elec boiler vs new gas pipe?

[kevplumb]

exept thatcher and her hit man closed all the pits

 

[bengasman]

Ah well, we'll have to accept leccie is dearer then gas I suppose.

 

[SimonH2]

ask a simple man - who`s not Gas Safe registered - get a simple answer

Who you calling simple And what's being an RGI got to do with it ? It could be argued that an RGI has a vested interest in someone going gas !

If they burn gas to produce electricity - how can electricity be a cheaper fuel

I never suggested electricity was cheaper than gas as a fuel. What I did say is that there is a lot more than just the cost of a unit of heat to consider.

If you were going to save (say) £500/year in fuel costs, but it would cost £5000 to switch fuels then that would be a 10 year payback assuming the cost difference in the fuels doesn't reduce. For many people that wouldn't be a sensible investment.

On the other hand, if you're looking at (say) £2000/year saving on fuel, but it's going to cost (say) £3000 to switch, then that's an 18 month payback and few would argue against it.

If there isn't already gas installed, then there's the cost of the boiler and plumbing on top of the service installation. I'm assuming that since the guy is asking the question then there isn't already gas installed, so presumably there is something else already installed. As someone else suggested, an air-source heat pump may be another option, as could thermal solar, along with a long list of other options.

I would suggest the OP needs to fill in some of the blanks, because only he knows what size of property, what the heating demand is, how much hot water he (and family ?) gets through, whether he has somewhere convenient for a gas boiler, etc, etc, etc - and of course, what is already installed. I can understand why (I know the difference in fuel costs), but some people seem exceeding clearcut in their advice to go gas when they seem to have little knowledge of the OPs situation - or have you guys found a source of working crystal balls, I've been looking for years and not found one

 

[Servotech]

I have never understood the point of electic boilers.
Why would you generate heat electrically at one point, and then use pipes to move that heat to a radiator when you can simply stick an electric heater half the size of the rad on the wall at a fraction of the cost?

It's all down to fuel efficency, I would think.
You are only using the one electrical element from which the whole household heating and hot water demand is satisfied. Granted it is via a secondary wet source.
It would be very expensive in running cost to have separate electrical elements in each room in the houseand and then another for the hot water.


And did someone mention ASHP?
No,don't go there!
These things are a disaster!
Expensive to install.
Expensive to run.
Take ages to warm up..
Extremely noisey.
Systems are very prone to faults.
If going for electric nearly all my customers are satisfied with the Aztec boiler (which must say something) whilst hardly any are satisfied with a ASHP).
Servotech,

 

[SimonH2]

It's all down to fuel efficency, I would think.

Doubt it ! Losses in a cable to a point of use heater would be way lower than in a load of pipes unless incredibly well lagged.

You are only using the one electrical element from which the whole household heating and hot water demand is satisfied. Granted it is via a secondary wet source.
It would be very expensive to have separate electrical elements for each room in the houseand and another for the hot water.

It used to be common (remember night storage heating ?) Overall I'd say it's both cheaper and easier to bung in a bit of relatively small and flexible cable than to install all the equivalent plumbing.

IIRC I've even seen 'immersion heaters' to fit in the bottom of standard wet radiators and convert them to electric.

And did someone mention ASHP?
No,don't go there!
These things are a disaster!
Expensive to install.

Really, didn't seem that bad to me - yes it's another option I have looked at. Not as cheap as a gas boiler, but horrendously expensive either.

Expensive to run.

Based on what calculations ? You'll be lucky to match gas at current prices, but for a lot of the time it'll be fairly close. CoP for these is typically 3 to 4 until the air temperature gets very low, which means about 1/3 to 1/4 the cost of the equivalent amount of direct electric heating. I was a bit concerned when I looked at them to see how the capacity and CoP dropped off at low air temps, eventually reaching about unity CoP - but admittedly we don't tend to get -15˚C all that often in this country. Trouble is, it's when it's -15˚ outside that you really need the heat.

Take ages to warm up..

I'd wager that's because the units are generally significantly undersized compared to a gas boiler installation. Since the cost rises quite considerably with capacity, people are going to be doing calculations to see what they need - rather than guestimating it and then doubling the guestimate before getting the next size up gas boiler.
I suspect the answer to both of these is storage - ie heat up a cylinder during the day when the air is warmest so you don't need to run the unit when it's very cold at night. But that adds further to the cost.

Extremely noisey.

That was one of my concerns. I know good A/C units can be 'fairly quiet', but late at night and early morning, even 'fairly quiet' can be quite obtrusive. Mechanical vibration can also travel well through structures - so I'd never consider bolting one on the house wall.

Systems are very prone to faults.

Just like gas boilers then

I can see they have their applications - especially if you don't have mains gas. More efficient than direct electric heating (up to a CoP of 4 under good conditions), but as you point out, have some downsides (including the need for A/C people to service them).

I've a customer who's had to shut down some of his servers because the A/C (which is just a heat pump) in his server room has packed in. Now as it happens, I was on site with my manager a few weeks ago and reported it as not working, but it took until yesterday for our customer to persuade their service people that yes, the unit really is faulty and no it's not the "wrong sort of room". Actually, they were only persuaded when our customer got us to contact the suppliers engineering people who agreed that the service techs story didn't sound right, and if the system ran properly all last summer then perhaps it is big enough. But I really am not joking, the excuse given for the unit not cooling the room was that it's the wrong sort of room - though expressed as "you've no chance of cooling this room without adding insulation" which it already has.

Turns out to be a stuck reversing valve and he's had to order parts.

 

[Corgigrouch]

Not too sure what Servotec has been looking at but I'd be very surprised if it was air to air....

Fitted hundreds of minisplits myself and they are very quiet, very reliable (Provided that you fit a decent quality unit) and will warm a room very quickly indeed.. Both my livingroom and bedroom will warm within a few minutes... In the main they will achieve their COPs but obviously as temperatures fall so will the COP and hence a 5kW unit will not be a 5kW unit in the winter.... Something that many installers forget.... Size them properly and the customer will be delighted.... Get them wrong and the customer will be most unhappy.... Even this winter my living room was a nice comfortable 25c even though the efficiency was poor for a few days.

Room air conditioners are not designed to be used to cool server rooms though it is not uncommon that they are

 

[SimonH2]

Room air conditioners are not designed to be used to cool server rooms though it is not uncommon that they are

I know, but before this was fitted I took great care to make the supplier guarantee that it was suitable for the dry heat environment which is what usually stops "comfort" units working in server rooms (they freeze up). It wasn't my choice, it was a customer having a new building fitted out and it was the make being used elsewhere by the developer.

My preference was for no active cooling at all, just air changes which is what we have in our own server room. Minimal running costs, reliable, and in our climate just as effective.
Unfortunately planning restrictions (it's part of a farm conversion and the house is a listed building) prevented us putting large grills on the easy side of the building though ducting to another side wouldn't have been hard. But as it not uncommon, the developer had no imagination and they just went with the easy (and IMO most expensive) option. I reckon they'll be paying about it's installation cost in electricity every 3-4 years, a couple of fans and some ducting would have been cheaper in the first place, and saved them a fair chunk in running costs as well - not to mention being much easier to maintain.

 

[Servotech]

Cutting through all that technical COP talk and moving onto the practical realalities -:

An ASHP customer on Friday told me that the bill for the last quarter for heating her small bungalow via a ASHP was over £400!!
I know it's down to how much money you earn or that you've got, but that's not cheap to me either!
Then add the fact that the radiators take hours to warm up and don't even start to work until the H/W demand is satisfied hence leaving the customers house perishingly cold for long periods of time.

Servotech,

 

[Corgigrouch]

Ah! Servotech... I'm talking air to air not air to water.. Even I'm not convinced of the benefits of air to water.

 

[bengasman]

It's all down to fuel efficency, I would think.

A leccie boiler is more expensive to run than a leccie space heater.

It would be very expensive in running cost to have separate electrical elements in each room in the houseand and then another for the hot water.

Why would 10 elements of 1 kW be more expensive than 1 of 10kW?

If going for electric nearly all my customers are satisfied with the Aztec boiler (which must say something) whilst hardly any are satisfied with a ASHP).

What are they unhappy with? Is that a system problem or due to installer?

 

[SimonH2]

Cutting through all that technical COP talk and moving onto the practical realalities -:

An ASHP customer on Friday told me that the bill for the last quarter for heating her small bungalow via a ASHP was over £400!!
I know it's down to how much money you earn or that you've got, but that's not cheap to me either!
Then add the fact that the radiators take hours to warm up and don't even start to work until the H/W demand is satisfied hence leaving the customers house perishingly cold for long periods of time.

Which proves that Servotech is a plumber (using it in the derogatory sense of the word). Looking at his other posts he does give the impression of having 35 years experience of doing much the same and avoiding looking outside the familiar small box.

That post roughly translates into :
A customer has a poorly specified system, badly designed/incorrectly installed, and it doesn't work very well. Therefore, by completely ignoring design faults specific to that installation, ALL ASHPs are rubbish.

By that logic, because some people have poorly specced and badly designed/installed gas fired heating systems, all gas boilers are rubbish.

As to whether £400/qtr is too high, well I can't really comment on that. But a quick look in my file shows that a one bedroomed flat has been using (on average, over 6 years) about £150/qtr at current prices. That's average - winter will be a lot higher, summer a lot lower. That's a flat without a cold roof, cold floor, or four cold walls. I'd expect a bungalow to be considerably worse as it's possibly the worst shape to make a dwelling - maximum outside area/living space. Is it well insulated BTW ?
Given that no-one has actually claimed even an ASHP will be cheaper than or even match gas for running costs*, I'd suggest those running costs aren't necessarily bad.

As to the system, it sounds like the unit is under sized (that would account for the slow warm up) and the controls haven't been well thought out (priority to DHW rather than rads or split).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not commenting on whether an ASHP was or wasn't a suitable choice for this lady, just that the conclusion that ASHPs are rubbish because this one isn't "right" is just plain wrong.

* It would have to run at a CoP of about 4 to match gas for cost. It'll be considerably less in very cold weather when it's doing the most work.

 

[bengasman]

the radiators take hours to warm up and don't even start to work until the H/W demand is satisfied hence leaving the customers house perishingly cold for long periods of time.

Of course it does. The old fashioned system of adding 3 kW for dhw and then size the boiler on that is totally outdated, and creates that problem on cylinders with 20 kW absorbtion.
Independent timer properly set properly solves that problem once and for all.

 

[Nige F]

ask a simple man - who`s not Gas Safe registered - get a simple answer

Who you calling simple And what's being an RGI got to do with it ? It could be argued that an RGI has a vested interest in someone going gas !

If they burn gas to produce electricity - how can electricity be a cheaper fuel

:

I am refering to myself as a simple non Gas Safe man - therefore I give a simple answer Simple does not mean stupid

 

[Nige F]

exept thatcher and her hit man closed all the pits

Indeed, and well said , Kev .

 

[SimonH2]

exept thatcher and her hit man closed all the pits

Indeed, and well said , Kev .

While it's getting very much off-topic ...

An alternative view is that Arthur Scargill did that, and Thatcher took the view that the government should dictate policy rather than a militant union.

Obviously, your view will be largely dictated by your politics, but my take on it is that Scargill was a hard line militant and not open to any compromise at all. He'd previously and successfully made the government cave it, but Maggie wasn't in for a repeat. The timing of the dispute was clearly engineered by the government so that the miners (if they stuck to the hard line of no compromise) would go out on strike before summer when stocks were already plentiful and demand low. Thus they would need to be out for a long time before the lights went out, unlike the previous time (I was at school at the time, and I recall the rolling blackout timetable in the Electricty Board Shop window !).

I think that had the NUM had more moderate leadership then things would have turned out very differently. But don't forget that we were, as now, facing cheap coal from places like Poland - so without subsidies the pits weren't all going to stay open anyway.