mi_buena Posted June 13, 2011 Share Posted June 13, 2011 Hello, everyone, I am currently not a resident in France, but I have a question which I hope will find suitable answers from here. I saw that there are topics, concerning water heaters, so I hope there will be people willing to answer a few questions, concerning them.I am a marketing student at university and I am currently writing a course-paper, describing a particular market of products in the European countries. I decided to explore the electric water heater market. I have been searching for information about France in the past 2 days, but I keep running into quite misleading information which I can't really assimilate. So in order to make sure that I get the things right that I don't write untrue things in my course paper I decided to ask people who really live there in order to clarify the situation for me.First of all, I would like to ask you to what extent are the electric water heaters used by French households for heating water? Is using electric water heaters really popular in France or most people use gas and other means already? I need to know this, because according to a statistics I read only 40% of french residents are connected to the gas network.Secondly, while looking at different web-sites selling water heaters I noticed that the prices are quite high - on average 400-500 euro per heater and secondly - there are only french producers in the web-sites. How do the producers manage to keep these high prices? And are there really no foreign trade marks of electric heaters offered on the French technology market? Does the government provide any special stimuly to stimulate French producers of heaters or anything else that puts foreign producers away? I am asking because I didn't see neither Ariston, nor Gorenje which are so common in Europe.You will help me very much if you provide me with some information about that. I would really like to write my course paper with suitable information in it. :)Merci beaucoup! :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Val_2 Posted June 13, 2011 Share Posted June 13, 2011 Gaz de ville is only available in the larger towns and cities which only leaves either liquid gas, oil powered boilers or electric for heating water here. We fit a lot of electric chauffe-eau units and these cost from €300 upwards for a decent guaranteed unit complete with groupe de securité and stand. If you have an electric chauffe-eau you can benefit from the heures creuses from EDF which in my own case is from 21.30 - 05.30 when our heater starts up for the next day's supply and we do our washing and use the dish washer etc. There are very cheap water heaters out there in the brico sheds and one client had one fitted which only cost €60 complete and lasted all of five days before the weight of the water caused the base to split open and the continual feed of water from the mains direct flooded his kitchen where the person who installed it placed the unit - this is how he became a client because we went out and replaced the unit with a proper decent one so there is this side to the market also. I'm sure other artisans will post info, but around here in the countryside it is the most commonly used form of heating water as a lot of people do not want a huge gaz container in the garden nor do they have the money spare to buy a large space taking boiler. However solar panels are really taking off now so there are those as well for heating the water etc but again a large initial outlay is required even with help from HEOL etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gardian Posted June 13, 2011 Share Posted June 13, 2011 [quote user="mi_buena"]First of all, I would like to ask you to what extent are the electric water heaters used by French households for heating water? Is using electric water heaters really popular in France or most people use gas and other means already? I need to know this, because according to a statistics I read only 40% of french residents are connected to the gas network.Secondly, while looking at different web-sites selling water heaters I noticed that the prices are quite high - on average 400-500 euro per heater and secondly - there are only french producers in the web-sites. How do the producers manage to keep these high prices? And are there really no foreign trade marks of electric heaters offered on the French technology market? Does the government provide any special stimuly to stimulate French producers of heaters or anything else that puts foreign producers away? I am asking because I didn't see neither Ariston, nor Gorenje which are so common in Europe.[/quote]Q1 - We and our two closest neighbours use a chauffe eau - BTW, the other 8 on our 'estate' will too, because there's no mains gas.Q2 - Our ballon had to be replaced last Autumn - €210 ttc for the tank + about the same for labour (there was some rectifying plumbing needed). Can't help with your other questions - sorry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quillan Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 We bought our electric water heaters and they didn't cost anywhere near that amount. The link below gives some idea of how much you will pay, we paid around the 200 Euros mark.http://www.bricodepot.fr/carcassonne/chauffage-production-deau-chaude/chauffe-eau/chauffe-eau-electriques Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pachapapa Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 [quote user="Quillan"]We bought our electric water heaters and they didn't cost anywhere near that amount. The link below gives some idea of how much you will pay, we paid around the 200 Euros mark.http://www.bricodepot.fr/carcassonne/chauffage-production-deau-chaude/chauffe-eau/chauffe-eau-electriques [/quote]I bought one of these ror € 30 locally off the "bon coin"http://www.bricodepot.fr/carcassonne/node/479341Works OK but it has poor insulation and cools down quickly.I have adopted a simùple policy to minimise energy loss.Switch on before breakfast; switch off after washing up.Idem lunch and supper.[I] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mi_buena Posted June 14, 2011 Author Share Posted June 14, 2011 Thank you very much for your answers! This helped to achieve a much clearer picture about the situation. :) If it doesn't disturb you, there is one more question I would like to ask, namely about the district heating and central heating of water. Is it popular in France or is it currently like the gas network - predominantly in the big cities? Skimming through the internet I ran into this web-site of the Fedene federation. As far as I can see the central heating produces 60% from the heat for the population or maybe I am wrong? "60 % de la chaleur produite pour le secteur de l’habitat." http://www.fedene.fr/content/reseaux-de-chaleur-et-de-froid/presentation-des-reseaux-de-chaleur-et-de-froid I would be very grateful if someone helps me into this last issue. :) P.S. I am not a French speaker, so I would appreciate help on this web-site. :)Greetings! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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