mix of economy7 and gas - good?

mwian

Hi.
I currently have a single rate meter (prepayment meter) on both gas and electric.
I want to get a 2 rate meter for the electric, so I can switch to economy 7 rates for the winter. If I keep my current supplier, I have to pay £65 to get the meter changed. If I change supplier, I can get the meter changed for free and they could take over the debt.

I owe money to the current supplier (less than £100). This is taken using the gas prepayment meter at 70p per quid I put on the meter.

I was "forced" to accept this prepayment meter during the last winter and obviously not prepared, so my house was very cold through winter.
This year I am taking steps to keep warmer.

So, my theory is... it's pointless to pay £60 to try to save money...well I am not actually saving money but rather using the money better (when I use economy 7 rate). To pay £60 to better use money seems senseless.

I have opened up a fire place. I can get free waste wood and heat one room that way...though it seems labour intensive.

I have a portable gas fire. I pay £30 a bottle and if I use one bar for about 6 hours a night, the bottle lasts almost a month. I used this last winter and the fire keeps a room comfortably warm as long as the door stays closed.

I have sourced 2 night storage heaters and taken two elements "off line". The heater takes a good 6 hours to get hot, but the warmth stays till the afternoon (getting less as time goes on) but I need to be on economy 7 rate to make this plan work as it is about 80p (per heater) to heat the bricks up using the current rate. If I use these two storage heaters, I can keep 2 rooms warm for the night and a fair part of the day, probably with closed doors.

I can use gas, but it seems most costly to heat the whole house, though I am thinking of getting a second thermostat switch upstairs and a switch to switch between the thermostat switches. This might just switch the gas on when upstairs gets to cold...but heating the whole house to warm upstairs doesn't sound intelligent.

I tend to be awake till 1am most nights, so having a fire going, using the washing machine/tumble dryer is a realistic possibility.

I will need to run a dehumidifier in winter. The damp gathers and last winter the house was not warm enough to dry out. Using this during economy 7 times makes this idea better.

I have an electric shower to run the bath. I have children, so I really need to run the bath in the evening before they go to bed....though if I can, I will get a hot water tank and heat that during economy 7 time and use the next night.... but this will be no easy task to get this winter.

I do occasionally use gas to run the bath. the 30p I am left with runs the bath for children, puts hot water in the sink to wash dishes and warms the radiators on the gas central heating.

If I can, I want to get an eberspacher diesel heater and blow hot air into the house. I am told I can use red diesel to run this. Suggestively this red diesel is about 60p a litre and I need a litre a night but I get 4kw to 5kw hot air blowing in and this for 8 to 10 hours...which, if true, sounds like a good idea.

It's difficult to calculate the costs/savings because I am working on hearing room by room and trying to add the running costs of bathing, cooking and other things a person does in the house.
My logic is, if I am in the lounge, I just heat that (with a fire and night storage heater). When I go to the bathroom, I can use the shower to run the bath. I can use the gas fire when I need to add heat to a room or take the chill out the air.

My question is...has anyone used economy 7 and gas rates to run a house and saved money by better using the energy in a localised area?

Thanks.

dogshome

Long Story

Does the gas you have supply a Gas Boiler, that supplies Hot Water and feeds piped hot water radiators ?
Are you living alone in a large dwelling ?
How well is the house insulated ?

mwian

I live with my two children. We have a 3 bed semi house. The house is larger than what I would call average. Floor space is about 140m/sq,
Double glazed windows, though the hinges could do with being reset because the seals leak - but that correction is in the pipeline.

The previous tenant was an old lady and she, I believe, got the house(roof) insulated in the last two years.
Some 8 years ago, there was an insulation applied to the outside of the house. The walls don't appear to be solid. It is a plasterboard wall, then a gap. Some sort of random gap though. A cement (if you can call it that) layer. I have not drilled further. The walls are about a foot wide.

I have a combi boiler, which appears to be new or almost new. It powers the how water and central heating (when there is credit on the gas meter).

Nada666

Surely whatever additional measures you use with localised electric heaters could be more cheaply achieved using localised gas? Do the gas radiators not have any controls? You can use a combi-boiler to heat just one room if you like.

If you are so bothered with minimising usage then Economy 7 storage would, surely, be worst of all?

Andy_WSM

This all sounds like crazy effort to "save money" when you have a gas supply, which is the cheapest form of heating, by far! Bottled gas is NOT cheap btw. It's nearly as dear as daytime electricity rates.

Pay the debt off the gas meter, rather than waste money on these other measures. NONE of them will work out cheaper!

Switch the bedroom radiators off during the day, on during the evening if you want to cut gas consumption.

Bottom line here is that your gas isn't expensive. Settling your debt is.

Nada666

You mention 70p in the pound - you may be confusing standing charge arrears with debt. And, as AndyWSM says, don't confuse what you are paying with what the gas heating itself only costs.

mwian

Thanks all for your replies.

I would like to pay off that debt. Unfortunately, I simply can't in the next few months. The winter is on the way, so I need to do what I can now, to get me through the winter.
I expect that the worsted of my trying times are not over, so the efforts I put in place now, while I can, are going to help in the next year as well.

I have some sort of thermo valve on the radiators. I have turned those down enough to switch off when the room is warm(ish). I suppose I could turn them off in the day. It's an easy option. I was/am a bit worried about having the boiler on all the time (thermostat switch stays on in a cold room) and only one radiator being hot. I expect the boiler has some sort of over heat protection. I just don't want to rely on it to keep switching the boiler off due to me running one radiator at a time.

If I am to focus on the debt to be able to warm my house, I think I have enough in place to keep me going and spending more money on ways to improve what I have is less advised.

Thanks again for your replies.

mwian

The 70p to a pound is the debt that I have to pay. The gas meter collects the debt that way. I put a quid on the gas card. The meter takes 70p for the debt and I get 30p gas.

I have about £10 to £14 a week (on a good week). If I pay £10 to the gas meter, I get £3 for Gas. The £3 might last a week, but £4 electric will not (and that's on the assumption that I have £14 for that week).

If I put £12 on electric, I am able to last the week. I try to put a quid on the gas meter, though I expect that the standing charge is more than what I pay each week....which caused me to into getting a gas supply where there is no standing charge....another issue. If the standing charge for the gas meter is pushing the debt up each week, that obviously isn't helping.

If I was on economy 7, I could use the washing machine and tumble dryer after midnight. That should help lower the bill.

matelodave

Electric showers are a very expensive way to fill a bath especially if you've got a gas combi boiler which would heat the water at a quarter to a third of the cost.
Have a look at what you've got because you wouldn't normally have a hot water tank with a combi, are you confusing combi with condensing.

By far the cheapest way of heating water would be by using gas whether it's a combi or a system boiler with a tank. Make sure the tank is properly insulated and only heat the water when you need it. The next best way of heating your water is by heating the tank overnight using Economy 7 electricity.

As said, an LPG cylinder heater is a very expensive way to heat although it might be useful just to heat a room.

Mucking about with an Eberspacher heater and trying to get red diesel (which isn't as easy as it used to be unless you know a farmer) sounds like a DIY disaster.
They are remarkably noisy when operating and you'd have to arrange for a fuel tank, piping and either a 12 or 24v supply as well because they are designed for lorries or boats. They are also ever so expensive to buy at well over £1000 unless you can get hold of a second hand one.

To operate the upstairs heating separately from the downstairs is more complex than trying to wire the thermostats together - you need zone valves connected to the stats to do it. It's not everso difficult to do but does involve plumbing and wiring.

Gas heating is still cheaper than using storage heaters and its also more controllable as you get heat when you need it - just make sure you've got decent controls, like a programmable thermostat

I'd also guess that by disabling elements in the storage heaters they now actually don't get hot enough to shut of the thermostat and so are probably on all the time and therefore costing more to run than if all the elements were working properly and allowing the thermostat to do it's job.

Nada666

But the debt should be capped at a weekly amount. If the triggering debt was £100 then it can't be all that much.

To pay it off over one quarter then a single tenner would be enough and your subsequent tenner that week would be 100% available for use. Over two quarters even less. If you had £14 a week everything should be paid off by now.

You're using an electric shower instead of a combi gas-boiler to run a bath. Seems crazy.

The thermostat on the radiators - so long as you turn them down to only the defrost mark (rather than zero) your system should be fine. And the heating should be switched off during the day.

dogshome

Believe Loft insulated 2 years ago?
Have a look in the loft to check the insulations thickness, which should be 15"

Concur with matelodave's comments on Eberspacher heating - It's expensive to buy, complex, not very reliable and spares are'nt cheap

If the Thermostat is positioned in an always cold room, ( Hallway ? ), look at getting it changed for a remote thermostat that you can carry from room to room .

The real killer in haveing an ECO7 meter with it's cheap overnight power, is the Premium cost of every Kwh you use during the day