Change to Electric Boiler or keep oil?

old_wrinkly_2

I hope someone can help me decide whether or not to replace my oil fired boiler with an electric boiler. My boiler is a Boulter Boilers 15/21 external wall hung rated at 65000Btu/19KW, which was installed in 1995.

With the high cost of oil it is going to cost me around £1200 to fill up with about 1700 litres of oil (this is my average annual consumption) compared to just over £600 last year.

I was thinking of either an ECH Fusion boiler (perhaps combi) or GAF ElectraStream although there are others I have still to look at. The two boilers I mentioned have models upto 12KW in size.

I have read that despite the high of oil, it's around 63p per litre today, it still remains cheaper than electric. The figures I saw quoted were 6.56p per kWh for oil and 11.95p per kWh for electricty on the Nottingham Energy Partnership site.

I live in a 3 bedroom semi-detached bungalow with 200mm loft insulation, cavity wall insulation and UPVC double glazed windows. I have done a quick heat loss calculation using the Trademate site and this gives me figures of 26391 BTU/7735 Watts.

My thnking was that with perhaps Economy 10 or Staywarm ( I am an OAP) I would at least only have one source of energy pay for and as there is at last some interest from Government at stabilizing energy prices for gas/electric by putting pressure on the energy companies, whereas oil is largely if not totally ignored, it could be prudent to switch especially as, even if oil reduces, it's unlikely to go down by very much, certainly not even close to last year.

I don't want to make a substantial capital outlet unless I can be reasonably sure it will give some benefit in the longer term. so any advise would be very welcome.

Thanks

Cardew

The kWh price of oil depends on the efficiency of your boiler as well as the price you pay for oil.

A litre of oil produces 10.2kWh.

The SEDBUK site gives the efficiency of boilers but I couldn't find your exact model. However they have this one:

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]4 Boulter: Camray : 15/19 External[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]oil : regular : non condensing : wall mounted[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]range-rated (15 - 19 kW)[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]SAP seasonal efficiency 81.6%[/FONT]

So assuming yours is just a slightly bigger model with the same efficiency

At 60p/litre the cost of a kWh produced from oil by your boiler is 7.2p
(60p divided by 10.2 x 81.6%)

Daytime electricity is considerably cheaper than the 11.95p/kWh that you quote, although it varies by area of UK and tariff, but 10p/kWh is about average(ignore the first tier 1/primary units)

So oil is without doubt considerably cheaper than electricity and it makes no sense to change a servicable boiler.

When that boiler needs replacing, then the situation might have changed.

old_wrinkly_2

Thanks for the info, very interesting and food for thought.

According to the product leaflet supplied originally with the boiler it has an 82% nominal efficiency.

However I did find some info on it at http://www.homeheatingguide.co.uk/efficiency-tables.php?model=000922 that quotes an SAP seasonal efficiency of 70%. Presumably this will have a marked effect on the cost you quoted?

I assume the price of 7.2p you quoted is the inclusive of 5% VAT cost?

From your reply, and other sites I looked at, it does seem that even with the high cost of oil it is still cheaper than electricity overall.

A replacement modern, and presumably more efficient, oil boiler could be an alternative solution, assuming I stick with oil. I am limited to an external boiler due to lack of space inside. If you have any suggestions on what I might look at that would be useful.

I need to consider everything before committing any capital outlay.

If I stick with oil then I will replace my old copper hot water cylinder (900mm x 450mm) for a modern foam lagged model as mine only has a rather thin and poorly fitted jacket which is some years old now.

old_wrinkly_2

Sorry to be a nuisance but can you tell how you calculated the 10.2kWh figure you quoted? Is there a calculation listed somewhere?

Cardew

The 7.2p will include VAT if the oil price at 60p a litre includes VAT!

If the efficiency is 70% (and not the 82% in your handbook and on the SEDBUK site,) then the true cost goes up to 8.4p/kWh (60p divided by 10.2 x 70%)

If you get the highest efficiency boiler available with a 95% efficiency then the cost of a kWh goes down to 6.2p/kWh

Now taking the best(95%) and worst(70%) case scenario, - and given you stated that you use 1,700 litres a year - that works out at an annual saving of approx £260.

With an 82% efficiency the saving is approx £140 pa.

Now replacing a boiler will cost a minimum of £2,000(probably £3,000-£4000) as the labour, new ventilation regulations, system flush, condensates drain etc cost far more than the boiler.

Just loss of interest on £2,000 to £4000 will be £100 to £200pa.

So it is difficult to make a financial case for replacing a working boiler.

There are masses of websites that give the value of heating oil in kWh

This one - conversion table 1 - gives it as 10.22kWh/litre which is the accepted figure.

http://www.entech.co.uk/entech/ener_conv.htm

old_wrinkly_2

Thanks for the update.

As any new oil boiler would have to be external the installation costs could be much less than you suggest although I take your point.

A new electric boiler might well involve higher installation costs than I had thought of to comply with the latest regulations etc.

Out of curiousity, what is the comparative cost of gas these days?

All in all it seems that oil remains the only viable option at the moment and I will have to just suffer the high unit price. The alternative is a high capital outlay with no appreciable gain in running costs.

Not sure there is much more I can do to reduce my overall heating costs, although I hope a new hot water cylinder will help but not sure by what amount, as I've already done the obvious things.

I am of course open to any suggestions for improvement.

old_wrinkly_2

Just a quick update.

Had a call from one of the firms that supplied info on electric boilers and they said that provided the correct Economy 10 tariff was selected, such as provided by Scottish & Southern then electric central heating would come out better than oil, other economy tariffs are not viable.

I gave him my heat loss calculations that shows I need 7kWs for heating and he said that on my type of property I would need to add about 3kWs for hot water so a 12kW boiler would be ideal. I'm now trying to research the Economy 10 tariff.

Also, had a friend whose son is a plumber and he uses LPG for his heating & hot water (he uses cylinders) and they thought it was very good. I'm going to speak to him but in the meantime have you any thoughts as to how LPG would compare with electric & oil?

Thanks

Active_Lad

I too have been rather cripped by the sharp increase in Kerosene over the last few months. I paid 38.7p per litre in September 2007 and 57.8 just last week. Ouch!

My parents have a modern (3 year old) bungalow with electric boiler heating (to radiators) and it is costing them a FORTUNE. They are on a 5 tarrif rate with Powergen and they still reckon up to £160/month in electricity.

A good friend has LPG and she is always complaining how quickly she has to fill up her LPG tank. It's probably down to the lower "energy content" of LPG vs Oil, but I know she's considering replacing it with a Kerosene system.

Although we have been lucky in the past with kerosene being very cheap, I still think it's a cheaper form of heating compared to the options. A modern condensing oil boiler will be as efficient as a gas equivalent and you have the benefit of chosing your supplier on an ad hoc basis and filling up as and when you want, rather than being stuck with a supplier that takes 3 months to change.

I have a Worcester Heatslave (non condensing) which is regularly servcied and is almost 90% efficient. There's no point replacing it with a condensing one until it packs up because it would take forever to recoup the cost. In my personal opinion, you're better off staying with what you have.

Have you thought about clubbing together with your neighbours and buying in bulk? Most suppliers will give you a bit of a discount. We do it regularly and save a fair bit.

Cardew

old_wrinkly wrote: »

Just a quick update.

Had a call from one of the firms that supplied info on electric boilers and they said that provided the correct Economy 10 tariff was selected, such as provided by Scottish & Southern then electric central heating would come out better than oil, other economy tariffs are not viable.

I gave him my heat loss calculations that shows I need 7kWs for heating and he said that on my type of property I would need to add about 3kWs for hot water so a 12kW boiler would be ideal. I'm now trying to research the Economy 10 tariff.

Also, had a friend whose son is a plumber and he uses LPG for his heating & hot water (he uses cylinders) and they thought it was very good. I'm going to speak to him but in the meantime have you any thoughts as to how LPG would compare with electric & oil?

Thanks

If you get Economy 10, then all your other electricity - not just for heating - will cost you more.

If you really want to go for electric, why don't you get storage heaters and have an economy 7 tariff.(which is cheaper than E10)

If your storage heaters run out of heat then use normal electrical heaters. They will cost exactly the same to run as these fancy electrical boiler systems.

If you believe all this 'blurb' about these electrical 'boilers' being cheap to run. Then all you need to do is leave your oil CH in situ and buy some cheap electrical heaters for £20 or so and use them for a trial period.

For all the claims made, these electrical 'boilers' give out EXACTLY the same amount of heat for your money as any other form of electrical heater; and that is the most expensive form of heating available.

It can't be said often enough, a 1/2/3/ bar electrical heater, stand alone convector heater or oil filled radiator etc have exactly the same efficiency as these electrical boilers.

old_wrinkly_2

Cardew

Thanks for the update.

Quite frankly I don't want to spend any money on buying a new boiler unless there is a significant gain in running costs over what I have now.

It was only whilst browsing that I came across electric boilers, I hadn't realised they existed, and they seemed to offer a nice clean option with not too much installation so given the price of oil it seemed worthwhile investigating.

From your replies, and other things I have read, there doesn't seem to be a case for switching to electricty for heating.

I will be interested to see what the Scottish & Southern Economy 10 tariff is compared to my current E.On Economy 7

Active_lad

Thanks for your input. My current DD for electricity has just been increased to £62 p.m and my oil consumption of 1700 lires works out at £88 per month at 62p per litres but this is rising daily, so your parents electricity bill of £160 per month is not far from my combined figure of £149 per month.

This is the figure I have to use when comparing any alternative fuel as it's based on actual usage.

Combining oil deliveries is from my own experience fraught with problems as everyone has different patterns of ordering. I am browsing the beetlejuice.com site to see if there would be any benefit in using their buyers weekend but don't want to do anything until I am certain I am not going to change.

E.ON have supplied me with copies of my bills over the last two years so that I can see if my usage has changed and I am also running an energy meter to check what kWs each item uses.

I will be interested to hear the experiences of my friends son with LPG.

At the end of the day I will have to make a judgement and hope that I make the right choice. what I really need is a crystal ball

amtrakuk

I guess it might be worth considering when your boiler packs up. I only changed to electric when my gas combi gave up the ghost and the heat exchanger wasnt covered by BG homecare... ££££££ to get it replaced. I use standard capped tariff, my eleccy bill in winter was about 100-130/month now its warmer and the convection heaters are switched off it has dropped to about 40-50/month thats with taking a 10 min shower in the morning. I decided not to have a water tank (haven't got space for one either so went for a 12kw redring powerstream) so it doesnt use lekky till the hot tap is turned on