Electric Boiler vs Combi

[Dan1990]

An Economy 7 tariff gives cheaper electricity at night, but it is more expensive during the day to encourage night time use. Using this tariff with an electric boiler to heat the home during the day/evening will cost considerably more. Some money can be saved by heating the water cylinder at night, but this won’t offset the daytime usage.

 

[gmartine]

Although most contributors have commented on how to run your HW system more efficiently (which you asked for) the cost of running the heating for most of the year with an electric boiler will be far more significant. If you intend staying I'd change it asap.

Look at it this way, your hot water cylinder has two heating elements (3kw or 1 kettle each) that you can only use one at a time and only need to use for an hour or so a day. Your electric boiler is probably between 9 - 12kw ( 4 kettles) and on most of the day when it's cold and you're in.

 

[Murdoch]

Successive governments have said they want to get all gas boilers replaced with electric units

so not only do they want to overload the uk grid with EVs , adding space heating in houses will surely bring it to its knees - talk about mad lack of joined up thinking

 

[gmartine]

New builds only atm from 2025 but gas hobs/cookers will still be allowed which seems odd. A hob cooker manufacturer in a key constituency perhaps?

To retrofit, the estimate is apparently over £25k per property....insulation, PV panels etc as the general condition and standard of our housing stock is p**s poor. Not to mention as you say the huge adoption of EV's, every house is going to have to be a generating station in it's own right yet they can't even get the adoption of smart meters right.

Good luck finding the money for that.

 

[allheatingone]

As you know electricity is the most expensive type of heating so a gas boiler will always be the best option from a financial point of view.
You will probably save over 30% by having a gas boiler fitted instead of running an elcetric version.

If you are looking to install a combi boiler then you have come to the right place! We at All Heating One always welcome you to contact us for further information on selecting the correct combi boiler for your house, comparing pricing, suppliers, and all installation procedures.

 

[haydn71]

Thanks for all the replies. So, as suspected, no matter how efficiently you run an electric boiler, it will always be quite a lot more expensive to run than a gas combi.

Gas was my original suggestion to my partner but due to the house layout and renovation, it's a bit of a convoluted route to get the pipework through the house which put the installation cost up. She's had one quote already but before we started getting more, I wanted some advice to see if that really was the best solution. So thanks for everyone's input, appreciated. Gas it is.

Thanks,

Haydn

 

[Arelia]

Thanks for all the replies. So, as suspected, no matter how efficiently you run an electric boiler, it will always be quite a lot more expensive to run than a gas combi.

Gas was my original suggestion to my partner but due to the house layout and renovation, it's a bit of a convoluted route to get the pipework through the house which put the installation cost up. She's had one quote already but before we started getting more, I wanted some advice to see if that really was the best solution. So thanks for everyone's input, appreciated. Gas it is.

Thanks,

Haydn

Hi Haydn71

We are a Spanish company and although we don't do solar energy, we do know that thousand of families down here are installing solar pannels on the roof and a simple electric water tank. Therefore, some or a lot of the energy it consumes will be provided by solar pannels and the electricity bill will drop.
I don't know how much sun you have in the UK compared to Spanish skies, I presume far less. But even so, I would ask for several quotations to local companies you may have around in your town. Bear in your mind that these solar pannels are going to sypply energy not just to the electric boiler but to the whole household consumption; Again, in Spain it is really profitable, but I am not so sure about northern European countries. You better ask where you live.

What I can offer/suggest is a shower timer that we make in Spain and sell in the UK, to restrict the maximum shower timer and also has a water leak detector, just in case someone leaves the shower tap open. It does save water and energy and prevents people from taking showers without any control. You can check it here if you wish to:


To end with this post, I must say that what is going to make you save more money is by far solar energy as long as you have sun light during the day, but it is also much more expensive than our shower timer
hope all this information helps
regards


​

 

[gmartine]

Yes get more than one quote or at least three and see what they have to say. Get back to us if anything needs clarifying or to chew over a scheme.

 

[Chuck]

I don't know how much sun you have in the UK compared to Spanish skies, I presume far less.

London averages ca 1400 hr/yr of sunshine compared with 2500 hr/yr for Barcelona.