Heating costs - rant to Which?

[NT]

3kw electric nonstop for 1hr is about 36p

NT

[NT]

I assumed it was nothing but the usual blithering product promotion

NT

[Tony Bryer]

If it's built to recent building regs the heating costs for a flat will be very low - when I was producing the last release of my SuperHeat program it was not uncommon for DHW energy usage to be much more than space heating usage, and given that you could not reduce DHW usage (in the SAP algorithms it was a function of floor area) but needed to reduce CO2, a number of designers were looking at electric space heating and communal DHW heated by gas - thus the maintenance of gas boilers becomes a management function, not down to individual owners.

First time I've fired up SuperHeat for a year or more: Single aspect flat, 60m2, 10m x 2.3m wall, UV=0.25, windows 2.4x2.1 + 2 x 1.8x1.2 low-E argon UV=1.8, air-test value of 6, gives an overall heat loss of 21W/K for fabric and 25W/K ventilation, total 920W for 20C inside when 0C outside. Knock off the heat from cooking, TV, computer etc and the actual heating requirement is minimal.

Across a year the SAP calculated usage is heating: 898kWh, DHW: 2232kWh, lighting 477kWh. Would play out differently on a larger detached house of course.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Heard a prog on the radio the other day where they said many had burnt fingers in the buy to let market.

[Mark]

I'd guess that people who entered the market just before the crash would have got burnt. Those who had been in it for a while would be OK.