Electric central heating

[biffvernon]

Trouble is all energy prices are going north. West Texas Intermediate crude oil went to $117.58 a barrel earlier today, a new all time record. All other energy prices are related to this figure. The UK faces a real problem with electricity supply over the next decade as old plant gets decommissioned faster than new plant is being built. We now use about 400 tera Watt hours per anum. By 2018 the present generating capacity will have dropped to about 300 tWhr pa and the difference has to be made up by new capacity and savings. Much of it will have to be savings whether we want to or not. There are grave doubts about availability of gas as other countries outbid each other for long term contracts for Norwegian gas and the Russians build pipelines to China and India. Our governments (forlorn?) hope is to keep the economy buoyant enough to keep importing oil as North Sea supplies dwindle.

Best spend your money on insulation.

 

[Flyfisher]

While I agree with the gist of Biff's comments I don't believe energy predictions can be simply based on circumstances prevailing today because as existing resources decline, others will become newly economic. For example, the current record price for oil will make hitherto uneconomic resources now worthwhile to exploit. Likewise all the coal resources within the UK currently lying dormant (mostly) below our feet. I also heard today that Australia has been granted the right (not sure by whom!) to extend their national waters and the cited advantage was that they would now encompass significant oil/gas reserves, which they plan to exploit.

Public attitudes will also change in the face of really punitive energy prices; today's decision to reject the Lewis windfarm proposal (for example) was safely taken with little or no risk of it affecting our electricity supplies today - but will that still be true in 20 years time? When really faced with preserving a view or having power cuts, such a decision might easily be reversed. Even the current 'green favourite' of wood burning stoves will start to become impractical if the current tiny proportion of households burning wood increases significantly causing the price of wood to rocket skyward (tree theft anyone?). So, I don't forsee an actual energy shortage in our lifetimes but I expect the price to continue to rise inexorably.

I think Biff is probably right - invest in insulation

 

[FamilyWiggs]

HI wouldn't go for bottled gas as I have enough trouble remembering to order oil (once ran out on Christmas Eve and couldn't cook the turkey the next day!).

The closest I have come to divorce was running out of bottled gas on Christmas day last year in the middle of cooking the turkey !!

Fortunately my wife remained rather calm, and my mother-in-law was well "seasoned" by this time of the day. A quick dash round the neighbourhood found a spare cylinder with some friends.

As a result I now recommend that you "rest" your turkey for 30 minutes mid way through cooking... very tender and moist.

 

[fatsheep]

Hi,
I'm a bit late to this thread but are the electric boilers like the ones glow worm advertise http://www.glow-wormheating.co.uk/index.php not electric central heating in the conventional sense?
I'm sure they may be costly to run but I'm wondering if they may be my only choice.
Grade 2 listed, no gas and the conservation officer is not enthusiastic about allowing an oil tank.

Cheers
David Goff

 

[Lime]

Not using anything to heat your home is the cheapest method.
Big south facing windows, treble glazed throughout with a minimum of half a metre of insulation in walls, roofs and floors would satisfy much of our comfort needs even in this country.
It won't happen though, will it?
There is too much vested interest in selling fuel, heating appliances and everything else to do with consumption.
(In olden times they used animals to heat homes too.)

 

[MdB]

Hi,
I'm a bit late to this thread but are the electric boilers like the ones glow worm advertise http://www.glow-wormheating.co.uk/index.php not electric central heating in the conventional sense?

Unless I'm missing something obvious, all those boilers are gas boilers.The need for a flue gives it away.

 

[biffvernon]

Not using anything to heat your home is the cheapest method.
Big south facing windows, treble glazed throughout with a minimum of half a metre of insulation in walls, roofs and floors would satisfy much of our comfort needs even in this country.
It won't happen though, will it?

Yes, it will happen. We really are going to face a physical fuel shortage - that's not something one can buy one's way out of. If it's not there then the price does not make any difference.

 

[Lime]

Not using anything to heat your home is the cheapest method.
Big south facing windows, treble glazed throughout with a minimum of half a metre of insulation in walls, roofs and floors would satisfy much of our comfort needs even in this country.
It won't happen though, will it?

Yes, it will happen. We really are going to face a physical fuel shortage - that's not something one can buy one's way out of. If it's not there then the price does not make any difference.

Not before the supplies of fossil fuels have been squandered by the richer amongst us and the poor will be the last to benefit if at all.
waste of energy is all around us.
~ Heated shop doorways where most of the heat is allowed to escape into the atmosphere. Double doors or a revolving door would save most of it.
~Heating in "institutional" buildings like schools and hospitals where the heat is high even when the outside temperature is too and usually built so electric lights have to be on all the time.
~Commuting 100s of mile to work by ANY fuel-driven transport.
~Cooling towers at power stations.
~Leaving electrical items on stand by or just left on all the time.
~Cars capable of over 100MPH that spend 99.9% of their time doing less than 20.
~Street lights on all night.

Just a few examples of our profligate waste.

 

[Nemesis]

Lighting on at night in those tower blocks at Canary Wharf...

Street lighting. Why? In rural areas it seems to be some sort of fetish to have it installed now. It was lovely when the one (of two) in our hamlet was broken, and we could have total darkness again.

My neighbour who has an outside light which he burns 24/7.

Other neighbours who have the garden lit up all night.

Why?

 

[Flyfisher]

We really are going to face a physical fuel shortage - that's not something one can buy one's way out of.

Well, eventually, perhaps, but it's a question of timescale isn't it? The world has a few hundred of years worth of coal, the UK alone has many decades worth, then there is all the oil and gas under Alaska, and the Antarctic and probably in other places yet to be found. I appreciate the environmental issues with exploiting such resources, but I really can't imagine them being left in the ground as other resources dwindle.

 

[Flyfisher]

Street lighting. Why? In rural areas it seems to be some sort of fetish to have it installed now. It was lovely when the one (of two) in our hamlet was broken, and we could have total darkness again.

Absolutely; does no one enjoy looking at the stars these days?

 

[Penners]

Street lighting. Why? In rural areas it seems to be some sort of fetish to have it installed now.

Not round us, missis. Wonderfully dark nights, revealing skies that you just never see in towns any more.

Anyone who tries to get my vote for street lights will get a sodium lamp up his wotsit.

 

[sue gazzard]

If anyone's seriously interested in this subject anymore they should take a look at Kalirel thermodynamic fully controllable radiators.

 

[Nemesis]

What keeps this site going really is chatting around and off the subject.

I'm sure that 'serious' applies at times. But if it was all the time I suspect the site would have folded long ago.

 

[shelli]

If anyone's seriously interested in this subject anymore they should take a look at Kalirel thermodynamic fully controllable radiators.

they're the ones i meant earlier - you know - before - when I mentioned radiators that were those ones

cant wait to move to our new place - no streetlights - the big telescope is going in the loft - that is one of the things we have been most looking forward to. on a clear night you can see the Milky Way

 

[MdB]

If anyone's seriously interested in this subject anymore they should take a look at Kalirel thermodynamic fully controllable radiators.

Do not listen to marketing hype. These radiators are no better and no worse than any other electric radiator which has a thermostat and time clock built into it. All are exactly 100% efficient and that includes the £10 one I got from Argos (though I do admit it doesn't look as good).

 

[Lime]

If anyone's seriously interested in this subject anymore they should take a look at Kalirel thermodynamic fully controllable radiators.

They look good but I'd never use them on daytime electricity tariff which is what you have to do to get heat in the day.
They would be too expensive to run.
If you have your own wind generator then it is a different matter perhaps.

All electrical heating appliances, no matter how they are fabricated or dressed up, consume what it says on the box.
If it has a timer and/or thermostat that will reduce electrical consumption but it will reduce heat output in direct proportion too.
Variations can be introduced that store heat for later but the resultant heat output is always the same as the total amount of electrical energy consumed.
There are no exceptions except with heat transfer systems (heat pumps and the like).

 

[shelli]

So....

because electricity is expensive to produce - electric systems are comparatively expensive to run - they are using a 100% efficient fuel ?

Is there no way to win with energy? - is there no system that gives a little bit more back than you put in?

Or is it always equivalent and we are just fooling ourselves thinking it matters a bean whether we use ground source heat pumps or pig poo - the values out always match the values in?

i hate the fact that we dont score points for being eco friendly

 

[Penners]

the big telescope is going in the loft... on a clear night you can see the Milky Way

Shelli, you really need to get those roof tiles replaced.

 

[sue gazzard]

It was a tongue in cheek comment....