[Badger]

Hello, We have just purchased a greenhouse, my partner is itching to get cracking with her seeds. Does anybody know how much it costs to run a parafin heater. Parafin is no longer the cheap fuel it was in the old days. I guess it would only have to run overnight during this fairly mild period.

Badger

[johnmac]

You are right...It ain't cheap!! I think paraffin is about £7 for four litres last time I was in bandq. I have my paraffin heater away! I might be wrong but I think kerosene (central heating oil) can be used as it's the same thing?? In which case sook it out your tank for around 60p a litre??

Electric ones are a possible... But probably equally as expensive to run... Unless you wire it
into a car battery?

Personally for me it's the
window sill for seedling
until March!! Grow the stuff that needs the longest time... Ie tomatoes and
grow the rest innthe greenhouse come march!

[Fleecewife]

We did try a paraffin heater but it was expensive to run even a few years ago, and the one we had was extremely unstable.  Heating the whole greenhouse doesn't make sense for seeds, although you might need to do it later in the year when your plants are mature and frost is forecast.  I work things similarly to johnmac, starting seeds indoors although it's cold here so I use a propagator.  Getting the timing right is a trick - if you start your seeds off too early without sufficient light they will become long and weak (etiolated), but if you leave them until the weather warms up enough then you won't get a crop before the autumn frosts.
Have you thought of using warming cables in sand under the pots/seedtrays in the greenhouse, with fleece or a cloche over them at night?  It might bge possible to run them off a car/tractor battery if you don't have power in the greenhouse.  If you do have to heat the whole greenhouse, then it would be worth covering the whole thing with fleece or a blanket on cold nights.