I'm on a roll here, posting so often. :P

So today is a nice sunny day and in November.. which is amazing! But I guess we had enough storms before now to make up for it all. I for one am Glad it's warmer and we don't have to worry so much about the cold so early in the season.

We're trying to get a geothermal heatpump installed which will result in a savings over coal methinks. :D

Currently we're doing electric radiant heat to keep things a bit warmer but with only a 3000 watt element we can't expect to heat the whole house on it. A ton of coal equates to about 20,000,000 BTU's and we normally burn one ton per month except in January when we burn about 1.5 tons. A 3000 watt element puts out approximately 7,372,080 BTU's per month and is more efficient than our coal burner. However with electric rates skyrocketing this won't be so good.

Now a Geothermal heat pump has anywhere from 5-7 to 1 conversion rates. So for 3000 watts we should be able to pump we should be able to pump 7,000,000x5 BTU's per month, (or 35,000,000 BTU's per month,) which we probably won't need more than 20,000,000 so it will be much more cost effective. :)

Coal costs 170 dollars per ton which comes to 2.9 cents a killowatt and whith our coal system only running about 60 percent efficient comes out to around 5 cents per kilowatt of effective heat, 6 cents is our rate for electricity but our power company charges 10 cents for every kilowatt above a certain threshhold which we do tend to run above.

If we ran straight electric we are looking at about 340 dollars per month to heat our house, but if we get a 5-1 ratio (7-1 is possible for our purpose) we should wind up with a net cost of 68 dollars per month, or if we keep the house warmer maybe as much as a hundred dollars. :)

You are in a room with nothing but a mirror on a table and there is no doors, how can you get out?

Well it's pretty simple, you look in the mirror and see what you saw, take the saw, cut the table in half, two halves make a whole, drop the w, climb through the hole and you're out.