How much energy does this oft quoted "average household consume"?

SAC2334

mumf said:

We are solid fuel and electricity. When I heard that ‘average’ prices by January will be in excess of £4000 per year, I checked ours. It’ll be about £1800 per year. That so- called ‘average’ means that some people must be living in cannabis farms!

I used to work as meter reader in high crime area Doncaster  and a senior British Gas Revenue Protection Officer told me back in around 2015 that an average cannabis farm in a typical 2 up 2 down terraced property growing   150 plants   cost £800 a quarter in electricity  , x 4 equals £3200 a year as they grow continuous crops

 I think electricity was around 12 p a kwh back then so at 45 p kwh coming up Oct 1 st a typical small cannabis farm will steal around £7000 per annum now to grow the crop. 
In my town of Doncaster earlier this year the police raided 5 cannabis farms in one street alone in Hexthorpe Doncaster showing just how numerous the business is .

Coffeekup

gj373 said:

Alnat1 said:

There aren't really any averages as each household has different needs and expectations.

If it's becoming a problem, get the family together, have a chat about cost cutting and get them all on board to help. Heating the house/water, cooking and washing/drying are the main culprits for high use so read up on how to save in these areas. 

Thanks currently on a 2 year fix till September next year so have time to get this right/ usage down before the tsunami hits us.

I have an old combi boiler (20 years). Anyone any idea how I could work out of it will be worth replacing? Still works fine

I have a 10 year old biasi 24kw boiler replaced 4 years ago (which ran at 94% efficiency 7), with an ideal 24kw (which runs at 98.2 efficiency), it made no difference to my annual usage at all.

The only reason I replaced it was every winter (3winters) I had to call out an engineer to fix it. By the time I decided to replace it, it was practical a new boiler.

Best things to bring down your usage is you manually controlling it when you want it on.

Having the thermostat in the room you and or all your family are in the most. As having it in a cold draughty hallway will mean the boiler will be on 24/7 as it may never get the desired temperature it's set at.

Acclimatize come September October when most people start to have their heating on and wear a jumper or sweater instead.

Mstty

SAC2334 said:

mumf said:

We are solid fuel and electricity. When I heard that ‘average’ prices by January will be in excess of £4000 per year, I checked ours. It’ll be about £1800 per year. That so- called ‘average’ means that some people must be living in cannabis farms!

I used to work as meter reader in high crime area Doncaster  and a senior British Gas Revenue Protection Officer told me back in around 2015 that an average cannabis farm in a typical 2 up 2 down terraced property growing   150 plants   cost £800 a quarter in electricity  , x 4 equals £3200 a year as they grow continuous crops

 I think electricity was around 12 p a kwh back then so at 45 p kwh coming up Oct 1 st a typical small cannabis farm will steal around £7000 per annum now to grow the crop. 
In my town of Doncaster earlier this year the police raided 5 cannabis farms in one street alone in Hexthorpe Doncaster showing just how numerous the business is .

This is why they now rent flats and houses, turn them into cannabis farms and never pay for the electricity.

[Deleted User]

Coffeekup said:

gj373 said:

Alnat1 said:

There aren't really any averages as each household has different needs and expectations.

If it's becoming a problem, get the family together, have a chat about cost cutting and get them all on board to help. Heating the house/water, cooking and washing/drying are the main culprits for high use so read up on how to save in these areas. 

Thanks currently on a 2 year fix till September next year so have time to get this right/ usage down before the tsunami hits us.

I have an old combi boiler (20 years). Anyone any idea how I could work out of it will be worth replacing? Still works fine

I have a 10 year old biasi 24kw boiler replaced 4 years ago (which ran at 94% efficiency 7), with an ideal 24kw (which runs at 98.2 efficiency), it made no difference to my annual usage at all.

The only reason I replaced it was every winter (3winters) I had to call out an engineer to fix it. By the time I decided to replace it, it was practical a new boiler.

Best things to bring down your usage is you manually controlling it when you want it on.

Having the thermostat in the room you and or all your family are in the most. As having it in a cold draughty hallway will mean the boiler will be on 24/7 as it may never get the desired temperature it's set at.

Acclimatize come September October when most people start to have their heating on and wear a jumper or sweater instead.

Modern condensing boilers are no more efficient than the boilers that they replaced unless they a run in an efficient mode with a low a return flow temperature as possible. Invariably, when heating water, the boiler runs at TMaxSet so no condensing is taking place. 

If the boiler flow is set at too high a temperature, and the radiators are not balanced, then again no condensing will take place.  130F equates to about 54C. The lower the return flow the greater the heat recovery and thus efficiency.

I would agree that a 25% saving is somewhat misleading. If 5 people are living in a home then 26,000kWh/year suggests a poorly insulated and leaky property. This is what I would look at first. Loft insulation costs peanuts compared to a new boiler.

poppy10_2

gj373 said:

Ouch my current projections are 5000 for elec and 26000 for gas. There are 5 of us though but still looking for ways to cut energy usage. Does anyone know if there are averages for different household types and sizes documented anywhere so I can see how we compare to other households our size?

Ignore the "costs" figures, they are from Feb 2021, but here is the average usage based on household size

MuckChucker

I think my house is upside down
we use almost half the avg. gas but double the avg. elec - of course we'd be over on the more expensive of the two!
1970s 4 bed semi

Mrs_F_2017

poppy10_2 said:

gj373 said:

Ouch my current projections are 5000 for elec and 26000 for gas. There are 5 of us though but still looking for ways to cut energy usage. Does anyone know if there are averages for different household types and sizes documented anywhere so I can see how we compare to other households our size?

Ignore the "costs" figures, they are from Feb 2021, but here is the average usage based on household size

I live in a 3 bed but for the last year have only used 7000 kWh of gas so I think pinch of salt needed. 

Rather than thinking about averages- much better to get accurate of where you are now & how you can reduce that if you want too. 

I’m still looking for ways to ‘save’ but that for me means optimising use without being sat in the cold & dark! 

EssexHebridean

peter3hg said:

mumf said:

We are solid fuel and electricity. When I heard that ‘average’ prices by January will be in excess of £4000 per year, I checked ours. It’ll be about £1800 per year. That so- called ‘average’ means that some people must be living in cannabis farms!

The average figures used are the median figure, not the mean.

They also publish usage figures for a low (lower quartile) and high (upper quartile) user.


Gas:

Low - 8,000 kWh
Average - 12,000 kWh
High - 17,000 kWh


Electricity:

Low - 1,800 kWh
Average - 2,900 kWh
High - 4,300 kWh


Using the January estimates, the low user's energy would cost about £2,850 a year and the high energy user's would cost £6,050 a year.

And then you have those of us that would probably break the system - here it looks like:
Gas: 270kWh
Electric: 4700kWh 
 

MisterMotivated

EssexHebridean said:

peter3hg said:

mumf said:

We are solid fuel and electricity. When I heard that ‘average’ prices by January will be in excess of £4000 per year, I checked ours. It’ll be about £1800 per year. That so- called ‘average’ means that some people must be living in cannabis farms!

The average figures used are the median figure, not the mean.

They also publish usage figures for a low (lower quartile) and high (upper quartile) user.


Gas:

Low - 8,000 kWh
Average - 12,000 kWh
High - 17,000 kWh


Electricity:

Low - 1,800 kWh
Average - 2,900 kWh
High - 4,300 kWh


Using the January estimates, the low user's energy would cost about £2,850 a year and the high energy user's would cost £6,050 a year.

And then you have those of us that would probably break the system - here it looks like:
Gas: 270kWh
Electric: 4700kWh 
 

Glad I'm not the only one who doesn't fit into any of these brackets lol.  My 1 August - 1 August usage was:

Gas: 2688kWh
Electric: 1199kWh

BUFF

gj373 said:

peter3hg said:

gj373 said:

Alnat1 said:

There aren't really any averages as each household has different needs and expectations.

If it's becoming a problem, get the family together, have a chat about cost cutting and get them all on board to help. Heating the house/water, cooking and washing/drying are the main culprits for high use so read up on how to save in these areas. 

Thanks currently on a 2 year fix till September next year so have time to get this right/ usage down before the tsunami hits us.

I have an old combi boiler (20 years). Anyone any idea how I could work out of it will be worth replacing? Still works fine

Do you know the model number?
Is it regularly serviced?

If it is a non-condensing type then the efficiency when new would have been about 75% or lower whereas a new boiler will be 90%+.
What that means in real terms is that you will use something like 20-25% less gas with a newer boiler.
At 20 years old though it might be a condensing type in which case the difference is likely to be less.

It's serviced yearly. It's non condensing. At current gas prices a 25% saving sounds worthwhile. Thanks

& don't forget to update your controls. The minimum that you should have is a programmer+room thermostat & TRVs. Ideally your controls will support load compensation/weather compensation.
If you are on a cheap fix from last year until next September I wouldn't make it a priority for this year but if gas prices are the same next summer as they are now it is probably as good a time to do it as any. Of course, if it dies in the meantime it should be a no-brainer.