Cold? Take action! A heating failure is manageable

I am not going to give advice here that assumes greater interference in the construction of buildings, because that defeats the purpose. Installing a heat pump with a heating function in the middle of winter with the current frosts sounds more like a joke than a real solution to the problem.

Before you run to the store for something that will raise your temperature, put on a sweatshirt and check the messages. The apartment may not have time to cool down properly before the heating returns. There is no point in buying unnecessary equipment in such a case. Of course, it is still worth ventilating your apartment as long as the air quality is good. And although it may sound unintuitive, the best method is not to open or open the windows, but to open them wide for a few minutes. This way we will get the best results with the least amount of heat lost. Additionally, it is a good idea to drink hot tea and take a blanket out of the closet.

It is also a good idea for household members to stay and sleep in the same room. Our bodies are quite good radiators. Don’t forget that cooking at home also increases the temperature inside. However, if this is not enough, let’s move on to other heating methods.

Let’s get back to heat pumps. There will always be some Ace who will say that it can be connected to ventilation. However, people using district heating are usually residents of apartment blocks or tenement houses. In such a case, we may do more harm than good by generating overpressure in the ventilation ducts. Don’t do this under any circumstances. You can really harm your neighbors.

The only worse idea is to connect a gas heater chimney to it. Then all its exhaust gases, i.e. carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide, will be distributed to our neighbors due to the higher pressure caused by introducing hot exhaust gases directly into the ventilation. This is downright deadly dangerous. The only thing that’s even worse is bringing in a stove and connecting it to ventilation.

This is where gas heaters come into play. These should only be used in ventilated rooms. If we don’t connect them directly to it, they won’t pose much of a threat. Of course, they should be accompanied by carbon monoxide detectors. This is because insufficient ventilation can increase the formation of carbon monoxide and end in tragedy. Of course, that’s not all. In addition to the stove itself, we also need a gas cylinder.

The problem is that not every apartment can use it. This is a matter of fire regulations. If there is a ban in a given building, this heating method is obviously out of the question. It is best to contact the administration about this matter before purchasing the stove.

The advantage of this solution is certainly its low price, both of purchase and power supply. The disadvantages are limitations in use and a much lower level of safety than in other applications.

Another thing that no one will forbid us to do is kerosene stoves. In their case, no one can forbid us from using them, because they are powered by liquid kerosene, not gas. However, they have two additional disadvantages: they smell of kerosene at the very beginning and at the end of using them. There is also a need for ventilation and the use of carbon monoxide detectors.

We are talking about fan heaters, commonly called fan heaters. Their operation is very simple: a fan distributes hot air from a heated resistance wire. The energy efficiency of this solution is close to 100%, which only on paper sounds like an ideal option for heating your apartment. In practice, we need several kW of energy even for a small premises. Moreover, after turning off the fan heater, the whole thing cools down quite quickly because we mainly gain warm air. Therefore, it must operate practically constantly, which in the case of a 2 kW fan heater that works for 12 hours gives us an underheated apartment and 24 kWh on the bill for each day.

And which one to choose? Overall… the cheapest. None of them will generate more energy at a lower cost, because it is impossible to exceed 100% energy efficiency. Its advantage is that it takes up very little space and is easy to hide, for example in a closet, even in a small apartment.

However, under no circumstances should you buy miniature, low-power designs that are referred to as energy-saving fan heaters. You can’t cheat physics: it takes a certain amount of thermal energy to heat a room. If you provide less of it, then… it will be colder. In critical cases, the apartment may cool down faster than the device heats it up. This is no saving.

It’s quiet, it’s relatively cheap to buy, it’s expensive to pay the bills. There are two types here: convector and oil. Let’s take a look at the convector one first: this one is definitely lighter and heats up much faster, which means it heats the room faster. Its operating principle is simple: it heats the cool air that enters it from the bottom and releases the warm air at the top. When this process starts, cool air is drawn in. This way we have circulation of warm air in the room. When we turn it off, it immediately stops heating.

When it comes to an electric oil radiator, it heats up much slower, but at the same time gives off heat for a much longer time, even after it is turned off. It is worth emphasizing, however, that its ability to accumulate heat does not translate into savings. The energy consumption of these two radiators is identical, even if we take into account that the oil one retains heat longer.

As you can see, any safe alternative method requires electricity. However, devices independent of it are potentially dangerous and require many restrictions. So the open question remains what do you value more: security or savings?