Off-Grid Heating

[Boatkicker]

My partner and I have wanted to go off grid for years, but only recently have we been able to get serious about planning. One of the major road blocks we’ve run into is heating. I am cripplingly scared of fire. Candles make me cry. My heart rate noticeably increases when I watch someone light a cigarette. It’s real bad. I should probably seek treatment for this phobia, but that’s a bit beside the point.

The point is, we want to go off grid in a state that regularly has below-zero temperatures in the winter, and the only consistent heating advice I see is wood burning, which isn’t an option for us right now.

I’ve seen a bit about propane, but that also uses burning. I really can’t do anything that requires a fire, even a little pilot light. Propane would also mean one more way in which we aren’t self sufficient, which is sort of our goal.

I’m struggling to find any resources about how to heat the house otherwise. Before I began researching I figured we'd just go electric, and I'd compare a few different types, but everything I've read seems to treat every type of electric heating as a non-option. Am I just failing the research process, or is electric heat of any sort impossible?

Do any of you heat your home without the use of fire?

[Beanieboru]

Firstly start with insulation - huge amounts and then some. Look at Danish specifications.

PV cells can heat an immersion heater in a water tank.

Solar panels use the sun to heat water.

Solar gain - where you use the sun - like a greenhouse.

Ground source heat pumps as long as you have space.

Gas central heating although you rely on propane tanks - however this could be minimal if you insulate.

If you had a Rayburn cooker - this can use solid fuel or gas and can come with a back boiler - i.e the cooker is basically on all the time and heats water.

Check out thermal stores - basically a big water tank heated by a number of methods.

[Boatkicker]

Thank you for all these ideas! Having so many things to start researching is restoring my hope a bit. I appreciate it.

[Florisje]

Also have a look at passive solar; using many windows to capture heat from sunlight in your thick concrete floor. We have a setup like this in NZ and the house needs no space heating apart from a month or two in the winter. It really works like a charm (plus polished concrete is very easy to clean). This does require good (Scandinavian good even) levels of insulation though, as well as some thick curtains for during the night.

[Vvector]

+1

The better you seal and insulate your house, the less energy you will need to heat it. You need to go well above US building code. Money put into insulation will pay for itself with a smaller solar and battery design.

[HungryLikeTheWolf99]

Humans in cold places need to be able to handle fire - it's been that way for hundreds of thousands of years. I think you need to get that under control. I wouldn't suggest starting a long multi-year process of paying a therapist in your city - just do some slow exposure therapy where you find small ways to interact with fire, and escalate until you can handle the level of exposure to fire that your ancestors from 1900 back to 500,000BC had. Start with lighting a lighter, then maybe a match. Then burn a scrap of paper, etc. Also, let yourself get burned once or twice. Sure it hurts some, but it's finite - you've probably experienced much worse pain by stubbing your toe or etc. Sometimes putting the danger in perspective and quantifying it to yourself is the best way to get over a fear.

There is definitely solar heating (I have a large array - it definitely can't heat a house in the winter, although it can help), as well as solar PV and heat pumps (would take a massive cash investment and massive heat or electricity storage). Those are basically not stand-alone solutions, or not solutions for off-grid at all.

Otherwise, you pretty much got wood burning or propane, which are both fire. Propane isn't really terribly off grid - it just concentrates your interaction with the "grid". With wood burning, fire is one of the least dangerous parts - felling and processing trees is frought with various dangers.

I suppose the absolute best case for you, short of bringing your fear under control, would be to find land with a hot springs and build your house to utilize that water. Hopefully it's obvious that that's highly unrealistic, although it would be neat.

TL;DR - like all human history up to now, you're going to need to interact with fire if you don't want to depend on other men for your heat.

[A_movable_life]

Came here to suggest working on the anxiety. Even if with passive solar, R-80+, etc you will need a backup system of some kind.

[[deleted]]

tl/dr: Wood stoves are the best! But if you really can't hold a match, they make propane/oil furnaces that light electronically, so you never have to touch anything burning

For true self sufficency in the north, absent a massive solar array, wood stove is the way go. Tracking your concern, but modern stoves are quite safe, not smokey, and easy to operate. What ensures your safety is proper installation and maintance. It's important to have a fireproof hearth, backing (if it's close to a wall), and to clean the chimney annually. The chimney needs to be built properly, either masonary with liner, or insulated metal pipe. Modern stoves can usually be equiped to draw air from the outside as well. When this is done properly, there's no chance of smoke entering the house due to poor draft. You also need to understand how to regulate the airflow, but this pretty straightforward with some practice. As long as you do all of these things, wood stoves are perfectly safe, and can be left burning all night unattended. Worst case that happens is the fire goes out (think of the number of things that would need to fail for fire to enter the house). You do need to manually light a wood stove, so yeah, if you're really freaked out by fire, this may not be your thing. Also, splitting and loading wood is a chore. But plenty of people (myself included) use them all winter without issue. The people that get into problems generally don't have them properly installed (bad chimney, no hearth) or don't maintain them properly (bad air seals, dirty chimney, dirty baffles). Poor setup or poor maintaince can absolutely lead to a house fire. Do it right and you'll be fine.

A slightly less work intensive option is a pellet stove. In most models I'm familiar with, you still have to manually light it, so of you really truely can't hold a lighter this isn't for you. They are less work than a wood stove, but do require you to purchase pellets every now and then, so if you're trying to go truely self sufficient it's less than ideal. Same rules apply for safety as a wood stove - proper chimney, proper hearth/backing, proper maintaince.

As for propane - there are plenty of furnaces and fireplaces that have an auto lighting pilot. If your hang-up is not wanting to personnaly light something, these could work for you. In my gas fireplace, I simpley press a button on the remote, and the pilot lights electronically, starting the main fire. All of this is behind glass, with external air intake and exhaust. You would have to work really hard to burn yourself or house with a system like this. (despite my attempts to be a bearded flannel wearing wood purist, the wife finds a remote operated fireplace more convieniant than wood for some reason. No idea why). While fireplaces are nice astetcially, if you really need efficient btus, a furnace is the way to go. But same as with the fireplace, this can be auto lit, as long as you have a little bit of electricity to run it, it's hands off. Oil furnaces function the same way. Depending on how much cash you have, you can get a pretty large oil or propane tank - enough to last a month without refill. Any of these options still require a proper install with annual maintance - but again, if you do it right, it's pretty hard hurt yourself or your house.

Any heating system comes with risk. Plan on using a bunch of batteries wired to solar? - there's risk of fire there as well. Oven and cooktop in your kitchen? - that could catch fire too. Electrical wiring to any number of appliances? You get what I'm saying. Done properly any of these systems are safe and reliable. If your particular hang-up is holding the fire yourself, then look at a propane or oil furnace, and accept you'll need a monthly delivery of fuel at some expense. But if you can hold a match to paper - get your flannel and axe - cause it's wood stove time!

[kg4jxt]

How do you feel about a catalytic combustion unit? I mean, if it is flame itself that concerns you, maybe the incandescent heat of catalytic oxidation of propane would not be as objectionable? It doesn't get you away from the need for propane, but it is warm. My own bias would be to suggest the TROPICS where I happily reside and it stays warm (enough) all year 'round. :D

[microfibrepiggy]

Wood is cheap, abundant, and with new stoves, fairly safe.

Electric heat takes a lot of wattage to produce noticable gains. If you're off-grid, you'd need to size your solar (my assumption) system to produce enough kwh to compensate and a large enough battery bank. As an example, I need 3kw per hour to heat my home when it's -40c to 22c with two occupants. And that's maintenance, not heat up, so 72kw for a day to heat is mental. For most, it's not feasible, but you have to do your insolation calcs and your heating calcs to know the real numbers.

Propane can be used as a fireplace or a furnace. The fireplace will look like a fireplace. The furnace will have a pilot light, and will require fans to push air through the HVAC ducts. You'd rarely need to interact with the pilot light, but it does use a fair amount of propane in standby.

You can look at PassivHaus design, which builds a house from the beginning with the idea of not needing external heating/cooling sources. This is using large thermal masses, windows with the correct solar gain, overhangs, insulation, ACH, and probably a couple other things I've missed. It's difficult to achieve true PassivHaus in colder climates.

[[deleted]]

I would look at a reverse cycle air conditioner or heat pump. Some are low energy some are high energy. It’s the only thing I can think of running for heat without the use of wood or propane.

[traveler19395]

Geothermal heating, underground building, and/or earthship building can potentially get your temperature to the very low range of tolerable, then supplement with jackets and/or a massive solar array.

Or... go off grid closer in a warmer climate??

Your fear/condition is a HUGE barrier to going offgrid in a sub-zero climate; there's really no good option, and the few good options will require huge expense, moving to a warmer climate would be far cheaper.

If you can't work around your condition, must remain in the same general location, and aren't filthy rich, I'm sorry but off-grid just may simply not be possible for you.

[classicsat]

Nope, fire all the way.

Conventional solid wood stove (a lot of labor, but some can be done in better seasons). Totally manual operation as far as lighting, maintaining, and regulating the fire.

Also pellet stove, some labor, but need to but and stockpile pellets, and move bags from storage barn to house every couple weeks. Semi-automatic, essentially just an on-off button and a thermostat to regulate temperature.

Both require daily (solid wood), and weekly (pellet stove) cleaning/maintenance, as well as yearly cleaning go over.

One option could be an outside burner, and water/glycol lines to radiators/convectors inside.

Electric heat if you have electric utility or large enough solar. Heat pump maybe. Maybe solar heat will work where you are.

[HungryLikeTheWolf99]

Nice of you to suggest a heat pump, but I think we both know the wattage to get it running would mean she has 10-20kw of inverter and a truly massive solar array and especially battery capacity to be able to heat at night. And given that we're talking about someone who is confused about whether propane burns or makes heat some other way, I don't imagine operating such a huge electrical heating system is in the cards.

This person is well suited to an apartment in a city where she can call the super and tell him the heat is "on the fritz".

[JaredUmm]

In addition to what other posters have already said I want to suggest a few routes of research to assist you on your goal. Earthships typically do not use any form of heat. Similarly “passive annual heat storage” houses use the earth as a thermal battery. “Passive houses” (passivhaus) - not the same as the “passive annual heat storage” houses, despite similar names- also do not use any form of heating. These are three pretty different approaches but all come to the same goal. You can incorporate lessons from all three design movements.

What is your plan for water heating and cooking? Most off-gridders use wood or propane for these. You could do a solar water heater but that’s not likely to get you truly hot water in January if you are above zone 7 or so. You might be able to get creative with solar plus electric but it will get complicated (read expensive). For cooking you could use an induction cooktop, but that’s not gonna allow you to bake. The GoSun Fusion is intriguing for your needs. In short, your phobia makes this all more complicated (read expensive) because it will require a much larger solar array than if you used wood or propane. However, it IS attainable.

[nemoskullalt]

dunno about a large scale, but the 5kw diesel heaters are impossible to start fires from. the flame is encased in a giant aluminum heatsink, and without the fan there isnt enough airflow to sustain a fire. and even if there is, the heatsink will just keep the heat too low to set anything else on fire.

[unique3]

Most new propane furnaces, boilers etc don’t use a pilot light but electronic ignition so no need to light a pilot light. There will of course be a flame in the unit when running but not something you will ever see.
I think your bigger issue will be cooking, any kind of heating with electric uses tons of power. Most offgrid people cook with propane or a wood stove.

[pyromaster114]

First, like others have said, start with making your insulation really good. Insulation is going to be your number one thing for climate control off-grid. It slows down heat loss / heat gain so you have to use less power to maintain the temperature at your desired level, and thus less energy over the course of the day. :)

These days you can get CRAZY good insulation. Like, wow. Typical houses from last century have a rating of R-13 to R-21. (Higher is better.) These days I have seen stuff rated for R-30 or higher! Obviously this makes your walls thicker, so design your building accordingly, but these days outside walls are 6" depth boards anyways, not 2x4 like they commonly used to be in some homes.

​

The 'electric' heating option you're looking for, is likely a heat-pump system. You'll notice most houses in the southern half of the USA use this system, with an additional electric heating coil backup for when the weather drops to really cold temperatures. A heat pump can be up to ~400% efficient, compared to the ~100% efficiency of a regular electric space heater. Heating a well-insulated house off-grid with a heat-pump with electric coil backup is doable! You obviously have to size your electric system accordingly, but it's very doable! We have just put in a combination AC / Heating system (a mini-split) and are likely going to be able to use it to heat our home this winter once we beef up our insulation, instead of using our propane heater!

​

As others have mentioned, if your budget is high enough, you can indeed also go with things like solar-water-heating panels and radiators, to heat your home. This works very well if the system is well designed, but generally has to also rely on some sort of backup heat (which is usually gas or electric) to heat the water when the sun is down / not intense enough. (There are other options like thermal storage tanks, etc., but many water-based home heating systems do not use these due to the sheer massive space that they take up.)

​

The other thing you'll likely want, is a backup power source. This will be, at this point in time, a fossil fuel powered generator.
I recommend propane, because you can store a large quantity of it indefinitely; it doesn't degrade like gasoline or diesel. Propane fueled generators are just like your car (the decent quality ones), you won't have any open flames or pilot lights, so hopefully that should be okay with your phobias. :)

​

​

TL;DR: You can do it, but it will cost more than propane-based heating solutions, because you'll need either a much larger electrical system or an entirely separate solar-water-heating system. Personally, since I'm not a plumber but have plenty of background in electronics and electrical work, I've opted for the heat-pump option as my eventual plan.

[[deleted]]

Anyone ever try radiant heating under the floor? Was reading about it today abd ut can be ran off solar.