ENERGY MATTERS

[Tizer]

Talking of Manchester...
The BBC web site today says "The Times puts plans for a £200m science institute in Manchester, on its front page. The paper says the foundation - which will be partly funded by private investors - aims to help create "a northern powerhouse to rival London's thriving economy". The centre will have "hubs" in cities such as Sheffield, Leeds and Liverpool, and will aim to attract "world-class scientists to the north", the paper adds."

I don't have access to any more on this and it doesn't seem to be mentioned elsewhere but perhaps it's a follow up on earlier news referring to the proposed National Institute for Materials Research and Innovation:
"Northern Powerhouse science plans set out by Chancellor"
"Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne today (Wednesday 10 September) welcomed ambitious plans for a potential major new National Institute for Materials Research and Innovation in the north of England."
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/nort ... chancellor

[Stanley]

Frosty out there! Should I be thinking about lighting the stove....? My kitchen is the best insulated room in the house, only half of the exterior wall is exposed to the outside because of the out-shut workshop. It also has additional heat sources like the fridge, the kettle, the computer and of course my body heat. Perhaps I should turn the thermostat down even lower.....

[Stanley]

British Gas inform me that from now on I will receive only one energy bill covering both gas and electricity.

[PanBiker]

I have been on paperless billing for a few years now so nothing through the door for me. Payments on direct debit and I read my own meters. The system presents me with the status of my account each time I surrender a reading.

[Tizer]

Our newly insulated rooms are marvellous. Hardly need the radiators on whereas they used to be going full pelt all the time in winter. It's much more comfortable too, with a constant temperature. `Turning up' the insulation is much better than turning up the heat.

[Big Kev]

This cold snap has been testing the underfloor heating I installed earlier in the year. Very impressed so far.

[Stanley]

I'm snug as a bug in a rug but feeling guilty because I haven't lit the stove yet....

[Tizer]

I've just read the following comment on energy efficiency of light bulbs and tubes. I know there's a lot of wastage as heat but never realised it was so bad!
"Incandescent and halogen lights are fairly inefficient: only about 2-3% of the power produces useful light, the rest goes directly to heat (and a bit to ultraviolet light). Older fluorescent fixtures were better, around 9%, but the newest fluorescent lights and fixtures are even more so, and around 12% for the best Compact Fluorescent bulbs."

[PanBiker]

I have recently fitted a new centre light in our living room. It's a five arm candelabra type with upward fitting lamps. We have 5 x Warm White (clear) candle lamps which are each multiple LED arrays arranged around the centre of the lamp. B22 bayonet fitting 300LM, 3000k, equivalent of 25w lamp. They each consume 3W so the entire fitting is now running at 15W for 125W equivalent output. The lamps a have a 2 year warranty on each, instant warm up and 20,000 hour life expectancy.

Our local lighting shop said that their running costs for keeping the shop displays of all the different fittings going used to cost £325 to run. Current consumption on low energy and LED's is down to £79 but they are aiming for £32.00.

[Stanley]

On top of that Tiz, you have to add the over 80% energy loss between the fuel supply at the power station to the meter in your house. This was why old-fashioned steam engines were so much more efficient than the mains, running at about 30% overall efficiency to the end use.
Very hard frost this morning. I've got the message, the stove is lit and has settled down very quickly. I'm glad I did all my flue-cleaning and preparation during the summer! Old habits die hard and save a lot of trouble do your maintenance in the warm weather! When I was in the boiler trade there was always a flood of calls for help with leaky tubes etc at the first winter start up for heating.

[Stanley]

I've dropped straight into stove mode and am happy to report that the CH is almost moribund.... I know it's costing me just as much but it feels better because the coal stock is bought and paid for and sitting there in the back yard.... Old fashioned or what?

[Pluggy]

Doesn't somebody nicking it out of your yard concern you Stanley ?

I wouldn't mind somebody nicking gas providing it's not my side of the meter.....

[Pluggy]

The government are making contingency plans for their lack of forethought on electric generation.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-30491173

[Stanley]

I can't spend time worrying about what might happen Plugs. It's got to be stored somewhere and the bath is full of books.....

I asked a mate in the US how much heating oil costs them, here's what he wrote, work out the conversions for yourself....

"About 325 pence per imperial gallon. We prepaid that amount it now looks possible to buy an imperial gallon for $3.60. Probably far cheaper than in the UK." Anyone have a comparison?

[Pluggy]

According to http://www.boilerjuice.com/heating-oil-prices/ the average price today in the UK is 46.39p per litre which I make to be £2.10 per imperial gallon. Its been steadily dropping for the last 12 months. It comes out at around $3.30 per imperial gallon at the present exchange rate.

There isn't the crippling amount of tax on heating oil as there is on road fuel, so there isn't much difference here.

Interestingly, if you work out the heating value of oil, its a very similar price today as using domestic gas.

[Tizer]

I knew that the power companies such as EDF and Npower had been told to provide customers with loft insulation and the like, and were being penalised if they failed to carry out the full commitment. What I didn't realise is that power station companies such as Drax that don't have domestic customers have been told to do the same...and now they are being penalised too. Drax is being fined £28 million for not putting in enough insulation in people's homes. The boss has complained that her company doesn't have any contact with domestic customers so it's difficult to carry out the project but they're not getting any sympathy.

To add to Drax's pain the Government expresses concern that its subsidy for biomass power generation has seen much more take-up than expected and it's going to cut the subsidy. Does that sound familiar? Yes, the `unexpected rate of uptake' of the subsidy for PV panels a few years ago which was then cut several time from its 40p+ level to below 20p. It makes you wonder whether the Government deliberately sets an artificially high subsidy to create interest and then acts all innocent about having to cut it. A bit like setting a low price on Royal Mail perhaps?

Heating oil price...through our local syndicate I've just bought 500 litres at 41p a litre exc VAT.

[Pluggy]

The solar panel subsidy was set high to attract people into buying them to get the market moving and bring the price of panels down, which it has done. You can get a much larger setup than mine at substantially less than I paid for mine. The present subsidy is little more than the retail price of electric, but they are still a pretty reasonable investment. Shopping around you can get a 4kWp system for around £5000 nowadays, compared with my 2.5kWp system which cost me the better part of £8000. My brother has just had some put in. The UK hasn't done a Spain (yet) and knocked the subsidies on the head altogether, there are a lot of sore solar panel owners in Spain...

The oil price on the website I linked was including VAT, so probably around the same you bought it for.

[chinatyke]

I have recently fitted a new centre light in our living room. It's a five arm candelabra type with upward fitting lamps. We have 5 x Warm White (clear) candle lamps which are each multiple LED arrays arranged around the centre of the lamp. B22 bayonet fitting 300LM, 3000k, equivalent of 25w lamp. They each consume 3W so the entire fitting is now running at 15W for 125W equivalent output. The lamps a have a 2 year warranty on each, instant warm up and 20,000 hour life expectancy.

Our local lighting shop said that their running costs for keeping the shop displays of all the different fittings going used to cost £325 to run. Current consumption on low energy and LED's is down to £79 but they are aiming for £32.00.

Hi Ian. I bought 5 of those 3W bulbs and find them great and give a very diffused light in the small room I use as a computer den. I'll buy these as replacements from now onwards. I don't like the compact fluorescent type bulbs and they seem to have a life span of about 2 minutes!

I have an open plan lounge and dining area and there are 22 x 25W bulbs and 8 x 40W bulbs in the 3 main light fittings. These are the old fashioned incandescent bulbs and the total demand is 870W. I should change these to 22 x 3W and 8 x 4W for a total demand of 98W. Unfortunately the new bulbs would cost over £42 (Internet price for Philips, Osram or Opple) and have a pay-back time in excess of 12,000 hours using the present cost of electricity here. So I'll just change them one at a time as the old ones fail. When I kitted out this apartment 2 years ago I bought 72 incandescent bulbs from the local supermarket. I think the lesson to be learned is that if you are setting up from new then you should invest in the latest LED type.

I have just bought 2 floodlights for my rooftop garden project. These are also the new LED type. Only 50W power consumption for 8000 lumen output of white light at 6000 - 6500K. They are claimed to be the equivalent of 500W of incandescent bulbs but I think they are better than the 500W garden floodlights that were the only thing available a few years ago. Also have a supposed life of 50,000 hours with only 5% light decay after 10,000 hours. Should see me out! The cost was £6 each, isn't technology wonderful?

[Stanley]

I wonder whether the white light from the new LED sources is better at alleviating SAD than the old lamps? You could get properly balanced light screens for this at one time but they were very expensive.

[Tizer]

I'm interested in these 3W warm white bulbs that Ian and China are talking about. Can one of you post a link to a page showing them for sale, e.g. on Amazon, so I can get a better idea what they're like? Are they only in candle shape or can you get spherical too?

[Pluggy]

Here you go Tiz :

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Philips-8W-48 ... 2c805dbc3b

I think I'll splash out and try a couple.

[PanBiker]

Here's another link, similar to mine showing how the Led's are arranged:

B22 Crompton 3w LED

It should be noted that if you have dimmers or need the facility you need a different lamp. The blurb will state if they are non dimmable.

[chinatyke]

Here you go Tiz :

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Philips-8W-48 ... 2c805dbc3b

I think I'll splash out and try a couple.

Jeez! £10 each. Absolutely ridiculous! It will take you forever to break even with those. Rip off Britain. The same things are £1.50 here (3Watts) also made by Philips and is the price I based my calculations on. I can get 7Watt ones at the same price. Think I should start shipping you a few over Steven or selling them myself on E-Bay.

http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a2 ... 465&is_b=1

Tiz I use the white ones, colour temp 6-6500K and not the warm white ones which are yellowish and have a colour temp of around 3000K and are more like incandescent bulbs.

[chinatyke]

I wonder whether the white light from the new LED sources is better at alleviating SAD than the old lamps? You could get properly balanced light screens for this at one time but they were very expensive.

Stanley, my guess is that they would be better because the CRI (colour rendering index) is more like daylight with this type of bulb, over 80% CRI. It is my understanding that you need to have a lot of light to alleviate SAD and because these new LED bulbs only use about 10% of the power of the old fashioned bulbs you can have lots more of them. I am told it is because they emit light in the visible wavelengths and not as much in the invisible infrared and UV wavelengths. Incredibly they are still only 20 - 30% efficient but that is good compared to incandescent bulbs which are only about 2% efficient at producing visible light. Strange how something only 2% efficient has lasted over 100 years.

[Pluggy]

Here you go Tiz :

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Philips-8W-48 ... 2c805dbc3b

I think I'll splash out and try a couple.

Jeez! £10 each. Absolutely ridiculous! It will take you forever to break even with those. Rip off Britain. The same things are £1.50 here (3Watts) also made by Philips and is the price I based my calculations on. I can get 7Watt ones at the same price. Think I should start shipping you a few over Steven or selling them myself on E-Bay.

http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a2 ... 465&is_b=1

Tiz I use the white ones, colour temp 6-6500K and not the warm white ones which are yellowish and have a colour temp of around 3000K and are more like incandescent bulbs.

I can openly criticize the government - priceless.

I occasionally buy stuff from China over ebay, typically half or less price but 2 or 3 weeks delay and a fair proportion of the stuff going missing enroute.

Nope, at 2p a unit or whatever price you pay in China, they'll never pay for themselves, They probably won't pay for themselves at UK prices over the much cheaper but thirstier CFLs. The wife craves something that looks a little more like an old school incandescent. Given the choice I'd have the higher colour temperature lamps, but I got it in the neck when I put some in recently.....