the bedrooms have wall mounted electric radiant heaters to take the chill off, although they don't seem to always keep up with the sub-zero temps. Our living and dining rooms have electric baseboard heat which provides the bulk of our fall and spring heat, when the wood is just too hot. To round up the list, we have an LP fireplace in the living room (opposite the baseboard) and an LP wall furnace in the dining room. These are the newest additions to the house, as the electric heat never seemed to warm these two extreme ends of the house.
The point to all this gobbledygook is wood is our cheapest heat, but we need a more even and constant heat source (I can't burn wood when I'm at work), plus parts of the house get cold from the basement furnace. Our next cheapest is electric.... yes, electric! Our electric co-op sells electric heat as "off-peak", that is, cheap rates for excess electricity. In our case, $0.055/kWh. No, that is not a misprint. The catch is during peak times (polar vortexes) they sell the excess electricity (my cheap heat) to customers in other states, so we need a back-up heat source. Enter LP. We live many miles out of town, so no gas lines within miles.
In other words, wood and electric are the cheapest I can get, but LP is still a must.
It's messy, but it works.
Joe
