# Is a continuous heat treatment furnace lower carbon than a batch furnace?

Canonical: https://senseible.earth/answers/continuous-vs-batch-heat-treatment-furnace-co2

At steady, high volumes, usually yes. A continuous furnace stays hot and avoids reheating the furnace and fixtures for every batch. At low or irregular volumes a batch furnace can win, because a continuous line burns fuel while waiting. Compare fuel or kWh per tonne treated from your own logs.

## What decides it

- Load factor: hours loaded against hours hot.
- Fixture and tray mass heated each cycle.
- Insulation and door losses.

## How to compare

- Fuel or kWh per tonne over a full month for each furnace.
- Same parts and treatment cycle.
- Include idle and warm-up periods.

## What Senseible does here

Senseible reads fuel invoices and electricity bills and applies IPCC 2006 factors and the CEA grid factor (0.710 kg CO2 per kWh), so you can compare Scope 1 and 2 before and after a change from the documents themselves.

- [Induction vs furnace hardening](https://senseible.earth/answers/induction-hardening-vs-furnace-hardening-co2)
- [Reheating furnace insulation](https://senseible.earth/answers/reheating-furnace-insulation-fuel-savings)

Sources: [2006 IPCC Guidelines, Volume 2 Energy](https://www.ipcc-nggip.iges.or.jp/public/2006gl/vol2.html), [Bureau of Energy Efficiency](https://beeindia.gov.in)

Last reviewed 2026-10-23.