Heat Network Usage

danco

I live in a two-bedroom flat in a retirement block built in 2019. Heating (and cooling) is through a heat network using a VRF supply. I am at home most of the time. The flat does seem well-insulated.

There have always been problems with the metering and billing for all of us, and the developers, who are the heat suppliers, have admitted that there is something wrong. They don't seem to have worked out what, even after several years, but hope to do so soon.

The figures below show the claimed usage in kWh for each bill they provided.

30 Nov 21 7500 (first bill, starting date 1 Feb 2021)

31 Dec 21 2259

31 Jan 22 1239

28 Feb 22 1336

31 Mar 22 715

30 Apr 22 398

31 May 22   5

30 Jun 22 130

31 Jul 22 437

31 Aug 22 555

30 Sep 22 58

31 Oct 22   5

30 Nov 22 1858

31 Jan 23 4525 (two months)

31 Mar 23 2837 (two Months)

30 April 23 270

31 May 23   5

30 Jun 23 282

31 Jul 23 63

30 Aug 23 142

30 Sep 23 204

30 Nov 23 547 (two months)

31 Dec 23 763

31 Jan 24 781

31 May 24 493 (four months)

Most of the bills seem somewhat high, with a few, such as Dec 21 and Feb 22, being exceptionally high.

By contrast, the Energy Performance Certificate for my flat indicates an expected ANNUAL usage for heating of 2200 kWh. Even allowing that this figure is only approximate, the discrepancy seems very large.

The figures given here are just for VRF heating and cooling, I haven't included hot water or standing charges. And, of course, my normal electricity supply is not included in this.

I would welcome comments as to what extent these figures are in any way reasonable.

MikeJXE

Wow 

Never in a million years could I live there

I currently pay £800 duel fuel 1 bed 

My last flat was approx £1,000 2 bed 

danco

The developers have admitted that the figures are in some sort of error, but have not yet worked out what the problem is. One thing is that the system (which is warm air, heated by a VRF system) has filters that they did not know existed. Dirty filters seem to have caused excessive usage. But there are probably other issues as well. For instance, we know that for one resident the current bills are definitely wrong, but we don't know yet if this is a system billing error affecting several people or just human error in transcribing one person's figures.

At the moment I'm mainly trying to hear what others think of the claimed figures, the more information we can gather the better.

MP1995

So VRF are Variable Refridgerent Flow heat pumps. They should produce an efficiency similar to domestic heat pumps so say for sake of this 1kwh in 2.5kwh out.

In which case the bills are shocking and it is as if you have been charged for the kwh output and not the input.

danco

That's an intersting thought, I wonder if that is the issue.