This 2025 ban on gas boilers in new builds.....

[oz-plumber]

Slightly off topic.

Last year I quoted a job for a facility that was going to be 'Green'.
UFH, fan coils and domestic hot water.
All solar tubes on the roof with hot water stored in buffer tanks
The whole system was to be backed up by a 35 kW boiler.

After a few meetings regarding 'Cost Reduction', the outcome was to use the 35 kW boiler for heating and Rinnai gas instantaneous hot water units for domestic hot water.

Saved the Council well over 100 k.
Until so-called 'Green Energy, becomes affordable, then it will be only available to Governments and wealthy people.

As far as I am concerned, with the cost of 'Green Energy' and the lifetime expectancy of the Green Products, you will never receive a financial benefit ( re-coup your initial costs ) from the Green products installed.

 

[Rob Foster]

Slightly off topic.

Last year I quoted a job for a facility that was going to be 'Green'.
UFH, fan coils and domestic hot water.
All solar tubes on the roof with hot water stored in buffer tanks
The whole system was to be backed up by a 35 kW boiler.

After a few meetings regarding 'Cost Reduction', the outcome was to use the 35 kW boiler for heating and Rinnai gas instantaneous hot water units for domestic hot water.

Saved the Council well over 100 k.
Until so-called 'Green Energy, becomes affordable, then it will be only available to Governments and wealthy people.

As far as I am concerned, with the cost of 'Green Energy' and the lifetime expectancy of the Green Products, you will never receive a financial benefit ( re-coup your initial costs ) from the Green products installed.

I agree with you. However it will happen as with solar voltaics with the none adopters paying a levy...hidden...to subsidise the adopters. The neighbour without the panels paying the neighbour opposite
to save money ! centralheatking

 

[Welder]

Perhaps what we need is to remove commerce from the equation? For example, a number of govts get together to design & build their own kit which is then sold on to consumers at cost plus.

Not only would the tech march forward but take up would improve 10-100 fold.

 

[Pickwickpick]

Perhaps what we need is to remove commerce from the equation? For example, a number of govts get together to design & build their own kit which is then sold on to consumers at cost plus.

Not only would the tech march forward but take up would improve 10-100 fold.

Couldn't agree more, leaving the solving problems of this scale "to the market" will never work imo, there's a reason the Chinese are currently flying ahead of us on this front.

 

[Welder]

Couldn't agree more, leaving the solving problems of this scale "to the market" will never work imo, there's a reason the Chinese are currently flying ahead of us on this front.

Seems to me that the far from 'free market' is the root cause of just about all of our problems. The greedy, the manipulative, the self interested control just about all of it but have the naked audacity to tell us we do. #TakinThePiss

 

[Pickwickpick]

Seems to me that the far from 'free market' is the root cause of just about all of our problems. The greedy, the manipulative, the self interested control just about all of it but have the naked audacity to tell us we do. #TakinThePiss

Yep and its a system that rewards the worst sides of human to the detriment of its good sides a world of spivery!

 

[gmartine]

China have already started reducing their pollution - although no one reports it. They aim to be THE least polluting industrial nation on the planet. They are not messing around either. The measures put in place will close many businesses OR everything WE buy, as its all made there, will very soon go up considerably in price.

Unlike here, no business in China will be given a choice, or be able to opt out, or do BS things like carbon offset. When they do somethng they do it properly not just fanny about around the edges.

Worries over China coal power boom

 

[hammers4spanner]

Worries over China coal power boom

They are also increasing their use of oil to a record high

 

[OffshoreGas]

No way in the world will hydrogen ever become a fuel in domestic dwellings.

Natural gas has a lower explosive limit of about 5% and upper explosive limit of 17%. Hydrogen on the other hand

Hydrogen on the other hand has a LEL of about 3% and UEL of about 75%.

Even most politicians surely can understand how much more dangerous it is?

 

[OffshoreGas]

Makes total sense, we have a gas national grid which is worth billions, why on earth literally devalue it to nothing, whilst increasing the strain on the electricity grid requiring shed loads of investment!

Hydrogen is a win win, a) current gas engineers wouldn't loose their jobs and would just need some extra training b) if we use renewables as electricity source for hydrogen generation, it can be used to smooth out the renewables supply peaks & troughs, must be cheaper to store hydrogen than buy loads of batteries! c) its more effective than heat source pumps imo in most real life uk situations d) it helps reduce strain on electricity grid e) we still have a valuable gas national grid...

Hydrogen is a terrible idea, for one it’s explosive in almost any concentration.

Secondly it’s very difficult to seal, hydrogen molecules are tiny compared to methane.

Thirdly if it does catch fire it’s all but invisible which makes it more dangerous and difficult to fight fires.

Forth putting in a whole new gas network would be cost prohibitive, you’d have to use existing system. If you use the existing distribution system all consumers would have to move to H as a fuel and not CH4.

A lot of infrastructure/hardware would need to be replaced. Valves designed to seal methane may not seal provide a tight shutoff for hydrogen.

The caloric value of hydrogen is 4 times that of methane. You’d need to change size of jets etc.

Appliances are CE tested/type approved with methane, would we redo all that work?

 

[Millsy 82]

Didn't they try and stop gas from being used in new builds a few years ago. Builders complained that the cost of fitting renewables meant they couldn't build affordable homes so government relaxed it.

Not that it makes much difference the amount of building going on around me the building trade will die. There has been no forethought just chuck up houses most of which are poor quality and not think of the future. Newquay has almost doubled in size because of 3/4 new housing estates but people can't afford the houses as there are very few jobs around.

 

[PETE 123]

They will allow gas but make some type of tax up.

 

[Ryooo]

Our renewable energy policies are a joke. I was employed as biomass sales engineer between 2013 to 2014 just when the renewable heat incentive was really beginning to take off. Farmers were being told to heat up sheds and they would be paid for it. Not by me, i might add. Does anyone know the scale of this issue and how many are locked into the scheme for 20 years?? If you don't you will be shocked. I could write a book about it.

Farmer with grain drier and large family home installs a 200 kw biomass boiler for say £120,000. He gets a paid on the non domistic tariff of 8.2 p per kW for 1314hrs per year. These agreed times were supposed to go your average hours of heating per year. 3hours in summer, 6 in winter.

Sum 8.2 x 1314 = £10,778 per year for 20 years!!! It's rpi linked and can't remember if it was taxable income. No brainer if you've got the capital to do it.

Renewable technologies are far more expensive to builders to build into their pricing structure. I like the idea of district heating systens that is common in Denmark. The fuel in which they burn I'm not sure of though.

One thing i would like to stop is the richer getting richers from incentives that are not for there benefit but our childrens, children benefit. Rant over.