I'm curious about my energy usage

A caveat before we begin - we're actually doing really well on electricity/gas compared to many people. I'm not actually sure why - but maybe discussing it here will help.

We are currently spending about £450/year on each of gas and electricity. A total of £900/year, or £75/month. (1,800 kWh of electricity, 10,000 kWh of gas)

When the cap changes at the start of April this will change to £678/year on electricity and £829/year on gas. A total of about £1500/year or £125/month

Checking with friends, and looking online, this is *really* low. Like "1 bedroom flat" low.

Now, I did set up Hive temperature controlled valves on the radiators, so that we're only heating the rooms we need to. We use Hive, with the rooms having schedules for when they're generally used (bedrooms 7pm-7am, living room 5pm-8pm, my office 9am-4pm) and heating only being turned on in rooms that we're using - and only up to 19.5° ( a compromise between Jane and I - she'd rather it be lower, I like it mediterranean). But can that really be saving us *that* much money?

I also had assumed that our electricity usage would be higher. As we're not great at turning off lights, have an induction cooker, run multiple washes per week to keep the children in clothes, etc. And have a ridiculous TV. And yet somehow it's not high. I really do wonder why.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

lilysea

Is your house better insulated than the average?

From:

andrewducker

I honestly don't know!

Not the two rooms at the back of the house, which leak heat through the floor near instantly in the winter. But the other rooms seem okay. At some point I'll get the place tested.

From:

cmcmck

People are so often told that 25C is 'normal' room temperature which would be way too high for us. We set our thermostatic control at 18C. Hardy northern ancestry and all that! :o)

The house is also now completely LED lit which makes a bit of a difference.

We took out a three year fixed rate dual fuel contract a year back which will certainly help somewhat.

Edited Date: 2022-03-10 01:12 pm (UTC)

From:

andrewducker

Three years fixed will have been an excellent choice - that'll save you thousands!

And yes, 25 is probably actually slightly warmer than I'd like unless I'm going to start wearing shorts around the house. 22 would be nice, but I can live with 19.5 and a jumper.

From:

rmc28

Everyone in this house prefers it chilly except me. Thermostat is set on 18 I think, maybe 19 if I'm feeling rebellious. I think gas costs us a lot more than electricity and our main usage of gas is heating, so maybe keeping it cooler really is helping - plus only heating the rooms you're using.

From:

mtbc

I feel cold ever since losing much weight but, given that, I do okay at 21°C (but have been known to turn it up on my birthday!). Though, hard to tell, in a past house I kept it set at around 19°C but not convinced it was really that cool.

From:

redbird

19.5 would definitely be too chilly for me.

Our thermostat is set at 19 at night, and 22.5 during the day (though the forced-air heating system is either on or off for the entire apartment). I am, unfortunately, more sensitive to cold (and heat, *sigh*) than most people: dealing with that, plus poor insulation, is reflected in our heating bill.

Edited (remove something that didn't lead anywhere) Date: 2022-03-10 01:48 pm (UTC)

From:

channelpenguin

Figures from Germany: the 1 bed flat is on a 2 year dual fuel, Jean is the main resident but he's picked up relatively frugal ways from me. Rarely run rads at over 19-20C and not at all at night. It's all monthly, at about €45/49 apiece.

The 1886 country farmhouse is another story...

2 bedrooms, one small living room, box room, music roomn one room under construction but still heated.

From last year's usage they have me on €104 / month power.

I'm ultra frugal, my housemate is not. I work from home. We have a dishwasher, microwave and air fryer (and a lot of power tools!).

I used 2000l of heating oil last winter which cost me €1500. This year I bought 2000l for just under €1800. (There is NO VAT exemption on heating oil!). That's 2 of us, and me possibly being evil to my housemate by keeping it to 19C max, usually 16-18C. I can't be nice to him as he'd want it up at 25C (which isn't actually possible!). The heating goes off overnight unless it's forecast below zero (with no overall thermostats it's impossible to be efficient, plus I NEVER have had heating on overnight and can't sleep if I'm warm). There's no thermometers on the rads, most are stuck at whatever setting the knobs seized at (I injured my elbow this time last year trying to free one and it's only JUST better). The climate is windy and damp, the upstairs is a huge empty uninsulated loft with one insulated room. Happily the floor in between is a foot or so of solid clay. It took 48hrs constantly running the boiler to get the place from 7C up to 17C last week after we had both been away 5 days. It rarely drops below 14-15 overnight once warm. We also have some woodburners (one still to be fitted, not used much) and even burn coal briquettes (dirt cheap) overnight when the weather pulls a -15-20C proper winter spell.

The 30yr old boiler uses about 1l of fuel per hour. That's €1/hr for the current batch of fuel!

From:

guybles.livejournal.com

It sounds very similar to what we use (about £1,000 a year up until recently, looking like closer to £1,500 going forward). That’s for a 25 year old, three bed flat.

However, like others have remarked, I keep the times pretty closely managed and the thermostat is normally maxed out to 19C. It only rarely goes above that if one of us gets seriously chilly.

(oh, and hello - long time, no speak and all that)

From:

andrewducker

Hello! Hope you're doing well!

From:

andrewducker

I'm glad I don't have to bulk buy oil. Sounds complex. Still having it already hopefully insulates you against the price rises at least temporarily.

From:

guybles.livejournal.com

Ticking along nicely, thank you - having the most radical week over the last two years by being in the office for two days out of five.

Although that’s mostly because I have an insane amount of work to do…

From:

andrewducker

If I can make it another 5 days then it'll be two years without me being in the office. I have to say I don't miss it!

From:

channelpenguin

I would be fine down to 12C (with jumper) but it's not good for damp / condensation to go below about 14C (exactly where depends on humidity of course). So I heat the house more for its sake rather than my own. 16 is perfectly comfortable to me. I'm a skinny thing but I eat A LOT! My food turns instantly to heat rather than insulation.

From:

channelpenguin

Tank can only store 4000l, but yes , it can be mind bending to time. Delivery can take a month in the autumn / winter, which is even more to consider. In the non- peak times it takes a week or so.

From:

cellio

Wow. Are you sure you aren't (completely accidentally, of course) patched into the neighbor's feed? :-)

From:

davidcook

So here's a comparison with what we pay here - 5Br house/detached/2 storey. All figures approximate / from 2021 ...
Gas - AUD 1480 (GBP 820). Heating/cooking/hot water.
Electricity - paid AUD 668 (GBP 370), but we have a good feed-in tariff from our solar panels. Actual cost of electricty was AUD 1240 (GBP 690).
So a total cost of AUD 2148 (GBP 1190) per year.

Obviously there are differences in climate to account for ... we probably use airconditioning a bit more than you :)
We usually set the thermostat for 20°, and usually run the heating 7am-9am + 4pm-8pm or so mostly, although with me WFH the last couple of years we've had it on all day more often (when the room temperature in my office gets down to 18° or so, it doesn't matter how many layers I wear, my hands start to seize up ...).

From:

channelpenguin

I suspect climate plays a role, so I can't envy your low heating bills, but your electricity costs are HALF of mine (even with the solar nulled out!)

Still, it's only what the power company estimated based on a year where I know my housemate ran a fan heater pretty much 24hours a day for 10 days when we arrived, and I ran 2 800W oil rads (it was winter and it took us over a week to get the old boiler back in commission).

From:

andrewducker

I don't think so. But how would I tell?

From:

andrewducker

And the person who replaced our meter with a smart one would presumably have noticed that?

From:

andrewducker

Yours sounds pretty reasonable!

From:

anna_wing

I'm doing the opposite because of a huge local increase in fuel prices. Work aircon is now set at 26C (outside temperature is now 38-40C in the day and 24-26C at night), and we're switching off all unnecessary lights. I'm just using a fan at night.

From:

andrewducker

My sympathy, I hope you can keep things at a survivable temperature!

From:

anna_wing

Thanks! It's not a problem for me. But for people who can't afford to run generators, the daily power cuts are a major issue.

From:

andrewducker

It feels so weird to me that a rich country has power cuts on a regular basis.

We've had two in the last 6 years, and neither one lasted more than half an hour.

From:

mtbc

That's great. I can be cold at 21°C but am sometimes wearing two pairs of socks inside my fuzzy slippers, three layers on my torso too, also have a blanket on my lap. I lost a bunch of weight years ago and have been cold ever since. If I eat the calories a regular guy ought to be able to, I gain the weight back. It's just how things are, I guess. I wish I too burned it instead!

From:

mellowtigger

Here in frozen Minnesota (air temp is forecast to fall to -20C/-4F tomorrow), I keep my thermostat always at 19.5C/67F. In theory I could turn it off or lower it more at night, but in my century-old and very leaky house, I worry that my plants would die.

Economic values fluctuate so wildly, have you (AndrewDucker) considered switching to fuel measurements instead? Therms of natural gas for heating, or kilowatts, or whatever is appropriate? I highly recommend this carbon calculator to help estimate everything from heating to travel to household product purchases like food. That's how I came up with my carbon costs for 2021.
https://www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx

From:

andrewducker

It's because economic values fluctuate that I'm worrying about them!

From:

naath

at 21 degrees I am shivering in a jumper, ah the variety of life

From:

channelpenguin

It seems anecdotally, that yours is the common experience of people who have lost a lot of weight. Food is fuel and if you are having to eat very little, then it makes sense that you'll feel the cold. I notice the cold more if I don't eat enough.

If you can possibly build muscle, that might help a bit, but you've probably tried that (assuming that's not out of the question due to other physical / health issues).

May you ever have enough heating to keep you warm!!