Hi. I'm talking about fuel consumption only (I know double glazing, insulation etc influences it).
I'm in the process of getting quotes for new gas boiler and heating system to replace my current inefficient set up. So its a good time to rethink how I actually use it so looking for opinions on the most economical way using gas heating (regardless of budget) during the colder months.
Currently, I have heating on in the bathroom and hall upstairs. I don't tend to heat the bedrooms unless I have people staying over. Rooms are generally uncomfortably cool. I put heating on low during the really cold weather to avoid frost etc. My downstairs I keep relatively warm. I'm wondering if that is the most economical way of heating the house. Ie does the boiler use more fuel to compensate for the cooler upstairs? Would it be better to keep whole house at the same lower temperature and throw on the woolens? Or best to heat used rooms and keep other rooms on a constant lowish temperature? Opinions please?
I'd be interested in others' experiences too. We are in the middle of a 2 week experiment to see whether it is cheaper/ more expensive/ about the same to leave the heating on all day or to have it on twice a day with boosts as needed. As pensioners, we are home all day.
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We are also pensioners and to get around it we do the following;
Heating on at 20C from 6am until 10am.
From 10am until 3pm heating set at 18C
From 3pm until 10pm heating at 20C
From 10pm until 6am heating at 17C
We have a small bungalow with 4 rooms incl kitchen and bathroom. All the rooms are heated as it seems pointless only heating lounge, hallway and kitchen.
we live in a mid terraced house, double glazed, cavity walled and loft insulated to the max. we do benefit from non exposed walls.
we had a new boiler fitted 12 months ago and are still getting to grips with it, the timer is the part causing the most issues as our previous one had a feature of just hitting the boost button and that would put the heating on for 1 hour and then go off, now we have to remember to turn the thing off, which often we dont! so rely on the google nest for setting a reminder/timer.
our heating is on in the whole house from 6 am until 8.30am and then off until 3.30 pm until 7.30 pm so 6 hrs in total. it has to be minus numbers for us to have the heating on during the daytime.
Radiator thermostats are essential: have each room the temperature you want. It’s wasteful to heat an unused room. One must have no thermostat however: for us, it’s the towel rail upstairs.
We turn our heating on when we actually get up, turn it off an hour before we go to bed, it’s at 19 deg but I may need an extra jumper (OH is hotter blooded). We use a multi-fuel stove instead of heating the whole house during spring & autumn, and to boost heat or reduce gas use in winter. Water heated one hour morning & one hour evening (for showers & washing up).
New homes must be carbon free from this or next year (soon, anyway). I’m concerned that the parts for gas boilers will get less available when far fewer gas boilers are being fitted.
I live in a bungalow and have electric underfloor heating under laminate flooring. I have found this to be far better than radiators. I don't have a timer, just a thermostat to keep the house at a constant 22 degrees. I have found that having the heating controlled solely by the thermostat is the most efficient way of running it. In winter the heating is activated almost 24 hours a day and in summer it is only activated for 2-3 hours a day, if it comes on at all.
I put an extra layer on, and wear socks on my feet during the really cold days, as I set my house, van and car permanently at 18 +/- 0.5 degC throughout the year as I don't like it too warm.
I can set an off-set in my central heating system, so that the temperature in the upstairs bedroom does not rise above 18 degC due to hot air rising from below. It means downstairs can be lower than 18 degC at times.
I have to adjust this off-set in between seasons in late March/early April and again in late September/early October, and the weather cannot decide whether it wants to be hot or cold.
I have over-spec'ed my house in terms of heating, in that I have also installed underfloor heating downstairs and in the bathroom.
I seldom use the underfloor heating after receiving my first ever winter electricity bill back in 2007 and was shocked to see how much electricity I had used. Nowadays I always wear house shoes even when I have a shower!
I used to use my inverter air conditioning system on heating mode to heat the house, again, I stopped that after seeing how much electricity I was using, so I use gas central heating to heat the house in the colder months instead, and use the air con to cool the house down during the warmer months.
Curtain across the front door, blinds down etc. to reduce draughts as I am a bat who like cool and dark places.
I use the smaller combi microwave oven instead of powering up the main oven whenever I can; boil only sufficient water for a single cup; cut down on appliances on stand-by mode. That's about it.
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So sad that people have to worry about such things but we are very diligent about turning heating off when we go to bed or when we go out. 10 degrees at night, 18 during the day. I wanted to look into a heat pump but our boiler packed up and started leaking a few months ago so we needed to replace it sharpish so that's us with a gas boiler for the next 10 years! Sorry XR, we'll do better next time!
We are both retired and feel the cold. At this time of year our central heating comes on at 7am and goes off at 9am. (we don't get up very early) Then it comes on again from 4pm to 9pm. It is off overnight. We use every room in the house so no rooms are ever without heating except when the heating goes off altogether. The thermostat in the living room is set at 21 degrees permanently, but the thermostatic radiator valves are set lower upstairs. Ours is an end of terrace house, so 3 walls are outside walls, but it is very well insulated, so it is never really cold unless the heating has been off for 48 hours or more because we are away. However, these days we are very rarely away at this time of year and we are at home most of the time every day. If it gets really cold (below freezing) outside during the daytime "off period" then we use the one-hour-boost button on our timer.
As the year draws on and the nights start to get lighter, we tend to move the evening "on" time gradually later. We usually tend to set it to come on when it gets dark.
I found that when I ditched the timer and went to 100% thermostat control, my heating costs dropped by at least 10%. During winter with the heating off, the temperature in my bungalow could drop to below 15 degrees during the day and down to around 10 degrees at night. Using a timer to get the heating to bring the temperature up to a comfortable (to me) 18-22 degrees from those low temperatures used a lot of electricity (no gas here). Using a thermostat only to maintain a constant temperature +/- 1 or 2 degrees of 18 degrees overnight and 22 degrees when I am awake used far less energy.
Having said that, I do think that the type of home you live in makes a huge difference. I live in a modern 2 bed bungalow with both cavity and loft insulation with electric heating and hot water.
Uswitch (one of the comparison sites) says that for every one degree F that you lower the temperature that your thermostat is set at, you cut your energy bills by 1%. That was before the impending price rises. Other websites quote this relationship too.
I do not need Tenerife temperatures while I am asleep as I use a 15 Tog duvet & have been known to fill a hot water bottle.
Quote: Originally posted by martin734 on 07/2/2022
I found that when I ditched the timer and went to 100% thermostat control, my heating costs dropped by at least 10%. During winter with the heating off, the temperature in my bungalow could drop to below 15 degrees during the day and down to around 10 degrees at night. Using a timer to get the heating to bring the temperature up to a comfortable (to me) 18-22 degrees from those low temperatures used a lot of electricity (no gas here). Using a thermostat only to maintain a constant temperature +/- 1 or 2 degrees of 18 degrees overnight and 22 degrees when I am awake used far less energy.
Having said that, I do think that the type of home you live in makes a huge difference. I live in a modern 2 bed bungalow with both cavity and loft insulation with electric heating and hot water.
You are absolutely right, it does make a huge difference the type of home you live in. Unless the outside temperature drops to way below zero, the temperature in our house rarely dips much below 16-18 degrees overnight when our heating is off. We would need to be away for 48 hours or more with the heating off for that to happen. During the day at the moment our heating is off between 9am and 4pm, and I haven't seen the temperature drop below 19 degrees in our living room between those times so far this winter. It could happen if the temperature outside dropped below zero in the daytime, but then we'd just hit the one-hour-boost button.
I don't know how old the OP's boiler is that is being replaced but without doubt any new boiler will be much more efficient. Nearly three years ago we replaced our whole system with a Combi boiler as there was only two of us and header tank, expansion tank and hot water tank were all ripped out. The new system is controlled by the Hive system and the main thermostat is in the hall.(I can also control it from my Smart Phone) Currently set at 18.5 degrees overnight, 19.5 from 8.00 to 12.00, 20 12.00 to 17.00 and 21 degrees from 17.00 to 23.00. Our gas consumption for January cost us £69 and that is for a reasonably sized four bedroom house. I don't altogether agree with the Confused.Com article. I have seen the same expressed elsewhere but surely if you have the technology to programme your heating why not use it? We are in our mid seventies and like to be comfortable and whilst we can afford will continue to heat our house at it suits us. What we notice is that on milder days the heating tends not to come on a lot. Now the elephant in the room is that prices are about to increase by a massive amount and even if we turned down all temperatures by 1 degree (C) it will still mean its going to cost us a lot more. I will look at more opportunities to put more insulation in the loft.
I think a heat pump was mentioned? Unless you have a modern well insulated house I would forget that idea, in particular an air heat pump as they are not very efficient and you will use a lot of electricity. You will also have to double the size of the radiators and have somewhere for hot water storage. A ground heat pump would be more efficient but they will need to either dig a large hole in your garden or bore holes but the cost is horrendous. Our very green Government have just halved the subsidy they give so you will have to find around £15000. Makes an efficient gas boiler costing £4000 seem good value!!!
When the boiler is set to be on, whether by timer or theormostat it will cost money when heat is called for by the system, even if I don't need it, so I remain in control.
As I work from home it is set to come on at about 6am to a max of 19 degrees in the lounge. When I enter the lounge I turn the stat down to 10 so it will never turn on. The lounge will then keep heat, today it dropped to about 17 degrees by 2pm.
Stat is then set to 20 from 5pm and goes back to 5 degrees at 9pm. No need for heat overnight, even if its well into minus degrees outside.
I know from my parents bungalow that wet underfloor heating needs managing differently as the floor acts as a heat sink, like a huge storage heater.
If the heating is turned off in cold weather it can take a long time for the concrete floor to warm up again. They therefore set and leave the individual room stats all year round. Lounge and kitchen 19 degrees, bedrooms 17 and it is always warm, but their bills aren't excessive as its so well insulated heat is retained. Its also a south facing lounge so solar gain can be significant even at this time of year.
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Topic: Most economical way of heating house?
via mobile 07/2/2022 at 8:29am
