gas and the future

[gaspastemania]

Had an interesting convo down the merchants today regarding how over the next ten years the merchants are expecting to sell less in the way of gas appliances and more in renewables energies etc. Now with the price of gas going up and the consumer looking for alternatives at some point or other the gas industry will probably be on the down turn . So where does everyone think this will leave the gas engineer?
In my own experience gas engineers do not make very good plumbers usually because they dont want to do it but some are just useless. The engineer in my opinion only came about mainly because boilers became more complicated but with the industry looking at alternatives is gas still a good career choice and where do you think the gas engineer will stand when if the industry slowly moves back in the direction of solar,air source, ground source and grey water harvesting which in reality is more plumbing than engineering .

 

[Barry98]

i have a calculator so going to re-train as an accountant

2 week course 60k a year

 

[mickie]

it'll leave the gas angineer fitting a alternative

 

[quality]

I only became registered for gas as a need to , because some of the first heat pumps in this country had gas as a back up or oil or LPG But that was in the 80s. 20 odd years on gas is still the mainstream and I think it will be for a good bit more than the next 20 years.40% of my work is ground or air source heat pumps the rest is general gas heating. But I would say 80% of my earnings come from heat pumps.Put another way I can earn more for less from one than the other.

 

[tamz]

Gas will be around longer than i will so i'm not giving much of a fk. Renewables will definately grow to become a very big market but as we all know, being green is not cheap and is beyond the means of many.

 

[mickie]

10 years down the line, i think the price will come down and i'll be more than happy to fit an alternative..

im not too bothered whether a gas engineer can cross that gap, most work on plumbing and heating, bright enough and can work with their hands.. i dont see much of a problem once the price of alternatives comes down everything will be hunky dory..

atleast their is an alternative.. the thing i worry about is when oil runs out, is their much of an alternative to oil ?

 

[quality]

Most of the installs I have worked on (heat pumps) have had nothing what so ever had any connection with being green. That is not what heat pumps are about.
Its newish technology to our country and thats the stand out factor because it nocks spots of LPG or oil or electric heating for running costs .

We of all nations in Europe need heating but the european member states fund this technology like there is no tomorrow (the uk pay some of the highest gas prices in europe).

Unless a new build is specified for a heat pump a retrofit is hard pushed to compete with gas if its available

So the summary is we pay loads for gas and get little help for heat pumps (don`t start with MCS) and there is very little funding for heatpumps and renewables.

I was in Calpe Spain last thur to mon commissioning some equipment all funded by the local authority.

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