Oil Heating Vs. Gas Heating: What’s The Difference?

Written on: November 2, 2018

oil heat vs. gas heat pennsylvania

Heating oil remains one of the cleanest, safest and most reliable fuels your money can buy! Yet, some people believe the “gas” is greener on the other side and think they will get a big payback if they give up on oil and convert to natural gas heating. But the mere cost to convert from oil to gas—typically thousands of dollars—could easily break the bank.

So the question is, why gamble with switching fuels when heating your home with oil is one of the safest bets around?

Why heating oil is incredibly safe

Being safe at home is one of the big reasons people prefer to heat with oil instead of natural gas. You may not know this, but the fact is, heating oil cannot explode! The oil in your tank is as likely to explode as the water in your backyard swimming pool. It’s that safe.

Plus, with an oil tank on your property, you can always count on having a secure, on-site supply at your home. Heating oil is easily transported and handled by highly trained professionals using equipment and techniques that keep safety at the forefront.

Contrast all that to natural gas delivery. If an underground natural gas pipeline gets damaged, customers may lose their supply until repairs get done. If a serious problem occurs with a gas pipeline, the situation can turn tragic, as we saw recently in Massachusetts.

Additionally, unlike natural gas, an oil heating system poses a very low risk of carbon monoxide poisoning. If an oil burner malfunctions (most often due to a lack of maintenance), the safety devices in the unit will typically shut the furnace or boiler off.

Great value

If you’re wondering about natural gas vs. oil cost, overall heating oil prices have remained fairly stable over the last few years because of historic levels of domestic production. (Just keep in mind that the fundamentals of the market cause heating oil prices to go up and down on a daily basis).

Keep this fact in mind as well: heating oil is less expensive than natural gas when you apply an apples-to-apples comparison—a gallon of heating oil generates 40% more Btu’s of heat than an equivalent amount of natural gas. What’s more, gas utilities impose a surcharge on their customers that adds to the cost of heating a home with gas.

Additionally, modern oil burners emit near-zero levels of pollution; heating with oil today means no odors, soot or other residue in your home. Plus, widespread use of heating oil with a low-sulfur content, combined with cutting-edge emissions-control technologies, reduce already-low emissions even further.

Heating with oil—the more you know, the happier you’ll be using it! Please continue to contact Lawman’s Oil for reliable heating oil deliveries. For the convenience of Lawman’s customers, delivery requests can be made online by going here.

And please remember, we donate 1¢ of every gallon of heating oil sold to the American Breast Cancer Foundation.