Welcome to the Dead River Company blog!

Just like seasons impact the weather, changes in your home can impact your fuel usage. For example, when your son and daughter are away at college; you’re most likely using less hot water than when they are at home.

Ensuring that your home heating provider is aware of these changes is especially important if you’re on automatic delivery, which is calculated in part by your fuel usage history.

To provide expert advice on how changes in your home can affect how automatic deliveries are calculated and scheduled, we reached out to Whitney Martin, Dead River Company Delivery Dispatcher at our Woodstock, VT office. Her suggestion is that if you are suddenly noticing a change in your delivery patterns, experiencing runouts or getting unusually close to empty on your fuel tank – ask yourself if any of these things have changed in your home over the last year.

Are there more people in your home? If so…

• You will likely use more hot water for showers (possibly even laundry and dishes), using more fuel to heat the hot water as a result.
• You may be heating additional rooms that are normally unoccupied, increasing consumption.

Are there fewer people in your home? Just as additional people affect your fuel consumption, fewer people will have the opposite effect.

• You will likely use less hot water and may be heating fewer rooms in your home. Because automatic deliveries are calculated based on past consumption, you may notice your provider is making either fewer or smaller deliveries than normal.

Did you recently install a propane-powered appliance?

• Whether it is a propane space heater, fireplace, dryer, or stove, it’s easy to forget in the excitement of installing a new appliance that your fuel consumption will likely increase depending on how often the appliance is being used.

Did you add onto your house?

• If the addition to your house is a heated space, the extra square footage will likely increase your fuel consumption.

Have you stopped using another heat source such as a wood stove or electricity to heat your home?

• You may notice an increase in fuel consumption if you stop using a secondary heat source but maintain the same temperature of your home. You will be relying more heavily on your oil or propane heating system than you had before.

We recommend that if there has been a change in your home, or you anticipate one, to give Dead River Company, or your local provider, a call to discuss these changes and adjust your deliveries if needed.