Serving your Oil Heating needs for 75 years

Heating Oil and the Environment

Don't Believe Everything the Natural Gas Industry Tells You.

Oilheat is not a Significant Source of Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Home heating oil is not a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions, and the evidence documenting this fact is overwhelming and easily available. Recent data from both the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency show that emissions from residential oil burners account for only a tiny fraction of the total emissions from all combustion sources each year.

The chart below illustrates this fact:
Total Emissions (Millions of Tons per Year)

Air Pollutant	Residential Oil Burners (ROB)	All US Combustion Sources	% from ROB
Particulates	0.0012	1.78	0.068
Nitrogen Oxides	0.053	24.1	0.21
Carbon Monoxide	0.015	80.5	0.018
Hydrocarbons	0.0021	9.43	0.022
Sulfur Oxides	0.02 to 0.10	17.4	0.11 to 0.58

Sources:
1. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, AP-429/98, Jan. 2004
2. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA-454/R-01-004, National Air Quality and Emissions Trends Report – 1999, March 2001
3. U.S. Department of Energy, DOE/EIA-0214(88), State Energy Data Report-1999 May 2001

When It Comes to the Environment, Heating Oil is As Good or Better than Natural Gas

Natural gas is a fossil fuel, just like oil, and is no better for the environment than heating oil.

Natural gas is primarily methane, a deadly poison gas that is 23 times more harmful to the environment than CO2, the primary greenhouse gas associated with home heating oil.
Liquified natural gas has a significantly larger greenhouse gas emissions profile than dry gas or home heating oil because of emissions associated with its production and transport.
Liquified natural gas is highly explosive and considerably more dangerous to handle. Heating oil is non-explosive and perfectly safe for consumers to store on site. The Natural Gas Industry Would Like You to Think There’s a Difference. There isn't.

Today's Oilheat is Clean Heat

Thanks to Industry Advancement, Consumers Today Use Far Less Oil Than They Did 30 Years Ago

Home heating oil has reduced its carbon footprint by 40 percent over the last 30 years.
No other energy source has succeeded in reducing consumption, becoming more efficient, or marketing a renewable fuel as have heating oil retailers.
Thirty years ago, the average Oilheat consumer used 1,300 gallons of oil per year. Today, that number has been reduced by nearly 50 percent, to 700 gallons per year, thanks to new technology like sidewall venting, indirect water heating and high-efficiency equipment.
BioHeat, a blend of domestically produced, renewable materials, such as soybean oil, has the highest BTU content of any alternative fuel and is extraordinarily clean-burning.
Testing conducted by the National Oilheat Research Alliance (NORA) found that a BioHeat blend of 80% low-sulfur heating oil and 20% biodiesel (B20) reduced sulfur oxide emissions by as much as 80% or more. Nitrogen oxide emissions were lowered by about 20%. In addition, carbon dioxide emissions can be lowered by 20%.
If everyone using heating oil used a B5 blend (5% biodiesel/95% heating oil), 400 million gallons of regular heating oil could be conserved. This would be a big step towards conserving oil and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.