Second month of heating: reduced gas usage by 44%

Ally_E.

This is the second month I'm sharing my results in trying to reduce gas usage now that the heating is on. Last month saw a reduction of 33%, this month it's 44%. You can read about last month's results here.

Date period: 23 Oct - 22 Nov 2022.
Gas usage: 1,460kW/h in 2022 vs 2,615kW/h in 2021.
Average daily temperature: 10.64C in 2022 vs 10.18C in 2021, located in South London. So as you can see the average daily temperature is very similar. 

Things I've done:
🔹 Reduced thermostat temp from 18.7 to 18.2 
🔹 Reduced hot water temp from 65 to 60 (system boiler)
🔹 Reduced frequency of hot water heating 
🔹 Reduced central heating flow temp to 45 and only put it up on cold days when the system struggles to heat the house (last few days the flow temp was at 55, as the house was not warming up fast enough)
🔹 Bought a chimney sheep for the open fire

Hope this encourages others to make small changes and reap the rewards. I'm hoping we'll reduce usage to 18,000kW/h a year  🤞 It's gone down from 21,550kW/h to 19,889kW/h a year so far.

Brie

Ally_E. said:

This is the second month I'm sharing my results in trying to reduce gas usage now that the heating is on. Last month saw a reduction of 33%, this month it's 44%. You can read about last month's results here.

Date period: 23 Oct - 22 Nov 2022.
Gas usage: 1,460kW/h in 2022 vs 2,615kW/h in 2021.
Average daily temperature: 10.64C in 2022 vs 10.18C in 2021, located in South London. So as you can see the average daily temperature is very similar. 

Things I've done:
🔹 Reduced thermostat temp from 18.7 to 18.2 
🔹 Reduced hot water temp from 65 to 60 (system boiler)
🔹 Reduced frequency of hot water heating 
🔹 Reduced central heating flow temp to 45 and only put it up on cold days when the system struggles to heat the house (last few days the flow temp was at 55, as the house was not warming up fast enough)
🔹 Bought a chimney sheep for the open fire

Hope this encourages others to make small changes and reap the rewards. I'm hoping we'll reduce usage to 18,000kW/h a year  🤞 It's gone down from 21,550kW/h to 19,889kW/h a year so far.

Please don't tell me you're planning on sticking a sheep up your chimney!!!  

But seriously folks.....it's good to see how just small changes can have a big affect. 

I've been struggling with having our house as cold as it is - wearing fingerless gloves while using the computer helps but isn't as good as having the heat actually on.  But we're coping on a whole different level as we no longer have an aged MiL who needed tropical heat with us.  That in itself is drastically reducing our use and we're adjusting how we dealt with the rest of the house as a result.  No more wide open windows in winter as her portion of the house made the whole place too hot to be comfortable.  Knock on affects too are keeping doors closed which allow us windows open where they are needed (aka where the smoker is).

That said we're still in debt to the provider but even this time of year we are paying more than we are using so that's fine.  I expect they will again at some point tell me they need to triple our DD and I will again be telling them no. 

chris_n

I suspect your chimney sheep is the biggest saving.

Ally_E.

chris_n said:

I suspect your chimney sheep is the biggest saving.

It's only for 1 room, but it's my office and I work from home, so could be! That's the room I aim to heat to 18C and let cool down to 17C before I turn the heating back on. 

chris_n

Ally_E. said:

chris_n said:

I suspect your chimney sheep is the biggest saving.

It's only for 1 room, but it's my office and I work from home, so could be! That's the room I aim to heat to 18C and let cool down to 17C before I turn the heating back on. 

If people would start to think of a chimney as being the same as a hole in the wall they may realise how much heat they are loosing. My mother had an unused gas fire, eventually I managed to convince her to replace it with an electric fire and blocked it off. Made a huge difference. 

ariarnia

Ally_E. said:

Hope this encourages others to make small changes and reap the rewards. I'm hoping we'll reduce usage to 18,000kW/h a year  🤞 It's gone down from 21,550kW/h to 19,889kW/h a year so far.

for me its definitely appriciated you came back to update again and really good to hear your progress. we have two unused fires upstairs and ive been procrastinating about making something to stuff up there. got to get it done now before your next update. no excuses!

Spoonie_Turtle

chris_n said:

Ally_E. said:

chris_n said:

I suspect your chimney sheep is the biggest saving.

It's only for 1 room, but it's my office and I work from home, so could be! That's the room I aim to heat to 18C and let cool down to 17C before I turn the heating back on. 

If people would start to think of a chimney as being the same as a hole in the wall they may realise how much heat they are loosing. 

It seems a bit bananas to me that people wouldn't realise this.  (Sorry arinaria, just seen your comment - absolutely not aimed at you or anyone else specific in any way! )

Our fires were blocked up years ago but unfortunately the holes weren't filled with anything (we hear dirt falling down the chimney when birds are doing their nests!).  Not much we can do about it, but at least the holes aren't completely wide open anyway.

ariarnia

Spoonie_Turtle said:

chris_n said:

Ally_E. said:

chris_n said:

I suspect your chimney sheep is the biggest saving.

It's only for 1 room, but it's my office and I work from home, so could be! That's the room I aim to heat to 18C and let cool down to 17C before I turn the heating back on. 

If people would start to think of a chimney as being the same as a hole in the wall they may realise how much heat they are loosing. 

It seems a bit bananas to me that people wouldn't realise this.  (Sorry arinaria, just seen your comment - absolutely not aimed at you or anyone else specific in any way! )

Our fires were blocked up years ago but unfortunately the holes weren't filled with anything (we hear dirt falling down the chimney when birds are doing their nests!).  Not much we can do about it, but at least the holes aren't completely wide open anyway.

i think we realised just did't really care about it that much as we arent ones for hemetically sealing ourselves in normally (most of winter there are windows open upstairs so not much point worrying about the chimney!) 

but we are never going to use those fires (they arent blocked i dont think but theres just to much stuff in the rooms plus young kids and animals for me to be happy open fires are safe and not worth the money to put a stove in) so i may as well put some of my fabric stash to good use and make stuffers. just need to get into my fabric room and not get distracted  

actually thinking about it i might not be able to stuff one of them as i think that fire shares a chimney with the stove downstairs so maybe gets to hot for it to be safe me shoving something maybe flammable in there. will have to google. but i can at least stuff the other one. 

The_Green_Hornet

I haven't made any changes and my consumption is down 39% so the bulk of any reduction still appears to be due to the mild Autumn weather.

Grumpy_chap

Ally_E. said:

Gas usage: 1,460kW/h in 2022 vs 2,615kW/h in 2021.

These are interesting threads, but how do you get to have these levels of data in the first place to monitor the success (o otherwise) of any changes?

chris_n

Grumpy_chap said:

Ally_E. said:

Gas usage: 1,460kW/h in 2022 vs 2,615kW/h in 2021.

These are interesting threads, but how do you get to have these levels of data in the first place to monitor the success (o otherwise) of any changes?

Readily available if you have a smart meter.