# Gas bills



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

Background is had a new Vaillant EcoTec Plus 832 combi boiler fitted March 2020. Before that had an ancient floor standing Baxi and hot water tank. Live in a 3 bed semi detached Victorian property. We have the usual double height ceilings, a cellar, partial double glazing, plenty of insulation in the loft, draft strips etc on doors, full length double lined curtains etc so as good as can get it without full on overhaul say on windows and not all that keen on cavity wall insulation this type of property wasn't built with that in mind. All rads (8 of them some are big double doubles) are fairly new and all have TRVs on.

New gas meter went in October 2020.

Have dug out some old reads from when old meter and boiler were in.

Between 09/12/18 and 05/10/20 used 5702 m3 of gas. Call that 65,000 kWH in round figures for 22 months so let's say 35,500 kWH on average for 12 months use.

Between 05/10/20 and now have used 33,140 kWH, so a slight improvement for sure new v old but still, when I'm reading average use is 17,00 kWH and that's for 5+ bedrooms something seems drastically wrong to me?

I know average is dangerous to compare with as what is average and it's going to include super insulated new builds etc but still to be double?!?

Have the heating timed to come on for about 8 hrs a day at the moment spread morning, early afternoon and evening. Outside temperatures are around 5-10 degrees last few weeks. It's set to heat to 18 degrees and the set back temp when off is set to 16 in line with what I read is meant to be optimum temperatures. I'm sat layered up, hands cold and wearing a hat as I type . Let's put it this way before bed sometimes the temp will show say 15.5 so I drop the set back temp to 15. On some night the heating must come on during the night to keep hovering around 15.

The meter is not spinning when the boiler isn't firing so confident no leak to the meter. I don't think there's a leak beyond the meter but guess it's a possibility. Boiler has had a service and nothing was flagged.

I've put the thermostat to max from 16 degrees earlier in the week for exactly 1 hr my thinking being it will get the boiler to run at max to see the most gas it will burn over that period and it ran 2m3 so call it 23 kWH rounding up. If that is correct and say running 8 hrs a day for 13 weeks of the year that would get me to nearly 17,000 kWH just for that period. On that basis it would be easy to see how and why I get to 33,000+ kWH a year.

Does 2m3 an hour sound about right at full pelt?

I'm starting to get very worried about what bills will look like lost price cap increase, bad enough now. It's going to be north of £300 a month I reckon which is just crazy, we don't live in Buckingham Palace.

Oh and just for comparison we use 5,000kWH of electricity but that's running an electric oven, ceramic job, tumble dryer and even a hot tub in the summer. The only thing the gas is doing is the central heating and water and we shower most of the time so can't blame frequent baths!

It's times like this I think moving from a 2 bed flat was a mistake


----------



## GeeWhizRS (Nov 1, 2019)

3 bed semi here and I work at home most days so the heating is on most of the time. We have it on about 17C overnight. Aug20 - Jul21 was 19,400kwh.
Yours sounds damned high. My parents have a large old cottage and I know their bills are crazy high too. Could this be down to lack of insulation?


----------



## garage_dweller (Apr 10, 2018)

Might be worth asking to get your meter checked. We had several engineers came out to replace our meters with smart meters, all said they couldn’t do as the gas inlet gave no space to fit the smart meter. So I was doing monthly readings and sticking them on a spreadsheet. 

All seemed normal until April this year when we started using more gas than we did in any month in winter, thought it was odd so tracked it over a few months and was still high. Called our supplier and asked for a meter check which involves sending the meter away to be tested. I said about the gas meter issue, guy came out said ‘ah luckily I’ve done one if these before’ so fitted both smart meters. 

8 weeks later got a call to say meter was indeed faulty and went from owing £460 to £40 after the supplier adjusted the figures. 

So worth getting it checked although there’s a £60 charge if the meter is okay. 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## dholdi (Oct 1, 2008)

MDC250 said:


> Does 2m3 an hour sound about right at full pelt?


Max Gas flow rate is 3.4m2/h.


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

GeeWhizRS said:


> 3 bed semi here and I work at home most days so the heating is on most of the time. We have it on about 17C overnight. Aug20 - Jul21 was 19,400kwh.
> Yours sounds damned high. My parents have a large old cottage and I know their bills are crazy high too. Could this be down to lack of insulation?


Possibly, Victorian property isn't well known for being airtight as anybody who has one will attest to.

Cavity wall construction and rendered on the outside. All internal walls have thick plaster. Floors are wooden laminate but have underlay boards over the floorboards. We have rugs and runners down. Carpet on stairs and bedrooms. I've even taken to using insulation up the fireplaces to stop cold air coming down and warm air rising out. If it was me I'd happily drop a liner down the chimney and run a fire, would heat the gable end of the house at least, but the Mrs is adamant no fires. I'd say half the windows are double glazed and if I've got any draughty spots they are sealed up. We have an outer door on the vestibule.

I'm struggling to see the quick wins. Dead against cavity wall insulation think they cause more issues than they solve in older property. Whenever it snows or icy it doesn't melt quickly on the roof so happy the amount of insulation I've got up there is OK or thereabouts.

It seems to take about an hour to heat up 1 degree and seems to loose heat around the same rate maybe a bit slower than that depending on outside temp. Rads get super hot to the touch and confident as I can be that the system itself is running efficiently as in no build up etc it's just the actual usage. Can a boiler draw more gas than it burns?!?


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

dholdi said:


> Max Gas flow rate is 3.4m2/h.


So that doesn't sound like it's my issue at 2 m3 an hour it looks to be right.

I guess a heating engineer could monitor what's going through the boiler and if any disparity?


----------



## Coops (Apr 26, 2008)

Just checked my bills for you as a (kind of) comparison - we're in a 4 bed detached, 9 years old so relatively new vs yours:

9 June 2020 -> 18 Dec 2020 : 5,459 kwh
19 Dec 2020 -> 29 Mar 2021 : 6,686 kwh
30 Mar 2021 -> 11 June 2021 : 2,283 kwh

Total 12 month usage = 14,428 kwh

That's includes a good proportion of me working from home over the winter months so heating on all the time etc.


----------



## dholdi (Oct 1, 2008)

MDC250 said:


> I guess a heating engineer could monitor what's going through the boiler and if any disparity?


A Gas Safe engineer could rate the appliance, but they would use the meter to do this.
The process would be to force the boiler to run at max fire for usually 2 minutes and take a meter read at start and finish. 
This reading x 30 would be the rate per hour.
If the above is significantly different from the manufacturers data then there is an issue with the meter.
Presuming of course there isn't a massive leak or next door is tapped off your meter


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

dholdi said:


> Presuming of course there isn't a massive leak or next door is tapped off your meter


We do have shared water supply with the neighbour believe it or not. They are supplied from ours; it's on lead pipe that goes through a hole in the cellar wall, so just don't want to go there. I can well imagine it's lead from the supply on the road to the house then it goes copper when it hits the inside of my house. That goes to a run of lead pipe that the also junctions off to the neighbour. On my my side it goes back to copper.

It's hard to even compare with neighbours, he's an old chap next door and he keeps his house as well as he can but there are holes in his front window and yet he didn't seem too perturbed by his bills which he said were less than mine without revealing what his were. Neighbour other side has air con as main heating and cooling and occasional log burner session (with unseasoned logs, don't get me started it's like smoke cover for an invasion when they fire it up).

Hoping I can get hold of the engineer who serviced the boiler to see if he can figure what if anything is going on.


----------



## stevie boy (Jun 11, 2008)

Our house is a 3bed semi built 1952 used 13650kwh of gas per year give or take. Heating on 2.5 hours in the morning and 6hours at night. At the weekend on 14 hours a day with the stat set to 20.c It helps with the rear of the house is south facing.


----------



## Trix (Jul 1, 2006)

We have a 1930's end terrace 3 bedroom.. So no cavity walls solid brick.. The loft is insulated fairly well.. Double glazing windows are old so could do with being replaced.

At home all day but heating goes off around 10.30-11pm

One years gas (last year) total usage 15465 kwh 

Have you checked your humidity? a damp house will take more to heat.


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

No, not checked humidity but don’t think it’s damp, too much airflow for one! One thing Victorian properties don’t generally suffer with is mould and damp as nothing stands still in these houses long enough. 

Outside temp right now is 9 degrees, heating went off at 9am and was at 18 degrees, thermostat is showing 17 degrees so 1 degree heat loss in 3 hours doesn’t seem excessive. 

It’s always going to less efficient than a more modern property as there’s a reason newer buildings don’t have say 11 foot high ceilings.


----------



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

I'd love to help but our supplier went bust and now can't access the meter readings.

Heating is on all day and set to like 21 at night time due to baby and I don't think ours come close to yours, it is a modern new build though but we have issues with heatloss when it's windy.


----------



## Teamleader 21 (May 7, 2019)

Where is the thermostat placed? Its temperature readings could vary in different areas of the house.


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

Teamleader 21 said:


> Where is the thermostat placed? Its temperature readings could vary in different areas of the house.


Right now it's in the kitchen but sometimes will move it to the lounge, combined wireless thermostat and control.


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

Starbuck88 said:


> I'd love to help but our supplier went bust and now can't access the meter readings.
> 
> Heating is on all day and set to like 21 at night time due to baby and I don't think ours come close to yours, it is a modern new build though but we have issues with heatloss when it's windy.


TBF if heating was on all the time and the house was toasty I'd say to myself well what do you expect. But it's 18 degrees when the heating is on and it's on for 8 hrs so not going mad 

The other thing that gets me is how little difference in relative terms a brand new combi boiler has made v a prehistoric floor standing boiler that used to heat a water tank to boot. I was genuinely expecting the new boiler to smash the old one in terms of efficiency and in reality even though the old one probably lost 25-40% it's not far off the supposed all singing all dancing Vaillant.

I might trial a few days of 20/21 degrees when on and then put the set back temperature to 18. I can see quite a few kWh being used though


----------



## Andy from Sandy (May 6, 2011)

> The other thing that gets me is how little difference in relative terms a brand new combi boiler has made v a prehistoric floor standing boiler that used to heat a water tank to boot.


The guy who serviced my 25 year old boiler made a similar comment. His checks confirmed how well the boiler was doing. If I paid £2000 pounds for a new one just for the sake of changing it I may never see enough savings to pay for itself.


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

Andy from Sandy said:


> The guy who serviced my 25 year old boiler made a similar comment. His checks confirmed how well the boiler was doing. If I paid £2000 pounds for a new one just for the sake of changing it I may never see enough savings to pay for itself.


Very little to go wrong with an old school boiler to boot, no boards etc.

We were in a bind at the time, the hot water tank sprung a leak and couldn't be patched/fixed. Was just around the 1st lockdown so did well to get a heating engineer to swap the boiler out.


----------



## spursfan (Aug 4, 2009)

My brother says he has a saucer of water outside the back and front door, when they freeze he turns the heating on!!
believe me when i say he is tight, he even takes wine bottles back with him after we have finished our summer barby!!


----------



## dholdi (Oct 1, 2008)

Unsurprisingly, a condensing boiler is at its most efficient when it is condensing.
It cant do that if its blasting 80 deg/c round old rads.
Its got a chance if its doing 50 ish around underfloor or lst rads.


----------



## AndyN01 (Feb 16, 2016)

I, too, live in an old house, just coming up to its 182nd birthday 

Do you have solid walls, like us?

If so, all you're doing is heating up the structure for a few hours, letting it cool and then heating it up again. The heat isn't getting into the rooms, it's going straight into the walls.

It takes 3 days for our house to come up to temperature with the heating running 24 hours a day. 

We then run it 24 hours a day, set low, until it's turned off in the spring.

Modern controls work with modern, insulated homes. Old homes don't work like that.

Any open chimneys are blocked up with a cushion/pillow and the other thing is to make sure all the rooms are heated. Any that aren't just draw the heat to them.

Sounds daft, but it's the most efficient for us.

Hope that helps.

Andy.


----------



## Nidge76 (Sep 16, 2016)

We live in a 1960s ex council semi detached. In the last 2 years we've had new double glazing, a new boiler, new radiators and the digital smart rad valves.

We use just over 10000 kWh per year.

I'm quite careful about what I use but my wife just says I'm tight. 

Sent from my moto e(6) plus using Tapatalk


----------



## MDC250 (Jan 4, 2014)

AndyN01 said:


> I, too, live in an old house, just coming up to its 182nd birthday
> 
> Do you have solid walls, like us?
> 
> ...


No, double brick cavity wall with Tyrollean Render on the outside (not our choice was on when we bought the house).

Chimneys are either capped and/or have air pillows stuffed up them.

One thing I might try is insulating film on windows some are lead light etc.


----------



## init6 (Mar 28, 2012)

We have an Edwardian 4 bed semi, 13' ceilings, two rooms in the loft and our gas is about 17000kW pa. 
You're right about the houses not being draught proof, so there is always something that can be done to make them less draughty. The big one for me though is double glazing. The amount of heat you'll be losing on any windows that are not double glazed will be quite substantial. The film stuff is good for short term use and easy to install.
We got a new boiler a couple of years ago and stuck with the traditional boiler and water tank. This was recommended by the installer as we have something like 14 radiators. 
These big old houses take ages to warm up so we start our evening heating around 3-4pm (depending on season) and have it on until around 10:30. The heat in the walls keeps us warm enough until even I trundle off to bed around midnight. I'd need to time it, but I think it takes a good hour or so to get the house up to temp. I never have the heating running overnight, so maybe one to watch out for if your heating is coming on then.

Oh, nearly forgot about my favourite winter pastime - shutting doors when people leave rooms. Otherwise the heat just goes straight up and out of the house!


----------

