2 bed flat usage dual fuel help please

dreambig123

Sorry for long post in advance, questions at end. The detail may be useful for answering the questions.

We rent a 2 bed flat, 2 adults and small child. The flat is fully electric and our usage per annum is 7139 kWh. I know this is high, mostly due to electric heaters, working at home and renting, many cheap non eco appliances, old flats not insulated well. 

We are having a gas supply fitted in August through a government grant as I am disabled and I am concerned about the cost of dual fuel (I appreciate energy cost is awful right now, and a likely £200 installation meter cost, but this query is not about that). 

We will only have use of the gas for radiators that will be fitted in every room. No other appliance is gas. I know heating costs a lot of money, particularly from storage heaters (the bedroom ones are on timers to come on 7am-7pm and under 16 degrees, the living room on, from Oct-Feb ish), so the radiators should heat the whole flat, rather than just one room, for cheaper (I think). The standing charge will add though, that we don't have currently. I'm struggling to find any comparable examples because most people have a variety of gas appliances.

I can't get gas quotes until August when it is fitted. A friend has helpfully given her dual fuel May costings for 3 bed house, more people. 

Has anyone got any examples of how much their dual fuel costs in a similar situation? 

Has anyone been in this situation and what did you do?

Should I go ahead or will it end up costing me more money? 

Any advice? Differing views? 

I'm starting to wonder whether cancelling the gas installation would be the best thing, but I don't want to knee jerk without asking you experienced forumites your views. So if you got this far, thank you! 

Robin9

dreambig123 said:

We will only have use of the gas for radiators that will be fitted in every room. No other appliance is gas.  

A little confused .    Surely there is a boiler and that can supply your hot water

pochase

Welcome to the forum.

First of don't cancel the gas installation. Gas is still the cheapest solution for heating.

From your description it seems you are not using storage heaters on an E7 rate, but panel heaters/radiators on a single rate, which would be the most expensive way of heating.

You are saying the gas will only be for heating, are you sure it will not also be for hot water? Are you currently using a immersion heater for hot water, or are you using an electric shower?

The disadvantage of dual fuel is that you have an additional standing charge, but that is only £100 per months, so soon 250 to 300KWh worth.

Electricity is currently 4 times as expensive as gas, so the cost for heating will come down by quite a bit. 

Do you know how much of the 7000KWh is for heating/hot water? Maybe you have your average use in summer per month vs winter? 

More or less you will use the same KWh you currently use in electricity to heat also in KWh gas, but currently at a quarter of the price, which might change to a factor 3.5 in October.

Just an example if you use 4000KWh of your electricity  for heating and in future use 4000KWh of gas instead

4000 x 0.28p = £1120
vs
Standing charge gas = £100
4000 x 0.073p = 292
---------------------------------------
Total = 392

In this example you would currently save £728 per year. 

victor2

Welcom to the forum @dreambig123 !

As Robin9 says, there is surely going to be a boiler installed that will provide hot water as well as central heating.

Gas heating is still the cheapest way to heat a house for most people.

Are you currently on an Economy 7 electric tariff? If so, you'll want to look at changing that to a single rate tariff once the gas boiler is installed, as they are generally only useful to people with storage heaters.

It is impossible to say what the running cost of the gas is likely to be, but do take the time to learn how to control the new central heating so that you can find the balance between comfort and cost.

Do you have any neighbours with gas central heating already installed? If so, talk to them about running costs. You have already mentioned your current annual electricity usage in kWh. Keep on thinking in kWh, even when you have gas. The last stage oif any costing is convert kWh to pounds!

dreambig123

So firstly, absolutely yes there will be a combi boiler fitted (forgot this! Duh). The combi boiler will do hot water and radiators (which will be fitted to replace the electric heaters). Currently hot water only comes on once a day (on a timer) at 6pm for 30 mins and this sorts daily washing up and baby bath. The shower is electric. We use 3 electric heaters, the rest stay turned off. All radiators would be on so our flat would be warmer in general, which may help in terms of staying warm instead of a short blast. 

I don't have any neighbours to ask as of yet, we are the first. Great suggestion though, I wonder if any other friends may live in a block that I could specifically ask. I'll think on this.

Summer Vs winter usage- great tip, thank you. Just looked-
Dec 2021= 792 kwh
Jan 2022= 321 kwh
May 2022= 292kwh

So yes the heating causes considerable higher kWh used. 

The sums are very helpful, thank you. 

Learning as I go! 

dreambig123

Also thanks for the welcomes! 

pochase

Any chance to get the electric shower replaced by hot water from the new combi boiler? Will your landlord allow it or even pay for it would make it easier to rent out?

For your hot water you are currently using 15KWh per month. Immersion heaters are usually 3KWh.

An electric shower is usually between 8.5KW and 10.5KW. Just a 5 minute shower for the two of per day per person is 5 hours a month. That 42.5KWh to 52.5KWH per month.

So the 292KWh for May could be reduced by 60KWh, that is 20%. 

Gerry1

Don't be bamboozled into accepting an expensive fixed rate gas deal, you can always stay on the Standard Variable Tariff.  That's the deemed contract you will have if you don't select anything else, although it may not be publicised.  Things will become clearer in August when the new price cap will be announced.

If you know who the gas supplier will be, you may be able to choose a fixed deal now, which might turn out to be cheaper in the long run, but it's all a gamble whatever you do.  The only relatively sure thing is that gas will be cheaper for room and water heating for the foreseeable future.

dreambig123

Wow Pochase, that's quite a lot of difference isn't it. The landlady is paying a small amount towards the radiators, the rest is Government grant. So I suspect the answer is no, but if you don't ask you don't get. 

Possibly a stupid question, but how do you know these figures? From tracking your own energy usage, or a website that gives average appliance usage? Thanks 

pochase

It is a mix of different things. Lots of this information you will see repeatedly if you follow this forum, like how much KW does a electric shower have, or an immersion heater. That is just information you will need over and over again.

Other information I google when it becomes interesting or relevant.

BUFF

pochase said:

Any chance to get the electric shower replaced by hot water from the new combi boiler? Will your landlord allow it or even pay for it would make it easier to rent out?

If possible I would have both - gives redundancy in the unlikely event of the gas being off & less work/mess/upheaval. Of course if the landlord is doing a complete bathroom upgrade ...