Heating With Load similar to Driving With Load...
I've been "sort of" doing this for years but today is the first day I've put pen to paper with some actual thought behind it- no, really- in an attempt to clarify somewhat what I'm doing.
The premise is similar to DWL in that I believe it is not necessary or desireable to maintain a perfectly consistant indoor temperature all year around. As with our cars, we can have a variety of reasons why this concept may make sense- health, economic, energy conservation, or ?. It has been easy for me to do because there is nobody else in my house to complain, appease, or fiddle with the thermostat. However if you can get everyone on board- or if you rule with an Iron Fist- perhaps you can try it too.
I made a chart that is somewhat arbitrary because there are no calculations, measurements, tests, or formulas to derive it; just many years of living in the same house and already knowing pretty much what interior temps I can tolerate. I generally go about as cold as I can without undue suffering and since I live in a very cold climate, I'm acclimated to a large degree (PUN!) towards cold temps (some wonder if I'm some sort of Arctic animal...). I used Fahrenheit because that's what I do; I used easy round numbers for ease of remembering it; I broke it down into six temp zones of 15 degrees each (after several iterations) just because intuitively it seemed about right; and I used 35 as the temp starting point as a nod to the noticeably greater comfort inside when it's above freezing, plus a couple of degrees for good measure. This is not about chasing outdoor temps with the thermostat- the stat can stay put for days or weeks at a time, to generally conform to the guideline. Of course this is my chart and I wouldn't expect anyone else to follow it; adding 10 degrees to the stat for each temp zone would be far more typical yet still realize the concept. Without further ado:
Outside Air Temp.... Thermostat Setting
<-10F .... 50
-10 to 5 .... 52
5 to 20 .... 54
20 to 35 .... 56
35 to 50 .... 58 or Off
>50 .... Off
<35, Away from Home .... 45 (Grrr, that's as low as it goes)
>35, Away from Home .... Off
Note: My plumbing is all within a full basement where the furnace resides- no crawl spaces, lines running to uninsulated areas, etc., so I don't need much temperature "cushion" to protect against frozen lines, especially when I'm away from home. I know from lots and lots of bitter experience with mobile homes and older houses that this is not always the case.
In the past I experimented with how low I could go; at 45 I survived but sheesh, that was a little extreme, even for me. 48 was noticeably better but I'm not desperate and besides, the cat didn't like it one bit. One could find that minimum temp and just park it there all the time but I figure if I'm in the mood to reward myself with warmth when it's warmer out, this is a consistent way to approach it and not go overboard.
I'm not far from Canada and I made it to Novembrr 1 before turning the furnace on; after several days of freezing and below temps it hit 45 inside. Yes, my heating bills are probably in the bottom 1%tile for this region...
