Anyone got any experience of wind turbines

rogerblack

gornalboy wrote: »

Dear Roger
Energy Saving Trust give masses of advice along with Glass and glazing Federation etc etc. I wasnt expecting miracles just a measurable improvement!!

The improvement may indeed be measurable - with sensitive test equipment.
Clearly - my house differs from yours, but taking my house for example, I have about about 13 square meters of window.
These are single glazed.
They leak about 5W/square meter/C.
This works out - with 10C average difference on the inside and out - to around £170 per year. (13m^2*5W/m^2/K*10K*365*24*£.03/kWh) extra to heat my property, compared to having no windows.

http://www.pilkington.com/~/media/Pilkington/Site%20Content/UK/Reference/TableofDefaultUValues.ashx

If you replace this with air-filled non treated glass double glazing, you go from £170 to £100 pounds a year.

Replacing this basic double glazed window with Pilkington Optitherm (their best double glazed window) will now cost £60 to heat.

The last quote I had for double glazing - assuming I was willing to do all the prep work was 4K.

Neglecting various things that may make the calculation worse - going from single-double glazed basic windows would pay off in 60 years.
Going from basic-good double glazing would pay off in 100 years.

Unless the windows are actually rotting and falling off, have gaps that cannot be fixed with sealing tape or other retrofittable solutions, replacement with double glazing for most properties on gas is not sensible.

If the problem is 'just' misted or leaking panels, you can get those replaced quite easily.

Do you perhaps remember the pages on the energy saving trust that advise windows are a sensible upgrade?
It may be worthwhile trying to contact them about this.

zeupater

gornalboy wrote: »

..... Log burner has indeed given us a wonderfully warmer living area BUT at some cost!!! .....

Hi

Is your GCH thermostat in the hall and your door to the lounge kept closed so that when you feel warm in the lounge you just stop feeding the log burner?, also, do you run the logburner every day, or just occasionally (weekends?) to look good (as many people do!) ..... if so you'll probably just be heating the lounge to >thermostatic temperature (increasing heatloss) and the rest of the house isn't getting any heating benefit .... we always open the doors to the room with the logburner when it gets warm (unless elderly relatives are visiting then it's around 30C and I melt ... can't stand that sort of heat) and always leave the doors open at night so that the heat circulates throughout the house.

With TRVs, have you set the bedroom ones and other non-living areas lower than the living rooms ? .... what about any unused bedrooms, do you heat these (if any) to the same temperature as the used ones ? ....

We have been improving our insulation levels for years, but have worked against a plan based on payback ... the reasoning for this is that you can justify high expenditure when heatloss is high. For example, some would fall into the trap of justifying the cost of a replacement heating system based on high energy bills and then looking at insulation as a secondary issue .... however, when the insulation is improved the energy requirement is reduced and the calculated savings for the heating system become much lower ... The advice in this area should always be to identify areas for improvement, estimate the benefits, rank the improvements by cost effectiveness and start with the low cost improvements with the best return, when completed, estimate the adjusted returns for the remaining projects, as they will now be lower, re-rank, then tick off the next one on the list ....

HTH
Z

jamesingram

Roger , are you considering heatloss through ventilation (poor draught proofing that is common for most single glazed windows ) this could make a difference to your estimated savings

jamesingram

Not helpful to the OP question or Gornolboy, but regarding windows.
I can buy triple glazed Upvc windows trade for approx. 15% more than double glazed. with a theroreticial U value of 0.8Wm2k
So in Roger's example 0.8W/m2/C with delta T at 10 C = £27
though £0.03kWh might easily be £0.04kWh at 70% efficiency which would improve estimated saving figures , also as mentioned improvement in airtightness ( reduction the draughts) may well improve again on these estimated savings

So, Roger and any others that may be considering new windows in the future , do ask about 3G triple glazed windows because double glazing is so yesterday

rogerblack

jamesingram wrote: »

Roger , are you considering heatloss through ventilation (poor draught proofing that is common for most single glazed windows ) this could make a difference to your estimated savings

I was not, as I was assuming that it was reasonable in most cases to fit measures to greatly improve draught proofing at a tiny fraction of the cost of new.

gornalboy

Great advice many thanks