Huge bill and elec heating

Gerry1

Petriix said:

Spies said:

All electric heating costs basically the same to run as 1kw electricity = 1kw of heat.

I'm really not sure what the answer is I'm afraid other than getting the central heating extended into the loft? 

This gets stated often, but it's totally untrue. All resistive electric heaters use the same amount of energy, but heat pumps use about 20-25% of the energy for the same output.

You're assuming a heat pump CoP of 4 - 5, which seems pretty optimistic.  Probably more realistic to hope for a CoP of 3 which means using 33% of the energy used by a resistive heater.

Also, running costs of storage heaters are lower, especially the modern high heat retention ones with fan assistance.

theoretica

something_girl said:

kazwookie said:

Is it a proper loft conversion?

If so it should have the correct insulation.

I suggest you bring your daughter down from there, into the main part of the house, either in to a spare room or convert a room / lounge area as her bed room, then put a decent loft hatch up. Unplug / turn off any 'heating ' up there.

All other rooms are occupied. I was just hoping there would be a cheaper type of electric heater as a solution really 

If the heater is one that needs to be manually turned off I bet that isn't happening as much as it could.  You turn a heater on when you are cold - then don't think to turn it off again until you are too hot rather than just warm enough. At least I do! If the room has reasonable insulation, I think I would first see what temperatures it is actually getting to and if it is indeed getting warmer than OK then I think more sophisticated controls might help a lot with the bills (timer and thermostat plugs or integral to a heater).

something_girl

Thanks all, daughter is now using a small fan heater and says it heats up so much quicker. I’m going to look at what plug in heater would be the best long term. I’m not going to extend central heating. I can see insulation through the small hatch door in the room. It’s just like the room above the garage in my previous house. Cold in winter, hot in summer.

doodling

Hi,

Without wishing to depress you, if the room is warming up quicker, it is likely that the fan heater will be consuming more electricity than the halogen heater.

All electric heaters will use the same amount of electricity to provide the same amount of heat, the only difference is how that heat makes its way into the room.

- A halogen heater will generally provide a directed radiant heat which will tend to warm surfaces (including exposed skin) facing the heater rather than the air itself.
- A fan heater will blow warm air into the room, heating the air first before things get warm.
- An oil filled radiator will provide a mixture of convected and radiated heat (mostly convected), again heating the air.  Oil filled radiators will have a lag between the electrical energy going in and the heat coming out as it takes time for the radiator to warm after it is turned on and cool after it is turned off
- A convector heater will behave similarly to an oil heater but with very little lag and more convection rather than radiation. 

It really doesn't matter what type of heater you have - just choose the type of heater that fits with you.

What does matter is whether the heater has a thermostat on it so that it turns itself on and off to keep the room at a particular temperature. Without a thermostat (or with the thermostat turned up to max rather than set at a sensible temperature) most of the unnecessary expense will come from getting the room hotter than it needs to be.

A timer is also a good idea. Once you're asleep it is quite reasonable (except perhaps for the elderly / infirm) to turn off the heating and let the temperature fall to 14 degrees C or less. What you need is a timer so that the heater turns off before you go to sleep and turns on again 15 minutes before you get up. Otherwise it is very easy to spend money on unnecessary heating overnight.