Guest post: Heating Cost Security Found Only With Wood Pellets
The following is a press release issued by the Maine Pellet Fuels Association
For release January 24, 2018
“There’s only one heating fuel—the fuel made right here in Maine—that consistently provides Maine homeowners with the lowest prices and also the only stable prices,” according to the makers of Maine’s wood heating pellets.
“While heating oil prices fluctuate wildly, driven by world markets and speculation, the cost of central heating a home with wood pellets has scarcely changed at all over the past three years, and has gone up an average of only 1.5% a year– less than inflation—over the past six years, according to the Maine Pellet Fuels Association.
The Association’s Executive Director, William Bell, cites the archived Heating Fuel Price Bulletins posted on the website of the Governor’s Energy Office as the source of the Association’s analysis.
Bell notes that according to the most recent (January 19, 2018) Governor’s Energy Office price bulletin, pellets provide a million BTU at 92% the cost of natural gas, 74% that of heating oil, and 51% that of propane. “Going back beyond the past two winters, which were likely outliers, the pattern is obvious: pellet heating fuel is slightly less costly than natural gas, well below the cost of heating oil, and half that of propane,” states Bell.
The below data, setting forth the price of each fuel in the quantity necessary to generate 1 million BTU, is taken directly from the “Archived Press Releases” for the third week of January of each year, as found on the Governor’s Energy Office website, under “Archived Heating Oil Prices.”
http://www.maine.gov/energy/fuel_prices/
January 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012
Wood Pellets $15.64 $15.82 $15.58 $15.33 $14.67 $14.48 $14.30
Natural Gas 16.92 14.91 15.80 19.50 15.50 17.00 15.70
Heating Oil 21.20 16.44 12.96 18.46 27.40 26.82 26.68
Propane 30.77 26.93 24.31 29.12 35.58 29.78 34.71
