I am looking for a website that lets you enter a town/village name, and responds with a yes/no for whether there is mains gas there. (I am moving house, and am only interested in mains gas, not oil, LPG or any other form of heating).
Suggestions anyone?
What a bizarre criterion. Which misapprehension has led you to make such a decision?
Do a little reading regarding the various options.
you can ask for gas anywhere
ROFL
Do you have any idea what it would cost to get connected to gas in an un-piped area?
One place I lived, the vilage wasn't on the gas main .... no biggie you could easily get large cylinders delivered. Worked just like the real stuff.
Pete
Any particular reason you will not consider oil?
Peter Crosland
It has to be cost effective to them and have a supply available in the area - even then they may ask you to contribute the full cost of the installation if there is some distance between you and the nearest mains.
Ask the local estate agents
Except that it wasn't "the real stuff".
Mains gas is methane, the stuff in the cylinders is propane. It works pretty well, but there are differences in the appliances and there are certainly differences in the cost. For fundamental reasons of physics, you can't get methane in cylinders as you can for propane, nor is this ever going to happen for domestic supply.
IMHE, we were quoted around 20K for a gas connection to a pipe that already runs alongside our own land. I think the "pipe" in question does supply most of Manchester though, and we'd have mainly been paying for a very large regulator from a squillion psi down to domestic.
(If you want liquid methane, such as maybe a tankerload from Algeria, then it first has to be refrigerated to liquify it, then kept refrigerated -- unlike propane or butane which merely need to be compressed and bottled, then left alone)
On 8 Jan 2007 09:10:47 -0800 someone who may be "Andy Dingley " wrote this:-
If the pipe is a high pressure main then they would be unlikely to connect one domestic customer into it, for a variety of reasons. It would be possible in engineering terms, but not desirable.
As an aside British Gas came up with one of the best excuses for failure to complete some work on a large project I was involved with. Apparently the (expensive) fibre glass box which some equipment was to be placed in had blown off the back of the lorry transporting it to Scotland and been smashed into lots of pieces. I thought this such a good one that I didn't have anyone check up whether it was true or not.
But a lot more expensive
A lot lot more, reason we turned down a move.
It seems that Transco have made usage figures "available" down to postcode sector level (everything bar the last two letters), but as I couldn't track these down, they may have been supplied only to authorities, quangos, etc.
Two options:
a) Try Transco. b) Visit (for example)
I don't think it's all that odd to make this a buying criterion. IIRC, propane costs about twice as much as natural gas.
What about oil? That handles the CH. It takes hardly any gas to fuel a gas hob - a couple of medium-size bottles does fine, no need to even go to the
47kg ones.Not that I disagree about making it a thing to consider when buying, just that it may not be as bad as people think.
cheers, clive
Having gas in the area does not mean that gas is available to your house. We moved here about 6 years ago (in the sticks), there was gas to the next door neighbour. We paid about £1000 to have it installed, which simply involved running a pipe from the road to out house and fitting a meter, even then I had to get the box for the meter. 2 years ago our other neighbour was quoted £1600 for virtually the same job. contact Transco see what they have to say.
In message , David Hansen writes
My domestic heating is from a medium pressure gas main (6" I think) British Gas would not connect with the excuse that they might need to shut the pipe for maintenance purposes. When they were privatised, Transco connected for around 350ukp without demur.
Mind you they recently quoted a distant neighbour 14k for a connection to the same pipe. I guess the his lp run would be about 200m.
regards
My advice still stands Ruling out a place currently without asking National grid transco the question in the first place is short sighted and foolish. There are many instances of consumers being connected up for little money. Indeed, If there's a pipe less than 23 metres they have to connect for free. In addition the OP maybe entitled to a grant up to £2, 500 for gas central heating on the warm front scheme.
I have no more idea of where the OP is looking than you have. Unlike you I don't purport to know the location of every gas pipe.
By ruling out a property on the basis that it 'currently' doesn't have gas is foolish and short sighted as a free or cheap connection 'maybe' available.
If there's a pipe less than 23 metres they have to connect for free. There are many many communities getting connected for non or very little money each year. Indeed National Grid Transco are NOW much more likely to do deals nowadays in the face of enormously fierce competition from building developers who often are using Independent Gas Transporter companies. In addition the OP maybe entitled to a grant up to £2, 500 for gas central heating on the warm front scheme. So even a connection costing £2.5k is still 'free.'
Don't move to an unpiped area.. try for a large city or town.
KW
If you want Methane then go live next to an old ripe Landfill site.
KW
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