Surely gas has now overtaken oil as most expensive fuel?

[MM]

I've just heard that Phoenix Natural Gas in Northern Ireland is raising prices again, this time by 17%. The price was raised 30% in Septmber, so that costs will have gone up by more than 50% in four months. The General Consumer Council said it was "appalling" and a "severe blow". (BBC)

Surely oil must now be cheaper? But what about electricity? E.g. using a thermostatically controlled fan heater. Gas seems now to be an extortionate luxury, and with oil one does at least have the competition between local suppliers.

MM

[Christian McArdle]

Electricity is largely generated from natural gas anyway, so is also rising.

There are many suppliers of gas, so you do have a choice of supplier.

Christian.

[John Rumm]

Given that gas was a quarter of the price of electricity to start with, it still ought ot be cheaper even at double the price. Remember also that many of the power stations are gas fired, so you can expect price rises to knock on there as well.

[flash]

I would be interested in some figures on this sort of thing as I am trying to work out whether it is cheaper to heat my water overnight using oil or economy 7.

[usenet]

Although we've not done detailed sums it definitely feels cheaper to us to heat water overnight using economy 7. If you're clever you get other savings as well by running dishwasher and washing machine overnight.

[manatbandq]

I think you worry too much.

MBQ

[meow2222]

With E7 you often pay a bit more during day rate, which can cancel out the saving. With E7 you're heating the water many hours before its wanted, so use more energy to compensate for cooling later on.

E7 is not generally competitive.

NT

[MM]

Dunno about 'many'. In any case, nowhere as many as with oil suppliers.

MM

[MM]

So oil is looking even better! (I can remember when the general view was that gas was the cheapest by far and oil was very expensive, although perhaps not as expensive as leccy.)

MM

[MM]

For heating water overnight E7 is surely most economical, but what if someone wants a bath in the evening? Is the water going to be hot enough by then? I don't like the idea of E7 either for night storage heaters, which, in my experience, belch out enough heat to compete with the devil early on, then get progressively colder throughout the day.

MM

[MM]

How does it work with E7? Can I just request it from the leccy supplier, or do I have to have a separate meter and wires?

MM

[MM]

Certainly. Panic attacks, anxiety attacks, depression - tell me about it! Worry is the least of my worries. And what's your magic bullet? (Actually, scrub the word 'bullet'.)

MM

[Chris Bacon]

Not *ANOTHER* OT thread that's descending into a lot of old- womanish banter and griping. STFU, or go somewhere appropriate.

[Steve S]

To use your very own words:

"IMO to try and control this group by posting stuff like this is itself an unwelcome abuse."

Steve S

[flash]

We heat the water twice a day and the E7 runs up to 8am so I was thinking of using E7 for the mornings hot water and then oil for the second hot water run of the day in the evening.

The thing i was pondering though is since I have the boiler on anyway to heat the house in the morning - would it use that much more oil if it had to heat the water as well?

What would be useful is some idea of the amount of each type of fuel used to heat say 100 litres of water, though I guess this would vary enormously from appliance to appliance.

[usenet]

It's usually a change of meter, not a separate circuit (like it used to be I believe). You just get two readings, one 'peak rate' for the electricity you consume from 0700 to midnight and the other for 'cheap rate' for the units you consume from midnight to 0700. (Times may vary according to supplier and accuracy of clock).

[Richard Conway]

I think the clock gets its time from the Rugby transmitter.

[philipuk]

No, either just a mechanical clock or switch on / off from extra signals added to Radio 4 longwave.

[Chris Bacon]

Oh, bum. You have caught me out. However, I can only say in mitigation that there's a difference between a FAQ masquerading as a Charter endorsed by all, and my futile attempts to prevent uk.d-i-y being submerged beneath a tide of frightful old tittle-tattle and stuff that's meaningless from a DIY perspective.

Now I will go off and have a cup of coffee and reflect upon the economic situation in China and its relevance to the world of quality cheap tools.

[manatbandq]

Take your own advice, killfile the posters you object to or just don't bother tro read the thread.

MBQ