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Heating Costs


Breton
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We are about to install central heating in a building with approx 350 sq m floor area and are undecided whether to go for LPG or Oil; we're not connected to town gas.  Can anyone advise me as to which might be the better option?
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Your subject heading is absolutely correct - it sure does!

Our house came with an LPG tank and I guess it's the easiest and cleanest system. It's very handy to have the gas cooker connected to the big tank and so there's no need to bother changing cylinders as you might if you had oil CH. We have town gas in UK so at least using gas in France is familiar and we didn't have to learn the more fiddly details of oil burning. 

I suspect this convenience comes at a cost though.

In a house the size of yours I reckon the costs will be huge whatever the system. Our house is half that size, has pretty feeble insulation and can cost €30 per day for a week to get the house up to around 20 degrees when we pay a fleeting visit. Guess what - we hardly ever use it.

I think most non-town gas CH systems are oil burning but that's only from what I've picked up on this site and learned while viewing houses to buy. That suggests it has been the more economic option for a long while. However, don't ask me if it is now.

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With oil currently (round here at any rate) now having reached 88 centimes/litre, I suspect our traditional views as to what's a cheap and what's an expensive way to heat a house, probably need a thorough overhaul.

Since LPG is derrived from oil anyway, their respective prices tend to rise hand-in-hand.

I can't believe I'd ever be in the position of considering heating with electricity, but it's starting to look almost reasonable !

p
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For a place that size I'd start seriously looking at heat pumps or automated wood burners.

Air or ground source heat pumps effectively make electric heating 60-70% cheaper. There have been lots of threads about them here.

You can buy wood boilers that take wood chips or pellets. You just load up the hopper every couple of days and the system feeds the wood in automatically.

http://www.nef.org.uk/logpile/woodfuel/centralheating.htm

The really important thing is to insulate and draught proof the house as well as possible, otherwise you're just keeping the sparrows warm.

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You don'tsay if it's a new build or built?

We have LPG with a condensing boiler and wet underfloor heating. We looked at ground source and decided that we couldn't go horizontal and 16,000€ for 2 100 meter deep holes was OTT. Hence the condensing boiler. We are also looking at backing that up with evacuated tube solar heating to supply the boiler with warm/hot water to start off with and that will bring the anual cost down even more. The condensing boiler has proved very effecient so far, but we are still fine tuning the system. I forgot to say that the new boiler was fitted just before Christmas to replace a 20 odd year old boiler which was not efficient!

I also agree that having a gas hob on the bulk tank is good too. We had LPG in England before moving so are quite at home with it..

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I'd go for a wood gasification boiler with buffer tank. in milder weather you will only need to light the fire every couple of days because once all your rads and house are at the desired temp all the heat from boiler will heat the water in the buffer/storage tank and give you enough heat for free heating the following day.

look at this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga9TbNIiCJE

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Friends of ours have just recently renovated a barn. They have installed a Finnish woodburning stove that is incredibly efficient. It only needs to be alight for 3-4 hours per day to heat the whole house for 24 hours - plus they have a small oven in the top in which they can cook either casseroles or pizzas etc. These stoves are expensive, but eligible for a good rebate on your tax return.

This is the sort of thing:

http://www.nunnauuni.com/english/

 

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Gyn, not yet but i'm working on it. I've done a fair bit of research and these are ideal for heating large houses.

A friend has one without buffer tank and just needs to fill it once in morning and in the evening and it gets their very big house toasting.

 

Atmos seem to be very popular, you can get a pretty good deal from www.ph-renewables.co.uk

 

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[quote user="sweet 17"]

I am most intrigued by these heaters.  Will definitely bear them in mind should I need to install a stove in our next house.

By the way, RR, Good Luck in your new home!

[/quote]

Thanks, Sweet 17 for the good wishes. We move at the end of the month so I'm busy packing up and checking out boxes that have never been unpacked since we move here 6 years ago! Only going about 15 kms away, so not too bad - although we have three cats, two dogs and two donkeys to relocate this time [:-))]too.

 

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Quote: We are also looking at backing that up with evacuated tube solar heating to supply the boiler with warm/hot water to start off with and that will bring the anual cost down even more.

This idea comes up frequently and unfortunately does not warrant the expenditure and is not as effective as it might seem. It is better to use solar thermal for just the domestic hot water which is efficient - at least this reduces the demand on the boiler.

The best form of heating is definitely underfloor and I would suggest electric with some form of renewable energy to supplement the grid electricity. This way, when the demand is lower during the warmer months you can still utilise the electricity elsewhere.

Underfloor can be run as low as 15 degrees to provide comfort heating andf if used in conjunction with the good old wood burning stove is very cost effective. Underfloor is suitable for all types of floor construction. The only word of caution re underfloor is that for wood the temperature must never be allowed to reach 27 degrees as the wood may become irreparably damaged - not a problem with electric systems as the thermocouples are actually fitted into the floor.

Good luck

Marc

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[quote user="Mikey"]

Gyn, not yet but i'm working on it. I've done a fair bit of research and these are ideal for heating large houses.

A friend has one without buffer tank and just needs to fill it once in morning and in the evening and it gets their very big house toasting.

 

Atmos seem to be very popular, you can get a pretty good deal from www.ph-renewables.co.uk

 

[/quote]

I am also still at the design stage but, at the moment, an Atmos 20kw unit with a 2000l heat store is looking good. Heating load is calculated at approx 16.5 kw and the balance of 3.5 kw being for DHW. The latter may be a bit too high for just two of us. Having said that, the 16.5 Kw heat load assumes all rooms are heated wheras at least two bedrooms are likely to be on frost stat for most of the winter.

The heat store unit with a second heating coil for evac solar should give DHW in summer without running the Atmos.

All heat load calcs have been done using the conventional 21 degC delta T (outside temp at -1C) and using 200mm insulation in the roof spaces.

Costs of kit would seem to be about GBP 5000 as far as I an see and the site indicates an expected season useage of approx 25m cu of wood. If, as I believe, this roughly equates to 8 stere it seems quite economical. I have just ordered 8 steres at E45 / stere. I cant imagine a winter season heating bill of E360 plus the pump power + wood burner in sitting room for "ambience" but thats what the numbers say.

Any comments from anyone will be truly appreciated.

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A previous post referred to property insulation and this is by far the best, no doubt about it, way to improve comfort and reduce energy bills.

For those who have Oil, Gas or LPG boilers the following may be of interest.

I cannot mention any details without contravening Forum rules re advertising, but if anyone would like to PM or email me I can provide further information about a product that has previously only generally been available to the commercial market.

I will not note where you can found out more or purchase this product.

I hope that helps some and also sincerely hope that this general information is not seen as advertising.

Marc.

Post edited by a moderator to remove link

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Marc,

Whilst I am sure that many of us really appreciate your input on energy matters, do you not think that you are "ever-so-slightly" advertising your own company?

Personally, I have no problem with that, but I suspect the mods (or others ) might.

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[quote user="powerdesal"]Marc,

Whilst I am sure that many of us really appreciate your input on energy matters, do you not think that you are "ever-so-slightly" advertising your own company?

Personally, I have no problem with that, but I suspect the mods (or others ) might.
[/quote]

All forums live with some form of advert.

If only on a WWW.me

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As I said Geoff, I have no problem with it. There does seem to be fine line between a 'www.me' in the strap line and an overt link to a company web site.

Either way, it doesn't bother me, in fact it can be (and is) helpful on occasions.

edit: I see I was right. Luckily I got the link before it was removed.

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[quote user="powerdesal"]As I said Geoff, I have no problem with it. There does seem to be fine line between a 'www.me' in the strap line and an overt link to a company web site.
Either way, it doesn't bother me, in fact it can be (and is) helpful on occasions.


edit: I see I was right. Luckily I got the link before it was removed.


[/quote]

Yes i saved that one for reading later.

 But most i ignore

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Its a fair comment and a fine line between advertising and trying to help which is why I put the link to another website, not our website, which I thought might be acceptable.

Obviously not so humble apologies. I will refrain completely in the future and just post general comments.

So difficult to know what to do as I truly believe some of these lesser known products would be of great interest to all?

Marc

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[quote user="EcoPower"]Its a fair comment and a fine line between advertising and trying to help which is why I put the link to another website, not our website, which I thought might be acceptable.

Obviously not so humble apologies. I will refrain completely in the future and just post general comments.

So difficult to know what to do as I truly believe some of these lesser known products would be of great interest to all?

Marc
[/quote]

Is not possible for you to start a newsletter service,

Then you are out of the fog,so to speak.

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Hello Geoff

I didn't know such a service was available through Forums or am I misunderstanding something?

What I think is acceptable to say is that a monthly column will soon (July onwards) be apearing in one of the national newspapers (whose name I won't mention) that will encompass many aspects of renewable energy, energy saving etc.

It is in no way an advertising column but intended to hopefully help all with ideas, concepts, technologies available, to dispel myths etc etc with many of the ideas costing virtually nothing to implement.

The first article may be 'Whole house energy audit' but if anyone has any thoughts on subjects that might be useful I would sincerely welcome and appreciate them.

Regards

Marc

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