Oil filled electric radiators vs oil central heating

bwatkins1

The simple question is.... are oil filled electric radiators still more expensive than oil fired central heating? Most people will instantly tell you that electric is far more expensive than anything else but there must come a point where the oil price is so high it is equivalent to electric? Just 3 years ago I paid £245 to top up my tank and today the same delivery will cost £385 (57% increase) whereas electricity prices have gone up by about 11% in the same period.

Has anyone tried both and compared? Or done the sums?

Gerry1

https://nottenergy.com/resources/energy-cost-comparison/

https://www.confusedaboutenergy.co.uk/index.php/domestic-fuels/fuel-prices

https://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/about-us/our-calculations

dogshome

The OP's figures are an Apples & Pears comparison

The Elec is sold per Kwh, but the heating oil is by the litre, each of which contains *10.9 Kwh - (28 sec Burning Oil)


Whilst the Elec is 100% efficient and a modern oil boiler is only 90%, the Elec supply has a Daily Standing Charge which does not apply to Oil

Gerry1

dogshome wrote: »

Whilst the Elec is 100% efficient and a modern oil boiler is only 90%

Electricity is is 100% efficient only at the very last stage, from the meter to the heater.

When you consider the whole chain including the power station and the transmission network the overall efficiency is much lower, which helps to explain why daytime electricity is always hideously expensive for heating.

Cardew

If you look at the thread on oil prices in MSE it seems that the oil price for this month is around 35p a litre. So approx. 3.2p/kWh.

Given modern oil boilers are 80% - 90% efficient that means the cost to heat with oil is 3.6p/kWh to 4p/kWh.

An oil filled radiator would cost more than 3 times as much to run.

matelodave

Who really worries too much about the efficiency of generating & distributing leccy (or gas for that matter) it's the cost of it at the point of use that matters - wel,l to me it does.

As dogshome points out you get around 10.9kwh out of a litre of oil. Even at 90% efficient then you still get around 9.5 kwh/litre.

I dont know how much a litre of oil costs but 9.5kwh of leccy could cost somewhere between £1.10 and 1.80 depending on your tariff.

So if oil costs less than a £1.10 or more a litre then it's cheaper than leccy.

Even my superduper heatpump on my Symbio tariff would use approx 37p of leccy to produce 9kwh of heat therefore it's only cheaper to use leccy, even with a heatpump if oil cost more than 37p a litre.

Gerry1

matelodave wrote: »

Who really worries too much about the efficiency of generating & distributing leccy (or gas for that matter) it's the cost of it at the point of use that matters - well to me it does.

True, but if you burn a fuel to produce heat, convert it to electricity and lose half of it by the time it's reached your oil filled radiator and been converted back to heat, it's always going to be more expensive than if you'd simply burned it yourself ! No one would bother with expensive boilers and radiators if it were cheaper to plug in an electric heater.

matelodave wrote: »

I dont know how much a litre of oil costs

Seems to be about 50p - 60p. Did you read post 2?

matelodave wrote: »

So if oil costs less than a £.10 or more a litre then it's cheaper than leccy.

It doesn't.

matelodave wrote: »

it's only cheaper to use leccy if oil cost more than 37p a litre.

It seems to cost far more than that.

btr30

dogshome wrote: »

The OP's figures are an Apples & Pears comparison

The Elec is sold per Kwh, but the heating oil is by the litre, each of which contains *10.9 Kwh - (28 sec Burning Oil)


Whilst the Elec is 100% efficient and a modern oil boiler is only 90%, the Elec supply has a Daily Standing Charge which does not apply to Oil

Presuming electricity is already installed in the property for lighting and power, the standing charge element should not be included in comparison calculations

matelodave

Gerry1 wrote: »

True, but if you burn a fuel to produce heat, convert it to electricity and lose half of it by the time it's reached your oil filled radiator and been converted back to heat, it's always going to be more expensive than if you'd simply burned it yourself ! No one would bother with expensive boilers and radiators if it were cheaper to plug in an electric heater.

Seems to be about 50p - 60p. Did you read post 2?

It doesn't.

It seems to cost far more than that.

I've modified my words because I miss-keyed the price so oil has to cost less than £1.10 a litre to be viable.

The prices in post 2 dont really seem to relate to real world costs so it's down to the individual to decide what his local fuel cost would be.

For instance I was paying 11.5p/kw for leccy but others can be paying 15-18p/kwh which is a very wide range (E7 can be 8pkwh off peak and 21p peak which is even wider)

Likewise I'm sure that there's a big variation in oil prices depending on where you live and how much you purchase at a time. The sums really do come down to individual circumstances rather than ball park figures from a generic website although the generic site does give you a good steer as to the relative costs between fuels.

However in general using leccy, even at 100% efficiency is probably still more expensive than oil unless you've got a heatpump.

Gerry1

matelodave wrote: »

The prices in post 2 dont really seem to relate to real world costs so it's down to the individual to decide what his local fuel cost would be.

The three sites all seem to agree that oil costs around 5p - 6p per kWh. Their bulk prices also seem about right: I tried a supplier and was quoted 52p/litre for 1000 litres.

So unless you can get full price electricity at less than about 6p/kWh (good luck with that!), oil will always be cheaper than an oil filled radiator.

Niv

Gerry1 wrote: »

The three sites all seem to agree that oil costs around 5p - 6p per kWh. Their bulk prices also seem about right: I tried a supplier and was quoted £52 for 1000 litres.

So unless you can get full price electricity at less than about 6p/kWh (good luck with that!), oil will always be cheaper than an oil filled radiator.

Where do I sign up!!