[Closed] Electric Water Filled Heating System ?????

Double post

Electric wet is one of the most expensive ways to heat your house:

Gas - approx 4p/kWh
Oil/LPG - approx 6.5p/kWh
Electricity: anywhere from 8-14p/kWh

if you are using radiators, then you pay the price ruling at the time you need the heat - econ-7 is usually 5 hours overnight and an afternoon boost. econ-10 is 5 hoiurs overnight and 2 boost periods - one usually mid evening.

chances are you wont benefit from the cheap rates too often, edging the cost to the higher end of the price band.

Their advantage is the installation cost/hassle is a lot less than other wet systems.

Other housing associations (i see Fife gave them a testimonial but i can assure you they are not switching all their gas systems to these.) are moving away from electric wet systems due to running costs - they cant meet current SAP requirements (in Scotland) using direct electric wet heating.

Alternatives will depend on what your reasons are for choosing these units - cost/ease of installation/better quality of heating.

The only sure thing is that electricity will be available for a long time to come ie nucleur / wind / solar/ wave etc

Oil and gas well there is a question

But why use a wet electric system, you are heating water to heat the house????? it does not sound very efficient

Have a look at the new ranges of nightstorage heaters from the likes of Dimplex they are realy good nowadays

http://www.dimplex.co.uk/products/domestic_heating/installed_heating/duoheat_radiator/duoheat_radiator/index.htm

The other thing is if you just replace the original heaters you will save loads of hassle with making good

^^^what smudger said. Terribly expensive running and as we all know econ 7 and 10 are carp.

you are heating water to heat the house?????

Backhander

the new range of nightstorage heaters are very good to be fair butwhat I meant is it is a bit arse about face to heat water to heat a house you will have efficientcy losses, just because it is "pretty much what we all do" is true but is it right

My favorite form of heating in my place is my wood burner which is apparantly 78% efficient

But ground source heat pumps are superb and I am looking into them myself after instalation it is almost heat for free

How do air source heat pumps compare to gas nowadays?

The one's I have been looking at have an input of around 3Kw and approx 12-14Kw heat output. On those numbers, they seem a better bet than gas, especially considering the volatility of gas prices due to those pesky Ruskies and our red leaders war on the A-rabs

Yah - what backhander said.

ecodan is a nice neat solution - the cylinder will have all the primary controls and heatpump manager prepiped and wired.

Worcester air/water is also good kit at reasonable price.

fitting an air/water heat pump will be cheaper in the long term - running costs approx 1/3 that of direct electric wet heating. savings will depend on your house size/heat load.

heat pumps will only be suitable if you ensure the rads are correctly sized for the room/flow temp. and sort out the insulation - see previous 'insulate insulate' thread.

[i]But why use a wet electric system, you are heating water to heat the house????? it does not sound very efficient[/i]
Maybe not at the moment but in the future it could be one of the more efficient systems. As saladdoger said in the future your supply will most likely be electric, and a percentage from renewables such as wind, one of the problems with renewables is they may generate surplus electricity when not needed it. Do you waste the electricity or find a way of storing it? Batteries are out of the question, things like pump storage are impracticaly expensive in most cases, but a good possibility is houses having large very well insulated storage tanks, and dumping the excess electricity into heating the water. It's got a large thermal mass, so can store a decent amount of energy. Of course at the moment there's not the financial imperative to have such a system.

running costs of an air/water heat pump (the decent ones at least) are averaging out at roughly 3:1. you are brining the price of leccy down to just about that of gas.

advantages: no servicing, no chance of gas leak, longer lifespan.

if you want a simple installation, and less upheaval than installing a complete wet system, try the vaillant air/air system. one of their 'multi' outdoor units can feed up to four internal fan convectors - 2-3kW each. so long as you can get over the 'warm air heating' concept, they are very inexpensive to fit. afew Housing assocuiations are looking seriously at them to replace night storage.

Elec central heating is economically a mental choice in just about every case. I'd fit a complete normal system. In the event of a strange reorganisation of the power system and total reliance on renewables (meaning "spare" energy at odd times, It'll surely make more sense to adapt a normal heating system than to suffer the damage for the next 10 years before it becomes a reality?

From that website:

What are the running costs of the radiators?

The continuous running cost of a 1Kw radiator on a standard rate is approximately 12.6p an hour.

On a 5 radiator system that's not going to be cheap! And it doesn't say on what date that price is valid - it's probably fair to say that the price of electricity will have increased since...

When we moved into our place 2 years ago we had the dilemma of what / whether to replace the night storage heaters. With no mains gas our choices were oil / LPG / electric / new night storage heaters or wood / multi-fuel burner. We went for the stove choice - it's got a back boiler and does the heating and domestic hot water with no problems at all.

I terms of cost, can't remember the exact figures but I think we got the whole new central heating system including rads, tank and labour, the stove and the chimney lined for about 3 (compared to the 3K my brother's just shelled out on a new boiler it's seems like a bargain). If we'd gone wood only then you'd be looking at a further discount on that as you pay a reduced VAT rate rather than if you go with multifuel. We went with that as it means we can occasionally use furnicite (sp?) which burns very hot and for a long time.

I'd recommend one - ours is in the dining room / kitchen and heats the center of the house wonderfully as well as keeping the rest of the house toasty. We're going to be looking at solar panels hopefully next year - should just use a separate coil in the tank and help keep costs down further...

With COPs of ~3.5, air source is ~350% efficent (well its not but those are fair figures for comparison).If you could combine this with under floor heating then you're on a winner IMO.
The problem is that gas is cheaper than electricity at the moment despite the far better efficiency, environmental friendlyness etc, heat pumps can be more expensive than gas alternatives.
*this is VERY important* make sure when sizing an AS heat pump that it will deliver the heat duty that you require on the coldest day of the year.

[i]*this is VERY important* make sure when sizing an AS heat pump that it will deliver the heat duty that you require on the coldest day of the year. [/i]

Vital advice from Backhander.

backhander - what do you do? where are you?

(blatant advert content below.... sorry if it offends....

[url= http://www.greenworks-energy.co.uk ]My work[/url]

Hey Smudge, your work is right up my alley. I shall peruse your website (it's very good BTW). I work for the largest firm of building engineering consultants going (begins with "A"). I have a background in HVAC and refrigeration systems.

The blatent advert content is disgusting 😉

I will be having a good read later

If you really need to go electric, then there [i]are[/i] electric boilers which would operate with a mass heat store. So a bit like storage heaters only wet plumbed, giving you much better control. ie you can't really switch a storage heater off (well you can sort of shut some vents, but most storage heaters are poorly insulated and once charged will heat the space whether you like it or not). With an electric boiler you can damp the heat output much better when the pump stops, same as gas. The heat store is central and can be much better insulated.

Still damn expensive mind.

BTW, - how noisy are these air source heat pumps? - Has anyone got one?

Thanks for all the advice, I have a lot to think about. 8)

mc, soft start and Inverter driven scroll compressors. No more contactors banging in. I have seen some in action and would not regard them as intrusive by any stretch.

Dundee College have two ASHP fitted outside - dimplex - if you stand out of an arc 45degrees from each side of the fan, you have to touch it to know it is running - within the arc, you can hear the fan running at about 10 feet - I wouldnt consider them 'noisy' at all.