Natural Gas vs. Diesel Generators: Which One is Right for Your Home?

If you’re thinking about getting a generator for your home, you’re definitely making a great decision for your family’s safety and comfort. That said, shopping for a generator means being faced with a bunch of questions that you may not have expected. One of the most important unexpected of these is whether you should get a natural gas or diesel generator. When considering natural gas vs. diesel generators, it’s important to take into account various factors, including price, overall cost-effectiveness, availability, and performance. Today, we’re going over all of these categories in order to give you an idea of what the best choice may be for your home. Let’s get started.

This one may be easy to guess from the pricing sign you see outside of any given gas station: diesel costs more per gallon. In fact, it costs significantly more – so much so that keeping a diesel generator running can rack up quite a large bill. That being said, diesel is more energy-efficient than natural gas, meaning that although you’re paying considerably more per gallon, those gallons take longer to be used up.

Natural gas is much easier to access than diesel; it’s transferred to your generator directly from a pipeline, which can keep it running up to weeks or months at a time. Diesel is a different story: most generators’ diesel supply runs out after two or three days. On top of that, if you have stores of diesel for backup, they’re only good for about a year. If your biggest reason for getting a generator is to stay safe and comfortable during a blackout, diesel can definitely pose an inconvenience due to its limited supply.

Here’s where a lot of homeowners get stumped. Though natural gas is far more affordable and convenient, diesel engines are known to be more reliable and solid. They’re also much more low-maintenance than natural gas engines; they have way less wires and spark plugs that you (or your service provider) will have to deal with. That’s not to say, though, that natural gas generators are flimsy or unreliable by any means – just that diesel engines are absolute tanks. This sturdiness means that the engine can go longer between maintenance visits – its heaviness also makes maintenance more of a process.

If you’re taking your emissions into consideration when shopping for a generator, a natural gas machine is definitely your best bet. Natural gas generators release much less sulfur, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen than diesel generators into the atmosphere. Diesel generators are also noisier and release a much more pungent smell when they’re at work than natural gas generators. Because natural gas is a much cleaner energy source, and natural gas generators are much less obtrusive than diesel ones when it comes to both sound and smell, it’s the clear winner here.

The best thing you can do when it comes to deciding on the best kind of generator is to speak directly with a professional. That said, we hope this list was a good place to start. If you’d like to learn more about your generator options, don’t hesitate to contact us – we’re also happy to give you a free quote on your installation.