What is the cheapest way to heat your home? An interesting comparison of PAS
Polish Smog Alarm has checked how much we will pay for heating, taking into account the latest energy prices. The calculations show that heating a house with a heat pump is cheaper than with gas. A comparison of costs shows that apart from heating oil, the most expensive method of heating is currently natural gas, while coal and wood “smokestacks” are expensive.
The Polish Smog Alarm published a report on solid fuel prices from the beginning of July 2024. Using the prices from the report and the electricity and gas tariffs announced recently, PAS presented a heating cost calculator, in which we can check how much we will pay annually for heating our home. In the calculator, we can enter the building area, number of tenants and insulation standard. The calculator is available here.
The cheapest and most expensive ways to heat your home
After the gas price increase, gas heating, which is quite popular in Poland (about 30% of single-family homes), has become one of the most expensive heating methods. Heating a 150 m2 house with an average standard of insulation, where a family of four lives, with a gas boiler costs almost PLN 9,500 per year. Heating with an oil boiler is even more expensive – almost PLN 13,000 per year, but the percentage of houses using this heating source is low in Poland.
The cheapest is home heating with a heat pump (cost PLN 4,600 – ground heat pump, underfloor heating). The more popular and cheaper to buy and install air heat pump has an annual cost of PLN 5,300 (underfloor heating) and PLN 7,000 (radiators). The reduction in heating costs using heat pumps results from the reduction in electricity prices for people who did not previously use government protection, i.e. had high energy consumption. Owners of heat pumps have so far paid almost 70 gr net per kWh for energy. Currently, they will pay no more than 50 gr, and in multi-zone tariffs even up to 38 gr/kWh.
How much does it cost to heat a house with coal?
Coal and wood boilers in the Ecodesign standard are also competitively priced with gas. Coal heating is an annual cost of PLN 5,800, with lump wood – PLN 6,600. This is due to low coal prices – the price of nut coal is about PLN 1,300 per ton, and pea coal about PLN 1,400 per ton. A comparison of the price of heating with coal in an ecodesign boiler with a heat pump shows that it is cheaper to use than a ground or air pump with radiators, and more expensive than a ground or air pump with underfloor heating.
It is very expensive to heat houses with “smokestacks” in an uninsulated house – with off-grade boilers for coal and wood. It is almost PLN 12,000 in the case of piece wood and PLN 10,500 in the case of coal. Energy-inefficient “smokestacks” apart from gas and heating oil are one of the most expensive methods of heating a house.
You can read the full cost breakdown here.
