Just input my latest readings (last time put in end of July last year) and it popped up with a £450 payment shortage!
Granted I live alone and the house isn't the most energy efficient (1985 mid terrace, storage heaters and dragty single pane windows) but still
seems a lot. on top of my £66/mo DD that makes it circa £1250 per annum.. quite a lot given that in the same period a year ago it was around £750.
Does that not sound excessive? I've got a full time job so am not in during the day and don't exactly burn electricity for the fun of it.
Can anyone recommend one of those energy monitor things so I could figure out the biggest culprits?
Pavel
big TVS flat panels are like 1.5 KW compressor left on eeek
Also certain houseplants take a lot of leccy
i would imagine you have no gas?
also bet yo dont use a full tank of water a day if on immersion heater? if not turn it off every other night/ every 2 nights.
storage heaters i would put input up tol about half way and output down low.
also check your timeclock for economy 7 is showing correct time so your heaters and immersion are in use during eco 7 hours.
quote:
Originally posted by mangogrooveworkshop
big TVS flat panels are like 1.5 KW
When I got a 40" plasma 10 years ago the electric bill went up by £25 a month... kept the room warm though.
My TIG welder wound the costs up as well by a fair bit
We pay £101 per month. Thats ALL electric here in a 1970's 2 bed bungalow with storage heaters. Wife works mornings only so TV is on for a good 12 hours. Water tank runs on economy 7 but I do pop the over-ride on every day for 15mins just before bath-time.
we pay £70 all in per month for gas and electric. Given that leccy isnt as efficient as gas for heating and hot water, and you have dodgy windows, i
would imagine £100 being realistic for your house.
I have started turning the microwave off at the wall when its not in use! How tight is that?!
Put a plate over your toaster!
Also yes might well be worth changing them windows, especially if you're planning on staying there for a few more years.
What's the loft insulation like?
It's the storage heaters and immersion heater.
Ive got Double glazeing
Loft insulated
I've had cavity walls done for £99
Made a difference
When there was 6 in the house 4 using an electric shower washing machine on all the time, dishwasher every day tumble dryer etc etc, leccy was £122
gas was £68 a month
I'm hoping it will go down noes there's only 2
I am constantly adding up the total wattage of multiple items for my job and soooo many people don't seem to understand electricity and power
consumption. I would suggest due to the nature of this site that most people on here know what their talking about. My simple rules are
1. TV's, screens, computers, fridges, modern lighting (LED, Metal Halide etc) cost very little to run.
2. If you intend on heating something then power consumption sky rockets.
yep,anything with a heating element to it is biggest culprit
Thanks all,
Pretty much reinforced what I already know, but good to know that £100 a month is actually not that unreasonable. Just put in all my figures into an
energy comparison website and there's not a great deal in it in terms of switching anywhere (a couple of quid..)
I've got LED/low energy lighting everywhere, but do have some appliances on standby which could do with turning off so will start doing that.
Don't think the TV contributes a great deal as it's a brand new LED jobbie, which only gets used a couple of hours a day.
Loft insulation isn't superb but fine (will top it up), but upstairs holds heat incredibly well, it's downstairs that loses all of it.
Will also make sure I only use the washer and dishwasher on timer in eco 7 hours (which are correct by the way!)
Anybody know roughly how much it costs to install a small wood burner (I've got an open fire with a standard clay lined chimney so not intending
on having it stainless-lined?). Didn't burn much wood in it this year at all as it's not massively efficient even with.
Will probably change the windows and doors downstairs (again have no idea how much it would cost) as I'll be keeping this place for a few more
years at least.
I fitted my own double glazed windows and doors that I bought brand new from ebay. I had a friend to lend a hand who is no more skilled than me and I
thought it was a piece of pee...
So, price up that way of doing it if you fancy it, it really was fantastically cheaper and still fit as well as any other windows...
ATB
Steve
crumbs my electric is £120 a quarter
quote:
Given that leccy isnt as efficient as gas for heating and hot water
quote:
Originally posted by coyoteboy
quote:
Given that leccy isnt as efficient as gas for heating and hot water
Not sure how you get to that. Resistive heating elements are effectively 100% efficient at converting electricity to heat. Sure electrickery is about 3x the price of gas per kw.
3 bed 60s semi in chilly scotland here, gas and elec break even with £30 a month for each here.
Double glazing is pretty poor value in terms of payback time. Unless the windows need replacing anyway?
If they are good, fitting secondary glazing is much better value, and just about as efficient. Worth a thought. Also cavity wall insulation, plus get
that lost insulation topped up and the draught proofing sorted!
Wood burners are very efficient, you cant compare them with just burning wood on an open fire. the 'even' heavier ones with firebricks in you can burn coal too. They are good for recycling old pallets from work as well. Easy to fit in if your chimney is ok.
I've been heating my house on just a gas-bottle log burner all winter - I bring home scrap pallets from work by the ton , so my only heating
`cost' is cutting them up to fit in...........
I'm seriously thinking of fitting an extractor fan high up in the living room , and running ducting through the floor space to each upstairs room
for next winter .
quote:
Originally posted by clairetoo
I've been heating my house on just a gas-bottle log burner all winter - I bring home scrap pallets from work by the ton , so my only heating `cost' is cutting them up to fit in...........
I'm seriously thinking of fitting an extractor fan high up in the living room , and running ducting through the floor space to each upstairs room for next winter .
quote:
Originally posted by JoelP
Just make sure you provide a return path for the air to avoid sucking back through the flue! Having the doors open between rooms would sort it.
Fair enough if you are sure the rooms arent remotely airtight. Basically if you suck lots of air out of the room, the combustion products get sucked
into the room rather than up the chimney.
When we fit a gas hob at work under a ducted extractor, if there is a gas fire in an adjacent room, the gas fitter puts the fan on full and tests the
fire for spillage, obv with doors and windows shut. I imagine a HETAS installer would have to do similar.
I have this vague idea of putting in a multifuel logburner downstairs in the kitchen and running the chimney up through the floor and up through the
upper hallway and into the loft and then outside. The stove would keep downstairs warm and toasty and the pipe that runs through the upstairs hallway
would also get red hot. Effectively heating the whole house.
I recently changed my logburner setup in the garage that includes a chimney made from galvanised pipe that runs diagonally along one wall. The
diagonal pipe has 3inch x 1inch aluminium angle rivetted to it along it's length. Which makes it effectively a huge heat sink. The Chimney gets
hotter than the stove itself and gives out heat 100% better than before. Once it's hot however the draw is huge and you can burn through
softwood far to fast.
I bet all your downstairs heat is going up the chimney
I've found that I save very little with my log-burner, especially last year when it was very cold, as we spent as much on wood as we would have
on gas.
BUT - It gives heat in the evening exactly where we want it (in the living room), and when it gets too warm there we open the door and let the warm
air circulate through the house. By the time we get to bed the upstairs rooms are warm enough for us (we don't like over-warm bedrooms). This
means that the gas heating hardly comes on as the thermostat is in the hall, just outside the living room.
The bills should be better this year as it's been a lot milder, so perhaps we'll have saved a bit.
The other reason we got it was to act as a backup - we live in a village and we get power cuts now and again. No electricity -> no heating. We
didn't have a chimney (1960s house) so we had to do something. If the gas failed we can even cook on top of the stove.