Can Smart Meters cause reduction in Gas pressure?

fcjf

I had a smart meter installed in November by E-ON, all working OK, no issues.

Shortly after I had my annual Boiler service via Baxi and was given a notice that the Gas pressure had reduced to 16mb, below the boilers normal working pressure of 17mb. The pressure coming into the meter from the mains is 19mb. Previous boiler services have not raised the pressure issue and there has been no work to the gas pipework so can only assume that the reduced pressure has been caused by the smart meter installation. The Baxi engineer advised me contact EON and get them to come and make an adjustment to the smart meter which would increase the pressure as he wasn’t legally allowed to touch it. This seemed strange at the time.

I have contacted E-ON on 4 separate occasions now with the same response that as long as the smart meter is working OK, which it is, they would charge for an engineer to come out as the issue is related to the boiler. I have advised the “Energy specialists” I manage to speak to (Call centre operators) of the specifics and have been told that I would get a call back from their engineers to discuss but weeks have passed with no call.

The boiler is working OK and I have been assured by two separate heating engineers that there is no safety risk here other than the boiler failing to work, which it hasn’t as yet.

To cut to the chase, putting aside potential damage of the gas pipework during its installation, can the smart meter itself cause a reduction in Gas pressure?

Netexporter

More likely to be the pressure regulator on the supply pipe.

MeteredOut

Netexporter said:

More likely to be the pressure regulator on the supply pipe.

That was my thinking too - unlikely the meter itself is causing the issue, but perhaps something the engineer did when installing the new meter.

Not sure how to get E-ON out to fix it though. I suspect it'll have to go down the complaint and the Ombudsman route.

OP, does the service report show the reduced pressure, and do you have one (or, ideally, more than one) from previous years that show the increased pressure - that would be the evidence to submit to the Ombudsman, alongside the smart meter installation confirmation details.

fcjf

MeteredOut said:

Netexporter said:

More likely to be the pressure regulator on the supply pipe.

That was my thinking too - unlikely the meter itself is causing the issue, but perhaps something the engineer did when installing the new meter.

Not sure how to get E-ON out to fix it though. I suspect it'll have to go down the complaint and the Ombudsman route.

OP, does the service report show the reduced pressure, and do you have one (or, ideally, more than one) from previous years that show the increased pressure - that would be the evidence to submit to the Ombudsman, alongside the smart meter installation confirmation details.

The latest service report shows the gas pressure but unfortunately the previous reports don't, so I would be relying on the fact that as a reduced pressure wasn't identified it wasn't a reality.

I am writing a formal complaint to E-ON to see if that gets them out and if not after 8 weeks I'll raise with the Ombudsman.

Could the Baxi engineer have just adjusted the pressure regulator if that's what the issue is?  

born_again

Could have been the service persons meter was wrong?

FreeBear

fcjf said: Could the Baxi engineer have just adjusted the pressure regulator if that's what the issue is?  

NO, and neither can you.

If you believe the gas pressure is too low, you should be contacting your gas network operator. Use this link to find out who that is - https://www.energynetworks.org/customers/find-my-network-operator

They will be able to come out, test the pressure, and adjust if required. But if it is the pipe between gas meter and boiler that is the cause of excessive pressure drop (should be no more than 1 millibar at full load), they could slap an "at risk" notice on the boiler.

fcjf

FreeBear said:

fcjf said: Could the Baxi engineer have just adjusted the pressure regulator if that's what the issue is?  

NO, and neither can you.

If you believe the gas pressure is too low, you should be contacting your gas network operator. Use this link to find out who that is - https://www.energynetworks.org/customers/find-my-network-operator

They will be able to come out, test the pressure, and adjust if required. But if it is the pipe between gas meter and boiler that is the cause of excessive pressure drop (should be no more than 1 millibar at full load), they could slap an "at risk" notice on the boiler.

According to the notice I was given by Baxi, the pressure at the meter is 19mb, the pressure at the boiler is 16mb, min boiler pressure is 17mb. This wasn't an issue before the smart meter was fitted and I have had this boiler serviced 11 times. Could the pressure have been below 17mb previous and not noticed or has the installation of the smart meter affected the pressure between the meter and the boiler?

QrizB

The gas pressure is set by the regulator. This is fitted before (upstream) of the smart meter.

The smart meter fitter will not have done anything intentional to your regulator.

The smart meter itself shouldn't affect your gas pressure.

So, by deduction, either:

• There has always been a low gas pressure but your service engineer only noticed this year; or
  
• Your regulator has developed a fault coincidentally with the smart meter fitting (which might possibly have been revealed by the vibrations etc. caused during the meter replacement).

EDIT: Sorry, I was still typing when you posted "pressure at the meter is 19mb, the pressure at the boiler is 16mb, min boiler pressure is 17mb".

I agree with FreeBear and Netexporter, this sounds more like an obstruction or constriction in the supply pipe.

FreeBear

fcjf said: According to the notice I was given by Baxi, the pressure at the meter is 19mb, the pressure at the boiler is 16mb

OK, so you are getting a 3mb drop between meter and boiler - Either you have a partial blockage in the pipe, or it isn't big enough. If the latter, the pipe needs to be replaced with something larger. Have a read of this - https://registeredgasengineer.co.uk/technical/low-pressure-and-under-sized-pipework/

Netexporter

If the sampling nipple is downstream of the meter, which I'm fairly certain it is (I haven't had gas for some years), then it can't be the meter causing the pressure drop.

doodling

Hi,

Assuming you have a fairly conventional domestic gas supply then you will have an arrangement as below:

Incoming pipe->(A)->Pressure regulator->(B)->Gas Meter->(C)->Your Pipework->(D)->Boiler

Your gas fitter shouldn't have tried to measure the pressure at points (A) or (B) as this pipework is the responsibility of the gas distributor.  I'm guessing that he will have measured 19mBar at (C) and 16mBar at point (D).

The supply is permitted to be at a pressure of between 18.5mBar and 22mBar at point (C).

Good installation practise (I can't work out if it is mandatory or not) requires a maximum of 1mBar pressure drop between point (C) and any other point on your domestic gas plumbing (including point D) under all operating conditions.  The pressure drop should certainly be low enough that the pressure at each appliance is more than the minimum required pressure for that appliance when gas is supplied at the minimum (18.5mBar) pressure.

It appears that the output pressure from your gas meter is OK (19mBar > 18.5mBar).

It appears that the pressure drop in your pipework is not according to best practise (3mBar > 1mBar).

If you complain to your gas supplier they will say that 19mBar is greater than the minimum 18.5mBar and will probably charge you for any call out.

It is possible but unlikely that replacing the meter has caused the pressure under normal operating conditions to be lower than it previously was, that is however irrelevant as it is still greater than the minimum permitted.

The odds are that it has always been like this.  Certainly the pressure drop between meter and boiler won't have changed unless a pipe has been squashed and obstructions appearing in gas pipes are extremely rare.  It is of course possible that the meter fitter has somehow introduced an obstruction, which has moved along the pipe, away from the meter, when he fitted the new meter but that feels improbable.

The next step is probably to calculate what the pressure drop in the pipe would be expected to be given the flow rate associated with your boiler (taking into account the length of pipe, number of bends, etc.).  That should very quickly tell you whether your pipework is the problem or whether there is a blockage.

Unfortunately, if your pipework is too small then the fix is most likely going to be to replace some or all of the pipe feeding your boiler with bigger pipe (and / or fewer or more gently swept bends).

You might be able to get away with a pressure drop in you pipework of 18.5mBar (minimum pressure at meter) minus 17mBar (minimum pressure at boiler) = 1.5mBar which might mean less pipework replacement but whether your gas fitter would be happy with that would depend on his attitude to doing what some might see as substandard work.