Worried about Elderly Mum's Gas Usage

[Gareth Peters]

Hi All,
Really not sure if this is the right place to post this but I'm in a bit of a mess with my mum's energy supplier and I'm desperate for someone who knows what they're talking about to help.

End of last October my mum rented a two up- two down semi detached relatively modern house (decently double glazed and insulated) near me. Everything in the property is electric apart from the central heating boiler which is quite old (it's a Stelrad Ideal W 2000).

The energy company, Spark energy started her direct debits off at £65 a month. At the time I thought this was maybe a little high and figured we would get it down a bit once we had some meter readings.

Last week Spark wrote to her saying that the direct debit was going up to £95 a month at which point I went through the bills with a fine tooth comb.
Anyway, to cut a long story a little short, I've calculated that in the 138 days mum's been at the property (admittedly over winter) according to the meter reads she's used 671 cubic metres of gas or 7,506 kwh which works out at 54.3 kwh per day average.

My question is this, does this seem like high usage given that she only has a single thermostatically controlled boiler?

Any help greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance.

 

[CHRISX]

Hello All,

Without wanting to start arguments some of the comments on calculating the Gas consumption of the OP`s Mum`s Boiler would not produce accurate results.

We must remember that during very cold weather the initial `Heat Up Period` of the first daily use of the Heating / Boiler would probably be close to the Maximum Gas Rate especially if the first hour also included heating the Hot Water Cylinder - but after that the Hourly Gas consumption should be nothing like that.

The hourly Gas consumption to maintain the House temperature might only be 33% of the Maximum Gas Rate because the Boiler might only be firing for about 20 minutes per hour if the House is well Insulated and Double glazed and new Thermostat is positioned correctly.

Gareth / the OP has stated that the Room Thermostat is new and seems to be working correctly.

This is obviously a `Guesstimate` as every property is different - but it would not be accurate to just multiply the Maximum Gas Rate by the amount of Hours that the Heating is On for.

When the Hot Water Cylinder is heated again [late afternoon ?] the Gas consumption will obviously increase for that hour [ Cylinder heated for 1 hour morning & afternoon].

However I am pleased that we have now reassured Gareth that although his Mum`s Boiler is `Old & very Inefficient` that the 54.3 kwhrs per Day that he asked about is NOT a surprisingly large daily amount of Heat for an old Boiler supplying the Heating & Hot Water.

Regards,

Chris

 

[quality]

The building fabric heat loss is the biggest

 

[doitmyself]

The building fabric heat loss is the biggest

Not necessarily. It all depend on the ventilation losses.

My house has a fabric loss of 256W/°C and a ventilation loss of 185W/°C per air change. If only one air change is assumed the total loss is 256+ 185 = 441. The fabric loss is 256/441 = 60%. But if there are two air changes the total loss is 256+185+185 = 626 and the fabric loss is 256/626 = 41%.

Modern houses have much lower ventilation losses as they have to meet strict Building Regulations requirements.

 

[Murdoch]

On a tangent as it sounds like the OP is now happy, what is wrong with 'smart' meters in your opinion or experience? I don't really see the need (yet), and have some concerns about the radio frequencies used, but other than that...?

My main gripe is that there is currently no one single standard, so if a user wants to change suppliers, they also have to arrange to get their smart meters changed over .................... things are supposed to be changing but .............. hum, when exactly, and then what about all the units installed? As a spark this is my perception of the ones used by the suppliers

Also they need to be renamed - there is nothing "smart" about these meters .................... all they do is make meter readers redundant.

They can't tell you how much single appliances use, nor if such an appliance is energy efficient. Sure the needle may be in the green, but if all you have on is your aged 500w floodlight is that any surprise..................

And then there is the small matters of reports of them not recording usage accurately

 

[Best]

One big mistake people make when using their heating is to repeatedly turn the heating on for a couple hours, then off a couple, then on again, during each day.
Elderly folk particularly do this, thinking they are saving money.
All this obviously results in is long reheat burn times with much more fuel used and less heat in the property.
I have difficulty trying to explain that to some customers because they see it as if their heating is on at programmer, then fuel is constantly being burned.

 

[CHRISX]

Hello All,

Although Gareth / the OP seems to have been satisfied by our various explanations I would still have liked to know roughly how many Hours that the Heating system was on each Day / Night during the period of Gas usage that he asked about.

Although I worked out that the 54.3 Kw hrs per Day only cost approximately £2.08 per Day at the rate that I pay from British Gas [3.8325p per Kwhr inc. vat] it would have been nice to know the average amount of Hours of Heating that represented.

At least one other Member and I asked about that in our messages.

Gareth - could You please satisfy my / our curiosity and post what was the approximate average amount of Hours per Day that your Mum was using her Heating during the period that you asked about.

Regards,

Chris