Outdoor radiant (IR?) heaters - experiences?

[T i m]

Sounds like someone has a big chip on their shoulder Dave?

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

<snip>

Yeahbut would you think it equally funny if someone you knew and cared for died that way because of a similar cause John?

Do you remember how upset everyone (with a working moral compass) was when people emptied the shelves denying the care workers (still at work, not on furlough) access to essentials?

What I tried to describe with the electricity supply is no different, qualified as soon as we have the first managed power outage that could be avoided if a minority weren't greedy.

The ones who do fill their swimming pools or wash their cars when water is short and justify it by saying they 'pay' for what they use?

Why did they give out CFL's for free or giving grants for insulation if 'reducing our power consumption' wasn't important. Having an electric heater outdoors seems to fly in the face of all that?

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

<snip>

This should be good, I wonder how long it becomes Tim's personal biased POV ...

Ah, 'broadcast, so not very long at all then.

See, you wouldn't say a single word (because you don't) if any thread drifts onto any topic, unless it's one that challenges you personally.

And more emotive / biased language ..... 'wars' in a 'discussion group', how bizarre.

Sadly for you? Still can't help reading what I type or anyone who wants to engage in discussion with me Tim?

Shame you can't manage that then eh?

I'm happy to access your PC remotely and help you set up a killfile that saves you having to read anything that offends you personally.

I could include a list of words like cruelty or vegan and rights, that could help. ;-)

(Just watching Countryfile and hearing just how f***ed up yet another instance of man 'farming' animals re the salmon farming and sea lice is. Even the regulatory bodies admitted that the fines weren't good enough to stop all the bad practice. Out of sight, out of mind'?)

Cheers, T i m

[Nick Cat]

domestic water supply is never short in this country. It does help to get the basic facts right.

Energy companies: they were required to and paid to Government: they saw it as a green vote winner And they weren't free, they were in fact quite expensive. You paid for yours via your tax bill.

same as above. Money & votes. It is also financially efficient, ie a sensible idea.

Yes. And? I doubt I'll read your answer, it'll be more green rubbish.

NT

[T i m]

Is that so?

It does indeed, yet you keep trying to do the opposite?

Have you never heard of a hosepipe ban (last was only two years ago), seen a standpipe or water bowser when we have had a prolonged dry spell?

Hey, this must be you:

"The findings of the Great British Rain Paradox survey warn that 72% of the British public believe the UK has enough water to meet daily demands."

Want some tables:

And the future ... Or are you playing silly games and suggesting that there was always some water *somewhere* in the country and so that negates the general statement?

Not the ones other people gave me. ;-)

So there weren't there to reduce electricity demand at all then?

Plus they consumed less power ... 'saving energy' (fact).

No that's it.

Only rubbish because it opposes your biased POV and you have no understanding so valid answer to it.

The point stands, 'most people' (who aren't rich therefore) are against the conspicuous consumption of things, especially if it's seen to be 'going to waste'.

Hey, if this was nothing to do with wasting energy, why did you say re IR heaters: "all those things are grossly inefficient" (or were you on different meds then or just not me saying something you want to argue with)?

The end.

Cheers, T i m

[Richard]

How are old people being denied heating indoors by someone having outdoor heating on their patio? Imagine how many old bastards have died of hypothermia due to this:

[T i m]

<snip>

All explained above, especially for the hard of thinking.

Why, is it diverting heat from an old folks home or summat?

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

You could have used that rather than the more obscure one then. ;-)

What, that anything in nature being natural (the clue is in the name) but not a descriptor of the opposite of that re our context?

I think you might be alone in not understanding what 'natural' means (in the context of animals and human intervention).

See above.

In nature ... naturally a wild chicken would lay 10-15 eggs a year and live for around 7 years.

An un-natural chicken, one that has been genetically modified by us so we can exploit it further lays around 300 eggs per year and because their bodies haven't evolved as fast as we have made them, they suffer for it. They suffer because they would never have existed to support such a reproductive load 'in nature'.

See, just because an animal exists in it's current form (because of how we have mutated it to suit our needs, be it a cow for milk, a chicken for eggs or a dog for it's looks), we often cause those animals to suffer for 'our pleasure (the quantity of milk, meant for baby cows, not us ... or the number of eggs we can take / eat from a flow-line chicken. We also make dogs that can't breath properly or are genetically weak because they aren't a product of natural (there's that word again <g>) selection.

<snip>

No smoke and mirrors Roger, just everyday words describing an unnatural situation. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[Fredxx]

This is a radiant heater, that directs IR towards you. It really doesn't matter if you're in a workshop, or outside, the effect is precisely the same.

Does your knowledge of physics allow you to understand this concept? If you don't you will simply show your understanding of physics is lacking in this area.

When in your workshop, why don't you simply wear an extra layer, or do you think you own some moral highground?

[John Rumm]

The cause would not be too much heating in a football stadium though would it? It would be too much lame brained thinking leaving inadequate generation capacity due to a religious devotion to renewable or something similar.

You mean when they want to run their new government mandated heat pump or charge their car so they can go to work in the morning.

You know as though experiments go, this one really does not fly.

No more or less than having one in a workshop for example. You are not trying to heat the outdoors any more than you are trying to heat the workshop. In both cases you are just warming the people to make them more comfortable. The heat in both cases is lost to the environment.

Now insulation makes lots of sense when you are attempting to heat the space and the fabric of the building and maintain it at that temperature to all intents indefinitely. There it will be both more effective and use less energy overall with adequate insulation.

(ironically, my workshop is better insulated than any other part of the property)

[John Rumm]

none

(there are plenty of places that methane escapes to the surface - the only difference here is that its being burnt rather than discharged into the atmosphere. Since methane is a much stronger greenhouse gas than CO2, one might argue that it being in fire is actually a benefit)

[Dave Plowman (News]

Think that's a bit rich from our very own evangelist.

[Richard]

I know. Could you explain this to Tim. You appear to have way more patience than I.

[Nick Cat]

Your arguments are so idiotic sometimes.

Right out of the gate it starts with ecoboll Then it continues with more

they're correct. Not everyone is as clueless as the greens

If you believe the occasoinal inability to waste water without any limit whatever is 'serious stress' then you really do believe anything.

a politician warning about an imagined future to win votes? You couldn't make it up.

Hmm, I don't recall claiming that. Show me where you allege I did.

Water leakage rates in the distribution networks are huge, and water companies choose not to spend on fixing them because it just isn't financially worth it. Hosepipe bans make trivial difference to consumption. Water here is very plentiful, vastly in excess of what we want to consume. The only limiting factor is keeping treatment costs as low as possible. In fact drinking water is available in such excess that people are nearly always free to water their gardens all day long day after day without even being metered. Some still do.

they did of course, though not by as much as HMG hoped. HMG backed a technology that wasn't ready for mass adoption yet, and most people rejected CFLs at that time because of that. Most of those expensive bulbs went to waste, and people only began buying CFLs en masse when higher output lamps with quicker warmup were worthwhile £-wise.

It was an easy way to be seen as green. Obviously it had zero chance of changing the outcome of any nonsense 'climate catastrophe' model outcome. In reality it was an exercise in wasting money to buy votes.

yup, ie green vote winning. It's costs that matter in the end. And loft insulation does make sense.

:)

You don't get it at all. The political decisions of this country are only green to the extent needed to win votes, it's not like politicians take greenness seriously beyond that. You don't understand why.

I am too, but only to the extent that I don't engage in it & don't recommend others do. Others are free to and routinely do, it's their choice, that's how freedom works.

Patio heaters are in almost every case a daft idea. Your green basis for trying to change the actions of others is wrong in so many ways it's just not useful.

because they are.

You don't understand the situation in so many ways yet accuse people of beig on meds when they don't second your foolish povs. Need I say more?

It never is with you. I don't begrudge you your pov, though it's mostly foolish & uninformed. And like many fools you're sure those with facts must be wrong.

NT

[Nick Cat]

very mildly, in that the resources could be channelled into something constructive instead. But your desire to control other's actions is a fool's. If you claim some moral basis for you to control theirs, it gives them the same moral basis to control yours according to their views & wishes, something you'd very much object to. Greens want tyranny, the funny thing is they assume the tyrant will uphold all their views. Life doesn't work like that.

Some think it's stupid, some are impressed by it, I don't know why

Real life doesn't work that way.

1. No-one buys up all the bananas
2. If someone bought a huge amount, farmers would see there was more money to be made & grow more. The limit to food production is financial, farmers only grow the amount they can sell for a profit.

that is of course not true. Old people don't die whenever there's a power cut, and football heat/light doesn't cause power cuts. Reality eh.

it doesn't

no, you have misunderstood it

They're not. One could always make an argument that we should pay enough taxes for old people to stay warm, but one could just as soon make an argument that people should stop frittering their money away on patio heating so they have enough savings to stay warm in old age.

NT

[T i m]

I think you are confused but I can see how you would be so from your POV.

If you think you have the right to do anything to any animal, then 'of course' you would consider anyone trying to stop you doing so as an 'evangelist. Unless I stopped someone hurting your cat or dog then I would be a hero.

You have been brought up, been conditioned to teat a certain few animals are just food and therefore it's ok they should be killed for you to eat their flesh, even though you don't actually need to.

So my 'evangelism isn't trying to highlight something that doesn't have a victim, it's because it does, and you are supporting their suffering (and death), even if you don't consider it an issue for the small subset of the animal kingdom you have been conditioned to accept as food, whilst not treating any other animal that could equally be and of is eaten in other cultures not so.

Or maybe you would eat dog if you were offered it? Would you be willing to kill it yourself by cutting it's throat?

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

Let's see how you substantiate your personal opinion on that shall we (before you run away like you normally do). ;-(

Typical, quote the views of the uninformed public for me, the very point I was making about you!

Where did I say anything so specific. Again, stop digging.

Till it happens.

See above, I'm just familiar with how slippery you can be when trapped in a corner.

All completely and utterly irrelevant to those queuing for water at a standpipe because the reservoirs are dry.

So it doesn't change the spirit of my point.

Well, sort of (given the CFL's haven't changed much since):

1) They didn't get the point. 2) They CBA to change them. 3) They didn't like the light (often 'not bright enough'). 4) They didn't fit their fittings.

The ones we were given worked fine (startup) and gave *nearly* as much light as would be expected for their rating.

By 'green' you mean 'saving energy across the country by everyone doing something simple'?

But it did save power though, something we might try to economise on when demand could outstrip supply?

When we have more energy that we can consume, we can waste it if we want (assuming such wastage doesn't bring on other issues, like increased pollution).

From your cynical POV.

I think you are replying to your own point there mate.

Whilst they do, that's not the entire issue ITRW. Supply is also a big issue even as noted by the number of times people post how often we have been near the mark (and would have been over it, had it not been for the interconnects and load shedding).

Only to the homeowners pocket according to you.

Was the domestic solar PV / FAT just a scam to earn votes and line the pockets of installers and uptakers, nothing to do with distributed power generation? Why are they talking of making peoples EV's a mobile battery for support the grid? Another vote winner?

Really.

So, all the wind farms around the UK are only there because people voted for them ... when most people say they don't like them ... and the Green party aren't in power?

And you are so obsessed with your anti-political / justification stance you can't see if from the perspective of 'most people'.

So how am I different then? What are you arguing against?

Except you just stated '& don't recommend others do', just as you did here.

What do you think I'm going to do different, sneak round David's garden and cut through the SWA powering his tower of IR heaters that have melted his plastic roofing and are scorching his lawn? <weg>

No, ignoring any global warming connection (and it's not one pointless heater that could be an issue but millions if we all did it) but the wasted energy, in the winter when we are often sailing close to the mark. I doubt David (or 1M David's) would check Gridwatch before turning their outdoor heaters on to check the consequences of their actions.

Where have you got all this 'green' focus from? At the last local election I could have voted green as a way of spoiling my paper but I did it traditionally. ;-)

Then what are you arguing about.

Ok, as far as converting electricity into heat they are probably near

100% efficient.

As far as radiating that heat onto people, they would range from some level of efficiency (from burning your head / face to being 'just right') down to 0% efficiency (converting energy into heat for people) as soon people move away from the front of the heaters.

The same heater used indoors would range from transferring 100% of the electrical energy into the room when people were there (via the people) to transferring 100% of the energy into the room when the bodies move away.

Or the irony. You don't even realise you basically agree with me (even though you said the same)! You twisted my practical observations and recommendations (that was the same as yours) into some political thing I never mentioned?

Not sure there would be a point. ;-)

Is that right.

Well, in that case, so is yours?

See above.

David asked about heaters for use in a garden, we both offered the same advice (that probably covered the same or similar facets, but the outcome was the same) and now you are arguing that I'm wrong for sharing your POV?

You are a strange one indeed. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

p.s. And what's with yet another nym change?

[T i m]

Why are you talking the example so literally John?

It doesn't matter the cause it's the RW outcome that seems to be whooshing you for some reason?

How is that the same as putting a heater in the garden?

It flys perfectly well, once you understand it. ;-(

*Except* when I walk away from the heater for 30 seconds the heat isn't wasted, it's going into the space where I am.

See above.

Agreed.

Yes, *except*, when used in my workshop (or your workshop, as I believe you have actually stated) the heat that would be wasted when used outside is now retained *within* the workshop, for us to still enjoy?

'Of course' that heat will *eventually* leak out the outside but nowhere near as instantly as it would when used outside?

Of course and why the use of heaters *with* insulated places that are indoors makes sense and wouldn't be seen as being 'wasteful' (especially during times of marginal supply).

Cozy. ;-)

The 'good thing' about not trying to heat a space like a workshop (but just heat the person) is if you are doing anything physical (sanding / wire brushing / sawing steel) you soon heat up and I've often found I'm turning the IR heater off and then removing my coat etc.

On the same lines as the spirit of my 'wasting energy' thoughts, I generally report any street lights I see stuck on 24/7, simply because it's a waste of electricity (in general), a waste of electricity (as a rate payer) and was of the 'life' of the lamp (as a late night dog walker and ratepayer). ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

Quite.

My 'desire' is no stronger than yours when you recommended the exact same thing. 'Wear a coat'?

Erm no. If I asked everyone here how I might best heat my open dinghy when sailing I'd expect the same sort of replies as we gave David.

'Wear a coat' is also, 'use electrically heated undergarments, use a handwarmer' etc, nothing needs to be so literal.

<snip political crap>

Well, I can help you there, the first group have a grip.

Oh, it's so difficult trying to discuss anything with left brainers. ;-(

We are talking *instantly*, no long banana growing timescale's, the here and now.

Nope and yet another example of you back pedaling or being a left brainer.

'Of course' people die when there is a power cut and I was hoping the 'heating an open air football stadium' would be an easy / simple enough analogy for you to grasp. Seems not.

It can.

Nope.

I think you are answering your own question again.

We could but not what we are discussing atm.

Different people. The chances are the old people would prefer to stay in the warm or would know they need to dress suitably if going 'outside'.

Quite (but Richard is as crazy as you!). ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[John Rumm]

Well you keep coming up with specific examples that seem rather weak arguments, or at least rather narrow arguments.

So if there is no electricity because its dark and the wind is not blowing, that's the fault of over consumption then?

Its not - it illustrates that the demand for electricity will increase, and it has nothing to do with greed.

So if one has radiant heat in the garden and turns it off when you pop to the loo, that is ok?

If you were still there... My workshop is a temporary use building. I need to to be comfortable to work in - preferably quickly, and I may stay there for a few hours. After that I may not visit for days. So whether it stays warm for 30 mins or 10 hours does not really make much difference from a comfort PoV.

Now granted in reality its not that simple, since I do want low level heat in there all the time. Also comfort will be increased with insulation even if the heating is off, since the thermal gradient across the insulation will mean that the black body emissions of the walls etc will be higher. You won't immediately feel a chill in the same way.

So if I am sat outside under a radiant heater for a hour, and then turn it off and go in, or I am in the workshop for an hour under the same heater and then turn it off and go in, does the fact that the workshop retains some of that heat for a period of time after when its empty fundamentally change *anything*?

Well its got 2" of PIR insulation under a ply liner - that's fixed to what is essentially s single skin brick/block construction with render over. So the thermal mass is outside of the insulation. Good for infrequent use, but the opposite of what you might want in a house.

They turn off the street lights at 1am in many places round here. That upsets people as well, since they are then more worried about crime or personal safety, or road safety.

These are not just simple questions of using less energy. Sometimes you need to "waste" some to achieve a different goal.