[dirkf]

Performance wise floor heating has no problem with keeping a well insulated house warm; it doesn't have to be a passive house for that.

Comfort wise I think floor heating is the best. It's radiated heat instead of heat from hot air circulating around, and since it's coming from below it tends to give you a more evenly feeling of warmth across the whole room/house.

Comparing cost is difficult... you have to look at the complete picture of all equipment you need in the house: how do you produce the heat? Is the same appliance also used for heating your tap water? How do you ventilate your house? Do you want/need some way to cool the house during summer?

We've chosen a geothermal heatpump that handles both heating the house and the tap water. Since we don't need much heating capacity the additional cost compared to the commonly used (at that time) gas heater was manageable. Additional benefits:

- Gas/oil heaters require a mandatory (bi-)yearly maintenance/checkup while a heatpump doesn't. - Using only electricity as energy source means I only have to pay one set of installation cost + yearly fixed subscription cost. - Electricity I can generate locally on my roof. - The heatpump can also be used for cooling via the floor heating system. It's not the same as real A/C but on the other hand it costs way less energy (basically just running the circulation pumps).