[edkennedy]

This article was Sponsored by WhatTheFrack Drilling Company.

Fracking/Natural Gas follows the same playbook as big Tobacco, they hire experts and sponsor all kinds of studies that align with what they want people to believe.

The main cost here seems to be the energy monopolies, not the method of heating.

[BeetleB]

Disagree.

I see the same thing where I live. Natural gas heating is much cheaper than electric. And we have one of the lowest electric rates in the country.

Gas heating was also cheaper when I lived in the Midwest.

In fact, I often feel the opposite of you - that Big Electric is pushing propaganda. I often see people switching to heat pumps "because it's more efficient", but they don't see their bills go down, and on top of that it's a lot more expensive to install. Even if the bills go down a little, they'll probably not make up for the added cost of equipment in the whole time they are in that house.

[ethbr1]

My lay understanding is that gas is generally produced as a byproduct of pumping oil.

Consequently, as long as it's profitable to pump oil... more gas will be supplied to the market.

Which means that gas prices will generally be "low" (relative to energy content?) close to oil producers, as it's still profitable to "produce" gas even at low market prices (because you're mainly producing/selling more oil).

[out_of_protocol]

just pulled typical split-system listing in my country:

Gree Lomo Arctic R32 Inverter 2022 , about €740 (this is one of the top makers)

energy used while cooling: 0.7kW

energy used while heating: 0.7kW

cooling power: 2.7kW

heating power: 3kW

4x efficiency, yay! that's what heat pumps do

outside temperature from +43C to -25C. i've seen -30C and +48C in some models

Also, installation for split units is cheap around here

[tootie]

"much cheaper"

I can believe it has a lower price, but I'm sure the cost is higher.

[coldpie]

> Natural gas heating is much cheaper than electric.

Does this include the cost of dealing with the effects of emitting CO2 into the atmosphere?

[tinus_hn]

Gas costs just what the gas company asks for it, which is equal to what they think you’ll pay for it.

So it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to do this comparison to make some environmental point.

[alex_young]

  This article was Sponsored by WhatTheFrack Drilling Company.

Where did you see that? I don’t see the reference anywhere.

Edit: feel free to downvote. I’m not defending the content, I just thought it was interesting. Maybe we should tax fuel oil or something. I just don’t see this report as being some shadowy conspiracy with an oil company.

[LeifCarrotson]

It was written in part (I suspect in large part) by Robert Bryce [1], an oil and gas industry apologist, who has - if nothing else - been consistently arguing against renewable energy and for oil and gas interests for 30 years.

He's been funded by and a fellow with the Institute for Energy Research [2], a front group for Exxon Mobil, Enron, and Charles Koch, and with the Manhattan Institute [3], a corporate-funded conservative think tank, also funded largely by the petroleum industry.

The title of the article and main thrust is that if you use electric resistive space heaters and baseboards, it will cost more than gas. Everyone knows that. No one is seriously steel-man arguing for electric resistive heating (anymore), only heat pumps. I'm shocked it's only a mere 77% more, I would have assumed 2x or 3x.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Bryce_(writer)

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Energy_Research

[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy...

[r00fus]

I'm not downvoting you but if you're being downvoted it's because you failed to do some due diligence and actually look up the answer to your question.

I've taken the step to do a basic lookup when replying in haste and gotten a genuine TIL moment that added to the discourse here instead of asking an easily answered question.

[repeekad]

Downvoted because people don’t like the question? I would also like to know, apparently others don’t

[PumpkinSpice]

It's literally the playbook of every single business. Database vendors and graphics card manufacturers tout studies that show their product performs better. Pharmaceutical companies pay researchers who conduct studies that show their stuff works. If Safeway wants a zoning variance to open a new store, they will pay for an environmental impact study that says it's fine.

I'm not saying this to convince you should trust this study. But I think it's important to recognize it's absolutely happening everywhere, not just in the industries we don't like. Most of the research we read was paid for, and an overwhelming majority of it reaches the conclusion that aligns with the views of the researchers or of whoever is footing the bill.

[WillPostForFood]

Here is the original report, no fracking sponsorship. The data in the article is accurate.

https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/WinterFuels.php#tab...

[Aachen]

From near the table you linked to:

> the expenditures included for households that heat primarily with electricity in this report would also include electricity used for appliances and lighting

That's not a fair comparison (gaslighting?) unless you use gas lighting, a gas dishwasher, and a gas freezer!

It also doesn't mention what heat pump efficiency is assumed, it just compares electricity "as a fuel" to other fuels, which means resistive heating. Wholly unrealistic for places that need any serious amount of heating per year.

(I was surprised to learn that a colleague in South Africa was cold and couldn't turn on the heater during their winter because they don't have heating installed! A 10€ space heater and some blankets is all they need for heat around there apparently. There, resistive heating makes sense as compared to an expensive heat pump system.)

[toomuchtodo]

PR is all that is left when government is leaning into the destruction of your business and its harmful externalities (heat pump subsidies). Electric resistive heat is inefficient, heat pumps are not.

[archontes]

They also don't function well below 40°F/4°C

[hijinks]

ya electric baseboard are expensive to tun

heatpumps are really cheap to run

[qwytw]

> heatpumps are really cheap to run

But still more expensive than gas in most areas? Unless you get a ground pump etc. which has a much higher upfront cost.

[fuzzfactor]

This "77%" is nothing new, just the latest, most up-to-date price quote on their terms.

IMHO the real percentage is more like 200% more.

It was this way even before the price of energy skyrocketed in the early 1970's.

People in their all-electric homes didn't care about the cost multiple when it was only a few dollars difference every month.

The underlying physics are hard to argue against, it simply takes about 3 times as much natural gas to generate the electricity to heat one home, compared to using gas heat burned directly for the same amount of indoor heating.

So you pay about 3 times as much for the same amount of electric heat as you do gas and that ratio has been holding steady for many decades.

I also expect the differential to be maintained even after power plants are further decoupled from natural gas fuel supplies themselves.

[Nifty3929]

This is a good reason to be extra skeptical, but is not itself much of an argument. Is there any evidence their analysis is materially wrong?

[throwawa14223]

A search seems to indicate there is not a drilling company named "WhatTheFrack".

[Aachen]

I think that was part of OP's joke. I took the test of the post at face value though and feel mislead... This should not be the top comment

[lxgr]

Where are you seeing this? Right there in the article, it says that a heat pump would be around the same price as gas!

[Gibbon1]

It kinda makes sense. You can burn natural gas to make electricity. You get 0.4 energy units of electricity for each energy unit of natural gas. Heat pump COP is say 3.5. So you get 1.4 units of heating out. Converting to electricity has costs that eat away at that 1.4 units.

Call it a wash.

The big differences are the electric grid can be powered by zero carbon sources. And burning natural gas is a local pollutant. And if you ditch gas you don't need to maintain commercial and residential gas infrastructure.

[ulizzle]

You gotta have proof before saying that. Otherwise it sounds like lefty bleeding heart conspiracy theories that turn out to have some sort of evil agenda

[superduty]

False.