How does anyone retain heat in an Edwardian House?

macman

Emily_Joy said:

macman said:

Logburners can be around 80% efficiency, compared to nearer 90% with a modern condensing boiler, or 100% with any electrical heating source. Much better than open fires at around 20%, but not that great. Logburners are only cheap to run if you have your own free source of fuel, otherwise mains gas is cheaper. And they output large amounts of particulates, far more than diesel cars and trucks.

The condensing boiler was installed by the current owners in 2020. Regarding the last part - if the logburners were so dangerous, humans would have not survived.

I didn't say they were lethal, I just said that, because they burn fuel at relatively low temps and do not filter the smoke, unlike cars, the emissions are relatively high. In urban areas, this can be a problem, given the already dirty air.
Humanity survived the Great London Smog of 1952, but it's still thought to have killed about 4,000 people.

BUFF

Emily_Joy said:

macman said:

Logburners can be around 80% efficiency, compared to nearer 90% with a modern condensing boiler, or 100% with any electrical heating source. Much better than open fires at around 20%, but not that great. Logburners are only cheap to run if you have your own free source of fuel, otherwise mains gas is cheaper. And they output large amounts of particulates, far more than diesel cars and trucks.

The condensing boiler was installed by the current owners in 2020. Regarding the last part - if the logburners were so dangerous, humans would have not survived.

https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/household-air-pollution-and-health

FreeBear

macman said:

Logburners can be around 80% efficiency, compared to nearer 90% with a modern condensing boiler, or 100% with any electrical heating source. Much better than open fires at around 20%, but not that great.
Logburners are only cheap to run if you have your own free source of fuel, otherwise mains gas is cheaper.
And they output large amounts of particulates, far more than diesel cars and trucks.

Add to that the mess that lugging in logs every day creates, along with spiders & other bugs. Clearing out the ash also generates a lot of dust which seems to settle on just about everything.

Yes, a log fire is nice to have, but it isn't a clean source of heat, and is expensive if you have to buy the logs in.

Mstty

@Emily_Joy what does the EPC say, firstly what rating is it letter and number. It will also have a section on how many kWh it will take to heat and improvements and costs of those improvements.

It is a good place to start.

As for log or multi fuel burners as others have said if you get free wood then obviously that is free heat but paying for fuel for a log or multi fuel burner is not an efficient way of heating a house given you state the boiler is circa 2020 that's how you should heat your house.

mumf

There’s something of a paradox there, you know? Most gas central heating has only been around for forty to fifty years. Now ,government will be banning gas in new housing quite soon. Therefore they will use electricity and heat pumps. Before central heating - forever - was wood ,then coal. Now, I have neighbours who have thought me to be ‘odd’ for many years ,by processing firewood. Those very neighbours have installed log burners recently!😂 

Gas is getting ‘used’ and rarer,therefore more expensive. Last week,government got the three coal fired stations to re- fire as there was not enough gas available to provide electricity- yes, a potential power cut they had to cover ,in case. 

So for half a century we believe gas ,and the electricity it produces ( wind generation tends to stop during Winter when it is needed most,and solar doesn’t work then  either) are The Way Forward ,and that burning wood is ‘wrong’ ,even though growing trees is sustainable! Before the start of Central Heating ,solid fuel was the way to heat for millennia. Now it’s becoming popular again! 🤣🤣 

Emily_Joy

FreeBear said:

macman said:

Logburners can be around 80% efficiency, compared to nearer 90% with a modern condensing boiler, or 100% with any electrical heating source. Much better than open fires at around 20%, but not that great. Logburners are only cheap to run if you have your own free source of fuel, otherwise mains gas is cheaper. And they output large amounts of particulates, far more than diesel cars and trucks.

Add to that the mess that lugging in logs every day creates, along with spiders & other bugs. Clearing out the ash also generates a lot of dust which seems to settle on just about everything.

Yes, a log fire is nice to have, but it isn't a clean source of heat, and is expensive if you have to buy the logs in.

  My parents have been using log burners all their life, but their house is much smaller, far up in the north,  and about 100 years younger...

@Mstty EPC is D. Current estimated usage is about 26000 kWh per year. Recommendations are internal or external wall insulation and floor insulation, but as far as I understand 100mm on a roof is nowhere enough, so roof insulation should be triple that. The estimated cost of the insulation is... between 8K and 20K. Not sure how accurate this is! 

(There is also an old EPC certificate - the rating back then was F and recommendations were new boiler and double glazed windows - this is what the current owners seem to have done).

FreeBear

Emily_Joy said:  EPC is D. Current estimated usage is about 26000 kWh per year. Recommendations are internal or external wall insulation and floor insulation, but as far as I understand 100mm on a roof is nowhere enough, so roof insulation should be triple that. The estimated cost of the insulation is... between 8K and 20K. Not sure how accurate this is!

If you are reasonably fit & active, loft insulation is something you can do yourself. A few rolls of 200mm top-up from B&Q or Wickes will set you back less than £200 and can be rolled out in an afternoon. If the loft is boarded or full of "stuff", that will complicate matters a bit. If you have plans to board the loft out, then that really needs to be done in conjunction with laying the insulation.

Insulating the walls could quite easily be in the £8K-14K range depending on quality of job and who does the work - If you were to have it done under a Green Deal (thankfully discontinued) type scheme, expect to pay a "snouts in trough" surcharge. Insulating the walls internally means you can do the work on a room by room basis to spread the cost. Doing as much of the grunt work yourself would help to keep the costs in check and bring the bill down (in the £1K-4K range).

Emily_Joy

@FreeBear thanks a lot. To give an idea of the scale - the floor area is just under 180 square meters and the ceilings are... somewhere near 2.8 meters high. The loft appears to be almost empty, and someone else might think about loft convention, but we are not there yet.

BUFF

FreeBear said:

Emily_Joy said:  EPC is D. Current estimated usage is about 26000 kWh per year. Recommendations are internal or external wall insulation and floor insulation, but as far as I understand 100mm on a roof is nowhere enough, so roof insulation should be triple that. The estimated cost of the insulation is... between 8K and 20K. Not sure how accurate this is!

If you are reasonably fit & active, loft insulation is something you can do yourself. A few rolls of 200mm top-up from B&Q or Wickes will set you back less than £200 and can be rolled out in an afternoon. If the loft is boarded or full of "stuff", that will complicate matters a bit. If you have plans to board the loft out, then that really needs to be done in conjunction with laying the insulation.

£25/roll. Each roll covers 5.5 sq. m
https://www.diy.com/departments/knauf-insulation-eko-roll-loft-insulation-roll-l-4-83m-w-1-14m-t-200mm/182147_BQ.prd

FreeBear

Emily_Joy said:

@FreeBear thanks a lot. To give an idea of the scale - the floor area is just under 180 square meters and the ceilings are... somewhere near 2.8 meters high. The loft appears to be almost empty, and someone else might think about loft convention, but we are not there yet.

Ooof... That is a fair sized property. My £200 budget is a tad on the low side, sorry.

Looks like you will need to spend ~£800 for the top-up rolls. Shop around, haggle over price, and insist on free delivery.