Extremely High Gas Usage

The_Cappuccino_Kid

Hello,

We are in a 4 bedroom detached house - 30 years old. Loft insulation is so-so. We have a 7 year old Baxi boiler that is serviced annually. Most of the 11 radiators do not have TRVs. The thermostat is in our (cold) entrance hall. Apart from the boiler we have no other gas appliances.

We have already been in touch with British Gas regarding what we thought was excessive usage and we have an engineer coming out at the beginning of March - and a smart meter installation booked for the end of March.

However our latest bill is eye watering. Covering the period from 9th January - 8th February our meter reads a usage of 1748 units. Such a large number the BG website wouldn't let me submit it. I calculate that to be 19173 kWh  - for one month! 

I intend to look at our insulation and get TRVs installed but surely that cannot be right - the meter must be at fault? 

Thanks for reading - comments and thoughts more than welcome!

kipperman

I would take a picture of the meter and post it here - the meter will either be reading in m3 or cubic feet - if the latter then that might be one reason for these large figures.

EssexHebridean

I would also suggest choosing a time when you can make sure the heating is off altogether for a few hours - overnight perhaps. Take a reading before going to bed, then another reading first thing in the morning before the heating has kicked in and see if there is any difference in the readings. 

FreeBear

The_Cappuccino_Kid said: We are in a 4 bedroom detached house - 30 years old. Loft insulation is so-so. We have a 7 year old Baxi boiler that is serviced annually. Most of the 11 radiators do not have TRVs. The thermostat is in our (cold) entrance hall.

Do you have a hot water cylinder ?

If so, turn the thermostat down to say 50-55°C and set the timer to cover the periods when you actually use hot water. if the tank doesn't have a thermostat, get one fitted as soon as possible.

When you get TRVs fitted, have a programmable thermostat installed at the same time. You'll then be able to set different temperatures throughout the day/week - This could potentially save up to 15% on gas. In reality, more likely 5%, but with such a high usage, it will pay for itself very quickly.

Might also pay to measure up the rooms and punch the numbers in to a heat loss calculator. You may find some of them undersized, so it could be worth fitting some larger ones. One advantage of doing so means that you can run the boiler at a lower flow temperature and get better efficiency out of the boiler.

matelodave

How often do you read your meter and send in the readings.

Have you actually checked your bill against the meter readings and previous bills/readings to establish whether this is a glitch or a reconciliation after several estimated bills.

When you do it regularly then you shouldn't get random or estimated bills and you can also see how your consumption varies between winter and summer and month by month. Even more importantly you can see if something has gone awry well before it becomes a really big problem that is difficulty to unravel.

Krakkkers

We're either of the readings in Jan or Feb estimates or actual readings.

QrizB

The_Cappuccino_Kid said:

I intend to look at our insulation and get TRVs installed but surely that cannot be right - the meter must be at fault?

A few possibilities:

1. Meter fault. See eg. @MeteredOut 's thread here with his meter that kept increasing even when turned off.
2. Gas leak. See eg. @Annemos 's thread here where the leak was in the flue space behind the gas fire.
3. Hot water leak. See eg. @JandleCandy 's thread here where an underground pipe was leakign hot water and using 100k kWh/yr of gas.
   
4. Meter reading error, either this time or last time.
5. BG billing error.
   

The_Cappuccino_Kid said:

However our latest bill is eye watering. Covering the period from 9th January - 8th February our meter reads a usage of 1748 units. Such a large number the BG website wouldn't let me submit it. I calculate that to be 19173 kWh  - for one month!

For 30 days, that's 640kWh/day, equivalent to a constant 27kW demand. Your boiler would be firing continuously. Was it?

The_Cappuccino_Kid

kipperman said:

I would take a picture of the meter and post it here - the meter will either be reading in m3 or cubic feet - if the latter then that might be one reason for these large figures.

It's definitely cubic metres.

EssexHebridean said:

I would also suggest choosing a time when you can make sure the heating is off altogether for a few hours - overnight perhaps. Take a reading before going to bed, then another reading first thing in the morning before the heating has kicked in and see if there is any difference in the readings. 

A few days ago I switched the boiler off from 0800 - 1800 and the meter did not change.

FreeBear said:Krakkkers said:

We're either of the readings in Jan or Feb estimates or actual readings.

.

Do you have a hot water cylinder ?

If so, turn the thermostat down to say 50-55°C and set the timer to cover the periods when you actually use hot water. if the tank doesn't have a thermostat, get one fitted as soon as possible.

When you get TRVs fitted, have a programmable thermostat installed at the same time. You'll then be able to set different temperatures throughout the day/week - This could potentially save up to 15% on gas. In reality, more likely 5%, but with such a high usage, it will pay for itself very quickly.

Might also pay to measure up the rooms and punch the numbers in to a heat loss calculator. You may find some of them undersized, so it could be worth fitting some larger ones. One advantage of doing so means that you can run the boiler at a lower flow temperature and get better efficiency out of the boiler.

No hot water cyclinder. We do have a programmable thermostat which is currently set as:

07:00 17
08:30 14
16:00 17
17:30 18
20:00 19
23:00 11

I'll take a look at that website, thank you.

mortgageFTB said:

You’ve omitted some important data.

What is your heating temperature set to? 

What’s your flow temperature set to?
How many hours a day is it on? 

Are your radiators always boiling hot? Assuming yes given no TRV’s.
Is it a system or combi boiler?
If system, are you constantly heating your hot water? Or is it an hour a day or so?

The radiators are always boiling hot, yes. It's a combi system with the stat settings as above. Boiler settings are hot water: 50 and heating: 60.

matelodave said:

How often do you read your meter and send in the readings.

Have you actually checked your bill against the meter readings and previous bills/readings to establish whether this is a glitch or a reconciliation after several estimated bills.

When you do it regularly then you shouldn't get random or estimated bills and you can also see how your consumption varies between winter and summer and month by month. Even more importantly you can see if something has gone awry well before it becomes a really big problem that is difficulty to unravel.

I read my meter and submit the readings every month. The only estimated bills occur when I am on holiday and may miss the reading period. All the bills for the last six months have been based on Actual. 



Thank you all for your comments this far. One point of note is that the Dec 22 - Feb 23 usage was 755 units. Dec 23 - Feb 24 was 2377. Whilst I appreciate that there are tasks I should and will undertake to reduce my usage it doesn't explain this huge anomaly and I suspect a faulty meter.

FreeBear

The_Cappuccino_Kid said: The radiators are always boiling hot, yes. It's a combi system with the stat settings as above. Boiler settings are hot water: 50 and heating: 60.

Thank you all for your comments this far. One point of note is that the Dec 22 - Feb 23 usage was 755 units. Dec 23 - Feb 24 was 2377. Whilst I appreciate that there are tasks I should and will undertake to reduce my usage it doesn't explain this huge anomaly and I suspect a faulty meter.

If the house is heating up at a reasonable rate, and the boiler isn't constantly kicking in to maintain the temperature, you could dial the flow temperature back to say 55°C - That will gain a few percentage points on efficiency at the expense of longer burn times.

Your temperature profile looks to be reasonable for a young & healthy family - Certainly not the Mediterranean setting that some have. And it certainly doesn't account for a threefold increase over last year. If anything, this winter has been quite a bit milder than last.

Do you have an electronic gas meter or an old mechanical one ?

njkmr

Definitely check around the meter for any smell of gas.
I ignored a slight smell for a 6 month period thinking it was normal near the meter and it cost me over £1500..!
The new smart meter fitted by Octopus had a joint not soldered correctly to the pipe coming from the meter into my house. 
Apparently that was my fault. And as it was after the meter I was liable for the escaped gas, which was on the side of my property so was only detectable if I put my head into the plastic cover box.
Lesson learnt...! #£#%#£...!

markin

Do the bills say your read? BG have a habit of simply ignoring submitted readings, and people often just don't spot it.

640 kwh a day is huge, so if true then it must be a jumping meter, or a leak in the boiler after the valve.