Gas and Electricity cost.

dezpaula

My monthly cost for electricity is £62 monthly 
annual usage is 3,323.0 kwh.
For Gas is £73 monthly annual usage 18230.0 kwh. This is 2 bed end terrace.  How does this compare with others. Thanks for any replies. 

yksi

Not a very useful question without telling us what kind of building it is - new, 200 years old, insulated, sash windows, made of cardboard? 

Verdigris

It's a lot more than the mythical "average" figures that Ofgem use to calculate the Standard Variable Tariff annual costs; electric 2900 kWh, gas 12,000 kWh.

MaryNB

I'm in a Victorian 2 bed end terrace (EPC E).
Is use about 1500 kWh of electricity and 7200 kWh of gas over the last year. 

I live alone. Thermostat doesn't go above 18, heating is never on at night. On and off WFH over the last year. I use a heated throw and wear lots of layers to reduce the amount of time the heating is on. 

Aylesbury_Duck

Seems very high consumption of both, but so many variables to consider.  Mine is 2,500 kWh of electricity, and around 15,000 kWH of gas, in a 4-bed detached with 3 or 4 people working from home.

BUFF

End terrace will be higher thana mid-terrace due to the exposed end wall.

I live in an Edwardian 3 bed mid-terrace in Glasgow (so reasonably north) - electricity ~1150kWh/year, gas ~8000-8500kWh.
I do have my boiler set up to condense most of the time, keep the room 'stat low & wear multiple layers.

Planeteer

BUFF said:

I do have my boiler set up to condense most of the time

What does this mean, and what does that do? Thanks.

Astria

Planeteer said:

BUFF said:

I do have my boiler set up to condense most of the time

What does this mean, and what does that do? Thanks.

For a gas boiler to work at its most efficient, the heat exchanger needs to be equal to or below the dew point temperature which is around 55 °C, so typically you would set your boiler at something like 60°C. If you have it set much higher, like 80°C then it'll warm up rooms quicker but the boiler will be less efficient. They work by recycling the hot air that would typically be expelled through the flu and using it to pre-heat the cold water entering the boiler.

Verdigris

A condensing boiler has increased efficiency because it extracts heat from the exhaust gases going out of the flu. It does this by passing the flu gases over the water returning from the radiators in a heat exchanger ( a bit like a miniature car radiator) and prewarming the water before it is brought up to operating temperature by the burner. The cooler the return water, the more heat will be extracted from the exhaust gases. You achieve a low return temperature by correctly balancing the flows through all the radiators in the system. That should be done when the system is installed but may be skimped on by installers anxious to get on to the next job.

savers_united

A well balanced system will have a flow / return difference of 20 degrees.

Alot of systems are less than this, but anything above 15 is pretty good, as you need the right sized radiators etc to get optimum performance, if you can get 15 then setting the flow at around 65 will still get the boiler into condensing mode, will usually be hot enough to get the house to warm fairly quickly meaning the room stat should kick in sooner and switch off the boiler.

You will find the flow / return can be flawed when you have thermostatic valves as they will close radiators down diverting the heat to other radiators that in turn will return a higher temp back to the boiler on the return, so condensing may stop but the boiler will then modulate itself down as it no longer needs to heat the flow as much if there is only a 5 degree difference coming back.

I have a thermostat valve on all rads except for 1 up and 1 down. After an hour or 2 the other rads have cooled down and the non thermo rad is still red hot, so return temp back to boiler increases.