Insane gas usage, how can I reduce it?

Cat2011

Could you turn the heating off and rely on heating a couple of rooms. I lived without central heating for years when younger. We coped by heating the kitchen and living room with a portable gas fire (connected to a gas bottle). Kept the doors closed, moved quickly through the cold rooms and had thick duvets .

Also recommend getting an electricity usage monitor from your supplier. You can attach it to you meter and it'll tell you how much you're using. Run round the house turning everything off, then individual things back on and see how much electricity it all uses.

molerat

I am in the "high user" bracket with a 3 bed det in N Scotland generally using 20 - 24 MWh annually. Due to the mild winter this "cold" quarter has been 6200kWh with my heating on 24/7 keeping various room temps between 18 and 21 so 12000 is a pretty big number.

Your loft insulation is possibly a problem, it is the "best it can be" because to change it you would need to lift the boards. If it is just 100mm of fibreglass under there then it is not very good. A good, but expensive, solution would be to lift the boards and replace the insulation with 100mm of Celotex, which will make the loft colder, or insulate under the tiles.

macman

Back to basics please. Forget your last quarter's bill, what is your annual kWh usage from your annual statement/bills/supplier?
12,000 kWh in a winter quarter is not unusual, it's quite normal to use up to 80% of your annual total during the coldest 3 months. That certainly doesn't mean you are using 54,000 kWh annualy, which is what you suggest by saying '4 times the national average'.
Post the actual figures if you want meaningful advice.
If you paid £576 for the highest usage quarter, then how can a year's usage total £2300, which is 400% more?
If you have a boiler supplying both hot water and CH, then why switch on an immersion heater to heat the hot water for a shower? It's 3 times more expensive than gas.

captainhindsight_2

You can get the insulation fitted for free through ECO, although you would have to fix the walls first.

I would recommend contacting a local insulation installer and depending on the amount of work that needs to be done to fix the wall they may fix the wall at a subsidised cost so they can fit the insulation and then get paid through ECO.

Could be worth a try, try contacting a small company rather than a big national one as they will be more eager for the work.

Then if you havnt already, i would recommend fitting TVR valves on all but one radiator (or replace if you have old ones as they break), install a room thermostat make good use of the timer on the boiler and make sure its only on when you need it on. (you can get help for this through ECO)

Bigphil1474

macman wrote: »

Back to basics please....
If you paid £576 for the highest usage quarter, then how can a year's usage total £2300, which is 400% more?
If you have a boiler supplying both hot water and CH, then why switch on an immersion heater to heat the hot water for a shower? It's 3 times more expensive than gas.

Macman, the OP said he paid that for gas, but also over £570 for electricity, and standing charge on top. Well over £1200 for 3 months. Can't imagine how the electricity should be as high as the gas bill, mines normally no more than a third of my total bill, with gas CH, gas & elec cooker, and electric shower.
Op - replace your shower if you can - shouldn't have to turn the immersion on for a shower - how long does that take to warm up? An electric shower should provide instant hot water and only needs to be turned on when you need it - pretty cheap to install as well.
The advice about getting an electricity monitor is best way forward imo - your gas bill sounds not too far off the mark for the size of the property, but leccy is extortionately high. Something is spinning that meter too fast. Just got my 'winter' bill summary and gas was £350 for 4 months (mid Nov to Mid March) in a 3 bed mid terrace, electric was £150