The most obvious is the plug. In America anyway, the plugs for 120v vs 240v are unmistakably different. It also should say on the rating sticker or plate. If it doesn't give the voltage but gives you wattage and amperage, divide the watts by the amps and that will give you the voltage.
The easiest way to find the voltage of your old heater is to check the product label. You can find the voltage listed on product rating labels.
Turn off the power to your thermostat before checking the wiring as high voltages can be dangerous and even fatal. You can also look into the gang box of your existing thermostat. If you have black and white wires you likely have 120V. If you have black and red wires you likely have 240V.
Baseboard heaters typically use 250 watts per foot. Measure the length of your baseboard heaters and multiply the length in feet by 250 to find the wattage of your heaters. For example, a 6-foot long baseboard heater would use 1,500 watts (250 times 6).
Electric Baseboards
Baseboard heaters can be easily identified by their metal enclosure. Most baseboards will sit against the bottom of the wall in your rooms. Some modern baseboards will have a metal enclosure in the wall with grating around them. Baseboard heaters commonly run solely on electricity.
If you're installing your own baseboard heater, it's often easiest to stick with 120V heaters, but most electricians use the 240V heating circuit. It has the same wire type and size but 240V allows for twice the efficiency and the additional savings makes up for the difference in breaker price.
A: In order to tell if your heating system is electric or gas, check the front of your heating unit. Through the small window on the front of the heater, you should be able to see a blue flame glowing. Gas heating units use burners to produce heat. You can usually also hear the sound of the gas burner.
The most common voltage options for electric heaters are 120 volt or 240 volt. Higher voltage heaters draw more power from your circuit breaker, so it is important to know how much voltage your circuit breaker can handle.
In this method, it's assumed that 240-volt baseboard heaters typically produce about 250 watts per linear foot of length.
You need to use a 240-volt appliance with the required equipment or power outlet. In the U.S., Canada, and neighboring countries, standard household outlets run at 120 volts. It's ill-advised to connect an appliance requiring 220 or 240 volts to one of these outlets because it can damage or destroy the device.
At 240V the amperage is 50% of what it is at 120V. So, by using 240V you are able to take up less space in your electrical panel, and allow more room to make any future modifications which involve electricity. It also requires less wiring and you can fit more heaters on a 240V circuit than you can on a 120V circuit.
The 240-volt outlet has a four-prong design, while the 120-volt outlet has a three-prong design. Moreover, the modern-day 240-volt outlets have an L-shaped hole on the top, two vertical side holes, and a half-circle-looking bottom hole, making them appear larger than the 120-volt outlets.
However, a 240-volt outlet has two 120-volt wires plus a neutral wire and ground wire. You can easily tell the two apart by the 240-volt outlets' 4 prong design shown above. A 240 volt outlet is larger with two vertical side holes, an “L”-shaped hole on top, and a bottom hole that looks like a half circle.
120 and 240 Volt heaters are not interchangeable. A 240 Volt heater run at 120 Volt will produce 25% of the rated wattage. A 120 Volt heater run at 240 Volt will be 4x 120 Volt rated wattage, destroying the heater which possesses a severe fire hazard.
There are two different types of baseboard heaters: convection and hydronic. They have many similarities: Both provide a slow, gentle, and quiet trickle of heat through the room; both are built on the same type of long, metal framework; and both look exactly the same, at least on the outside.
Electric baseboard heaters can be powered by either a 120-volt or 240-volt circuit. Electricians generally install 240-volt heaters since they use lower amperage and are more energy-efficient than 120-volt heaters.
Using a 120V heater on a circuit with other significant loads can lead to tripped breakers. Ensure dedicated circuits for optimal performance and safety.
A 220-volt supply can transmit the power more cheaply because a smaller current is needed, and so you can use thinner cables and/or lose less energy through heat generated in the cables.
Generally, space heaters use 1,500 watts (W) of electricity, depending on the model. Most space heaters use about 15 amps and connect to a 120-volt outlet.
The power input can be calculated using the equation I^2 x R, where I is the current flowing through the heater and R is the resistance of the heater. The heat transfer coefficient and surface area can be estimated based on the material and geometry of the heater.
Most space heaters range from 750 to 1,500 watts, meaning a 1,500-watt heater will draw 1.5 kilowatt-hours (kWh) for every hour of operation.
Electric baseboard heating systems — also known as electric resistance heating — is a form of zone heating that individually creates and controls the temperature in each room of your home. There are no furnaces, boilers, heating ducts, vents or blowers involved in distributing the heat.
They're similar to in-floor systems, since they don't use vents or fans, but radiators aren't installed under the floor. Electric baseboard systems are generally not compatible with Nest thermostats.