Help working out my gas usage....

weehamish

wild666 said:

weehamish said:

Hi, im not sure im being charged properly for my gas usage... it seems very high for what i use.

I only have data from the past few days as octopus site has not been tracking gas usage for a while... it seems the new stats also show usage in m3 instead of khw... which is where im struggling to get my correct usage!

So for 4hrs heating, 2 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon im using 1.511m3 of gas at 6.22p per khw... googling m3 , 1 unit of m3 = 10.55khw so roughly i should be using 16khw? If thats how its actually worked out, so to me thats £1 roughly per day? 

So my heating should only be £30 a month and then my cooking and showers on top and then my standing charges.

Im not sure im doing the maths correct here but thats how i look at it? 

But my bills are not adding up to that, they are way way more... it seems if i have my heating on for a full 7 hours straight my gas bill is the same too, so trying to save money by not using my heating is not even working, some days i wasnt even having my gas on or only using 2hrs of heating and nothing seems to be adding up properly.

1 unit can be anything from 10.96 kWh to 11.39 kWh. If you want to air on the side of caution use 10.96 kWh as the reading for one unit of gas but if not that fussed use 11.39 kWh. It all comes down to the calorific value of the gas used. These figures are worked out using CV's of between 38.6 and 40.1, the difference is 0.43 kWh per unit so if you use 10 units and the bill is using a higher CV than you used, say 40.1 compared to your 38.6 and the kWh price is 6.22p you will be 6.88p out on the bill. The more gas used the higher the total you will be out on the bill.

No this is false... im charged 6.22p im not sure why people think theres more cost than what it states? Someone was saying add 5% vat early in the thread too... this has never been the case with any energy provider ive had and i confirmed this with octopus on the phone.

1.511m3 was 17khw according to octopus on the phone.

weehamish

markin said:

The bricks and plaster will take in a lot of heat the first time its heated well which will mess the data for just 1 day, a forum member that worked away 5 days a week and would have to heat all day on Friday and had a cold house tried heating all week and had the same or less gas usage heating all week on low and had a warm house when he got home.

The stairwell is a lot of volume to heat and it just keeps raising up, why its usually the coldest part of the house and the heat will always escape into the rooms and out the ceiling, so like it or not you are trying to heat the hole house just very slowly so it probably clicks on and off all the time when its on.

I dont think thats true... at all lol. The heating would need to be on 24/7 and that could cost way more than 4 hours a day.

Even if the heating is on for the full time which i expect it should be anyway... it seems 17khw in 4 hours for 1 rad is still a bit extreme. The bedroom rad has its own thermostat too so it would just cut off when the rooms hot enough.

Overall im still not sure how i can resolve this or who to speak to about it... 

[Deleted User]

weehamish said:

No this is false... im charged 6.22p im not sure why people think theres more cost than what it states? Someone was saying add 5% vat early in the thread too... this has never been the case with any energy provider ive had and i confirmed this with octopus on the phone.

1.511m3 was 17khw according to octopus on the phone.

Hi,

you'll need to quiz Octopus again.

Have a look HERE, below the pink box, 'All prices include VAT', so it's already included, 5% vat, in your 6.22p.

Edit: Octopus T&Cs:

7.7 VAT is also payable at the applicable rate.

MWT

weehamish said:

No this is false... im charged 6.22p im not sure why people think theres more cost than what it states? Someone was saying add 5% vat early in the thread too... this has never been the case with any energy provider ive had and i confirmed this with octopus on the phone.

1.511m3 was 17khw according to octopus on the phone.

The only time you need to worry about adding the VAT is when you look at the bill calculation as the Octopus bills add the VAT at the end, so we get some people confused about their kWh charge as it shows ex-VAT in the calculation then they add the VAT at the end.

All prices shown on their website will include VAT, the prices shown on the bill exclude VAT. The bill is correct though as VAT is added at the end, it just doesn't get shown in the kWh rates.

So my Octopus bills show my current rate as 2.84p/kWh, and states correctly that this does not include VAT. The rate shown on my tariff information on my account correctly shows 2.98p/kWh which includes VAT.

The calculation for converting m3 from the meter to kWh will vary from month to month due to the calorific value changing, but in general 11.2 works as a reasonably accurate multiplier.

QrizB

weehamish said:

Even if the heating is on for the full time which i expect it should be anyway... it seems 17khw in 4 hours for 1 rad is still a bit extreme. The bedroom rad has its own thermostat too so it would just cut off when the rooms hot enough.
Overall im still not sure how i can resolve this or who to speak to about it... 

You are running your heating in a rather unusual fashion and as a result its efficiency will be lower than expected.

You are heating two radiators, not one (the one in your bedroom plus the one in the hall).

All things considered, 17kWh isn't such a high number.

I don't really know what you expect anyone else to tell you?

weehamish

QrizB said:

weehamish said:

Even if the heating is on for the full time which i expect it should be anyway... it seems 17khw in 4 hours for 1 rad is still a bit extreme. The bedroom rad has its own thermostat too so it would just cut off when the rooms hot enough.
Overall im still not sure how i can resolve this or who to speak to about it... 

You are running your heating in a rather unusual fashion and as a result its efficiency will be lower than expected.

You are heating two radiators, not one (the one in your bedroom plus the one in the hall).

All things considered, 17kWh isn't such a high number.

I don't really know what you expect anyone else to tell you?

Maybe you didnt read the thread... its 1 rad.. 1 rad will always be on for the thermostat... so its classed as 1 rad... people are running all their rads for a similar usage... so i think there is something wrong... 

[Deleted User]

weehamish said:

QrizB said:

weehamish said:

Even if the heating is on for the full time which i expect it should be anyway... it seems 17khw in 4 hours for 1 rad is still a bit extreme. The bedroom rad has its own thermostat too so it would just cut off when the rooms hot enough.
Overall im still not sure how i can resolve this or who to speak to about it... 

You are running your heating in a rather unusual fashion and as a result its efficiency will be lower than expected.

You are heating two radiators, not one (the one in your bedroom plus the one in the hall).

All things considered, 17kWh isn't such a high number.

I don't really know what you expect anyone else to tell you?

Maybe you didnt read the thread... its 1 rad.. 1 rad will always be on for the thermostat... so its classed as 1 rad... people are running all their rads for a similar usage... so i think there is something wrong... 

Octopus will bill you on the meter readings that you provide. If you believe that your meter is at fault then Octopus will happily arrange for a replacement meter to be fitted. Your meter will then be sent away for independent testing. If it is found to be faulty, then Octopus will re-bill you for the energy that has been used. However, if the meter is found to be within industry accepted tolerances,  then Octopus will charge you for replacing the meter.

FWiW, running just a couple of radiators is not very efficient. Your boiler will be massively oversized for the output required and it will have a very high cycle (on/off) rate. Cycling is bad for all boilers.

theoretica

When you tried 5 hours at a lower temperature, where did you turn the temperature down - TRV?  Thermostat?  Boiler?  To what?

The boiler is probably stupid - it only knows the thermostat is asking for heating on and it puts hot water out which comes back at a lower temperature after going through 2 radiators and a lot of pipes. 

QrizB

weehamish said:

QrizB said:

weehamish said:

Even if the heating is on for the full time which i expect it should be anyway... it seems 17khw in 4 hours for 1 rad is still a bit extreme. The bedroom rad has its own thermostat too so it would just cut off when the rooms hot enough.
Overall im still not sure how i can resolve this or who to speak to about it... 

You are running your heating in a rather unusual fashion and as a result its efficiency will be lower than expected.

You are heating two radiators, not one (the one in your bedroom plus the one in the hall).

All things considered, 17kWh isn't such a high number.

I don't really know what you expect anyone else to tell you?

Maybe you didnt read the thread... its 1 rad.. 1 rad will always be on for the thermostat... so its classed as 1 rad... people are running all their rads for a similar usage... so i think there is something wrong... 

I definitely read the thread.

You are running one rad in your bedroom and one in your hall. One plus one equals two.

It was me that said that one rad would be unlikely to draw that much power. However two rads could do it, particularly under the conditions you've created.

QrizB

... and I thought of something else this morning. The water in your pipes will also need energy adding to heat it up. With a flow temperature of 70 degrees C it could take 2kWh of heat just to warm the water when the boiler starts up. (This heat isn't "lost", exactly; it will leak out of the pipes and rads after the system turns off.)

• 17kWh of gas
• Boiler efficiency of 80% = 13.6kWh of heat
• 2kWh to heat the water = 11.6kWh delivered to the radiators
• Two radiators = 5.8kWh per radiator
• Four hours = 1.45kW per radiator
  

Looked at like that it doesn't sound too bad. My bedroom radiator, for example, is rated at 1.2kW and my hall one at 1.5kW.