We have natural gas central heat. I have a programmable thermostat that I need to program. We currently have it set at 60. It is still a little chilly at night so I just ordered the heated mattress pads that Paul used for all three of the beds in our home. I intend to program the thermostat go down at night and warm back up to 60 in the morning. Anyone want take a guess if this will save us any money over the gas heat alone? I hope it does. But I wonder if using electric will increase the cost over gas. It all gets a little harder to figure out when there are 2 bills to consider.

I just posted my experiences with this in the Alt Energy area. Long story short I set mine at 55 at night, warms up to 60 for the two hours everyone is waking up getting ready for work. Goes back down to 55 while we are all at work, then warms up to 63-65 when we are home. Doing this and nothing else cut $50/month off my bill, bill was usually $80-$140 so ~30%. My house is also on the smaller side, 1927 Craftsman Bungallow 2 bedroom with lots of added insulation. I also sleep in PJ's and use about 6" of blankets on my bed at night, sometimes if it's really cold I use the dog as a "bioheater" under my blankets near my feet. My guess would be that a heated pad would save you money over heating the whole house. You would be amazed how comfortable you can sleep in a "cold" room when you are warm in bed. The only reason I have the heat turn up right before I make up is to make it easier for me to get out of bed on cold mornings.

Where are you getting the heating pads from? I might be interested in a couple if they work well.

Ordered them from Amazon.com. Same ones Paul linked to in his article.

Try thinking tent in the arctic… Less severe, a canopy bed, which originated as a means to preserve heat.

I prefer to just think of living in the tropics myself (where is an emoticon for shivering )

unno2002,

How was the canopy advantageous over lots of blankets?

Chad Ellis wrote:unno2002,

How was the canopy advantageous over lots of blankets?

well, you're creating a smaller "room" that will warm up with breathing/body heat, yet is still permeable enough to allow oxygen in.