Gas and Electricity Usage

Emma137

Hi everyone,
I'm just after some advice regarding our gas and electricity usage. We live in a 4 bedroom detached house and I've been looking at our usage in preparation for changing energy supplier. I was rather concerned to see that our annual electricity usage is over 8000 kw/h and our gas is over 35000 kwh. Having looked into it our usage seems extremely high, especially when there are only 2 adults & 1 teenager living here!
Can anyone offer any insight/advice/help about this and advise what to do or have I got it wrong and that isn't high usage?
Many thanks
Emma

Gerry1

Forget it if it's a forecast, a projection or taken from estimated bills.  Only actual meter readings a year apart count.

Emma137

These figures come from last years actual bills/meter readings. I've looked back over the last 3 years since we've been with OVO, there's a few meter readings that are a bit weird such as high gas and electric reading for random months in the summer.
The house is 1930's double glazed, cavity wall insulation. Combi boiler 5 years old.
I don't know where to start to check its  right. We've just had a smart meter installed on the electric meter which may help but they couldn't fit the gas one as not enough room to fit the bracket without butchering my kitchen cupboard!

Gerry1

Instantaneous electric shower? Immersion heater left on?

Switch the supplies off at the meter / consumer unit for a few hours and make sure the readings don't change.  Then take daily or even hourly readings for a while to establish your usage patterns.

Talldave

Gas looks high but do you have the place toasty warm 24/7 or is there no insulation in the loft?

Electricity looks very high. Does teenager have a high end gaming PC running 24/7?

Did the smart meter come with an in home display? If so, find the live consumption screen (in watts) and run around turning things off.  If you don't have an IHD, get an energy monitor. 

Petriix

Detached houses do lose more heat than other property types. The majority of the gas usage, however, will be due to the temperature you set the heating to. For 35,000kWh I suspect that you keep your thermostat north of 20 degrees and probably heat all the rooms all of the time.

We use under 7,000kWh of gas in our 3 bedroom terrace by setting the thermostat to 16.5 degrees and then manually bumping it up when we get too cold. We wear nice thick jumpers in the winter! Ultimately it's a personal choice whether the level of 'comfort' you have is worth the extra few hundred pounds each year. Our total gas bill is around £225 whereas the best deal for your usage would be about £800 (depending on your region).

8,000kWh of electric is indicative of extensive use of high power appliances such as electric shower, electric immersion heater, tumble dryer, hair dryer, electric heaters, electric oven etc.. It's hard to rack up that level of use just with lighting, TVs, computers and gadgets but they may contribute to a degree if you have many incandescent bulbs or a high power PC is on 24/7 etc.. Or do you have a hot tub, sauna or swimming pool?

If you can switch to using gas to heat your shower water then you'll save a fair bit. Try to keep doors and windows closed in the winter. Hang the washing out rather than using the dryer. Ensure all your lighting is low energy; and double check there isn't a 100w bulb on permanently in the loft or garage or a 200w security light on all night every night.

Robin9

Emma137 said:

...................... We've just had a smart meter installed on the electric meter which may help ....................

A smart meter by itself won't help - it doesn't magically reduce your consumption. It will/should save any estimated readings. 

Make sure the first bill with the smart correctly shows the meter change and the old/new readings.

RelievedSheff

Petriix said:

Detached houses do lose more heat than other property types. The majority of the gas usage, however, will be due to the temperature you set the heating to. For 35,000kWh I suspect that you keep your thermostat north of 20 degrees and probably heat all the rooms all of the time.

We use under 7,000kWh of gas in our 3 bedroom terrace by setting the thermostat to 16.5 degrees and then manually bumping it up when we get too cold. We wear nice thick jumpers in the winter! Ultimately it's a personal choice whether the level of 'comfort' you have is worth the extra few hundred pounds each year. Our total gas bill is around £225 whereas the best deal for your usage would be about £800 (depending on your region).

8,000kWh of electric is indicative of extensive use of high power appliances such as electric shower, electric immersion heater, tumble dryer, hair dryer, electric heaters, electric oven etc.. It's hard to rack up that level of use just with lighting, TVs, computers and gadgets but they may contribute to a degree if you have many incandescent bulbs or a high power PC is on 24/7 etc.. Or do you have a hot tub, sauna or swimming pool?

If you can switch to using gas to heat your shower water then you'll save a fair bit. Try to keep doors and windows closed in the winter. Hang the washing out rather than using the dryer. Ensure all your lighting is low energy; and double check there isn't a 100w bulb on permanently in the loft or garage or a 200w security light on all night every night.

There is no one answer to the question of power consumption. Last year we used 6500 kWh of gas in our 3 bed detached house and we don't like to be cold. The thermostat is set to 21 degrees during the morning and evening when we are at home from work. It is set to 17 degrees for the rest of the day and over night. But this is a super insulation house built last year.

8000 kWh of electric is a lot. . There are two of us in our house and we both use the electric shower every day, have an electric double oven, washer/dryer that gets used a few times a week, dishwasher, usual TV and stereo equipment, I'm working at home 5 days a week with PC and monitor running 12 hours a day Monday to Friday and we look set to use 3000 kWh this year which is up from the 2500 kWh we used last year.

Lighting can be a major electric user especially if you have a lot of halogen spot lights around the house. All of our lights are LED.

Emma137

Thank you so much to everyone that has replied and tried to help, very much appreciated!!!
I thought we were quite careful about our energy consumption tbh and I am horrified that we are so much above the average usage. We don't like to be cold and do have the heating thermostat set at 20 but I only put the heating on when we are cold, its not on all of the time.We do have spot lights in the kitchen and bathroom, I'm not sure what type the bulbs are but will check. The garage lights are fluorescent tubes.
The shower runs off the combi boiler, gas hob, electric oven. Security lights front and back, electric garage door. We do use a tumble drier but not excessively & washing machine 3/4 times a week. We have the usual pc, phone chargers plugged in but nothing different to anyone else. Definately no hot tub,sauna or swimming pool!!
Unfortunately I wasnt left with an in home display  so can't go round to check and turn things off.
I am planning on switching supplier this week as our deal has finished which won't alter our consumption but may save us a bit.
The smart meter was installed as the certificate had expired on the electricity meter. My daughter isnt really in her room a lot, she's usually downstairs. Her bedroom is what was the loft so possibly we don't have the same amount of insulation as other homes.

MWT

The electricity is high for sure, but not to the same degree as the gas.

One basic check for the gas is to make sure that your meter reading is being properly converted to kWh...

On the front of the meter itself you should be able to see if it is marked for cubic feet (ft3) or cubic metres (m3) then look at your bill and make sure it is using the same units.

If the meter is metric (5 digits) but is being treated as Imperial (4 digits) then your gas will be over charged by a factor of x2.83.

RelievedSheff

You say you had the boiler replaced. Was this with a condensing boiler? If so are you running it so that it drops into condensing mode? To reach condensing mode modern boilers need to be set to a temperature so that the return water flow is at around 55 degrees C. In our case this means setting the boiler to around 65 degrees C any higher and the return water is too hot and the boiler never runs in condensing mode so is not running efficiently.