Find Out How Much Fuel You’re Using During the off-Season!

With all that’s going on this summer—what with long-delayed vacations, celebrations, and simple get-togethers put off from the events of the last year—we want to make sure we have our household spending well-organized.

One way you might do that is by trying to figure out how exactly much propane is being used in your home this summer season to better control costs.

Blue Flame makes managing your propane supply easy with our Automatic Delivery and wireless propane tank monitoring. However, knowing exactly how much propane you’ll use this summer is challenging because there are many variables at-play. These include the weather, travel plans, and how you utilize propane in your home to begin with.

We have a way you can get a good idea of how much propane you’re using in the summer. Read below to learn more!

How To Approximate Your Propane Usage

Firstly, it should be realized that you are probably not running all your propane appliances at 100% capacity, 24 hours a day. So, we’ve created the examples below to estimate propane usage for running them at 25% and 50% capacity for 2 to 6 hours per day.

The estimate for potential propane use can vary a great deal, between 1.2 and 7.2 gallons a day—even in the middle of summer! It’s a surprise to many of our customers because many correlate their fuel usage solely to the colder months of the year when they’re heating their homes.

However, as temps climb into the 70’s and 80’s, you may have guests stay over for a few days, those extra loads of laundry and hot showers can have a larger impact on your propane usage—and bill—than you may initially realize. Here’s an example:

1. Example 1: For a gas water heater, clothes dryer, and range run at 25% capacity for 2 hours a day:
   220,000 BTU/hours (the total for all the appliances) ÷ 91,547 BTU/gallon of propane = 2.4 gallons per hour

   2.4 gallons x .25 (25% capacity) = .6 gallons per hour
   .6 gallons x 2 hours = 1.2 gallons

   This number can then be used to calculate greater use of propane appliances:

   • 25% capacity for 6 hours = 3.6 gallons per day
   • 50% capacity for 2 hours = 2.4 gallons per day
   • 50% capacity for 6 hours 7.2 gallons per day
2. Example 2: If you have a propane pool heater (at 425,000 BTU/hour) that operates for one hour a day at 75% capacity, which adds about 3.5 gallons to your daily usage:

   425,000 BTU/hour ÷ 91,547 = 4.64 gallons/hour

   4.65 x .75 = 3.48 gallons

Pool heaters use a lot of propane. You can reduce your propane usage by using a swimming pool cover when the pool is not being used. This will help to retain much of the pool’s heat, so the heater does not have to run as frequently.

A propane generator can also make calculations challenging since you don’t know when or if you’ll be using it in a power outage—or for how long. Keep track of any time your propane whole house generator is in use so you can account for it when managing your propane delivery bills.

It’s also incredibly important to make sure you know the size of your propane tank when doing your estimates. That helps you have a close approximation of just how propane much you have left so you aren’t faced with a run-out emergency!

You simply can’t beat Blue Flame for dependable propane delivery across Central and South New Jersey—as well as Eastern Pennsylvania. Become a customer today and experience the Blue Flame difference!