Hot Water?

Endurance Man

So this has annoyed me since the day i stepped foot on this wonderful soil, the whole water heating mission. Having to switch on the heater every time u want to shower/bath, and then you have to try remember to switch it off, its bloody annoying. In my old house it was not such an issue as it had an electric thing to heat the shower, but the new place doesnt have this.
Why is it so in this country, and the uk i guess to? Why did i always have hot water in SA? We never had to turn on/off the thing, it was just always on.
Reason?

Hoagy

Maybe more suitable for the philosophy forum?

The_Conductor

Varying energy costs.
Energy costs over 6 times more to produce in Ireland (and nearly double what it costs in the UK) than it does in ZA.
Also- in ZA, most water is solar heated, and then pumped into a reservoir for immediate use as hot water- it is not the same as having an immersion heater running the whole time (quite apart from the fact that it would burn out in no time flat). Despite what you may think, solar heating of water would actually work in Ireland, it would just take a bit longer to heat than in ZA obviously. Kits for installing this are not yet readily available here though (when we think of solar energy in Ireland, we more often think of generating electricity- at about 20% efficiency, rather than heating water at 45% efficiency). Times and attitudes are changing though (helped no doubt by a 34% rise in gas bills on the 1st of October and a 28% rise in electricity costs from next 1st of January).

Shane

Endurance Man

smccarrick wrote:

Varying energy costs.
Energy costs over 6 times more to produce in Ireland (and nearly double what it costs in the UK) than it does in ZA.
Also- in ZA, most water is solar heated, and then pumped into a reservoir for immediate use as hot water- it is not the same as having an immersion heater running the whole time (quite apart from the fact that it would burn out in no time flat). Despite what you may think, solar heating of water would actually work in Ireland, it would just take a bit longer to heat than in ZA obviously. Kits for installing this are not yet readily available here though (when we think of solar energy in Ireland, we more often think of generating electricity- at about 20% efficiency, rather than heating water at 45% efficiency). Times and attitudes are changing though (helped no doubt by a 34% rise in gas bills on the 1st of October and a 28% rise in electricity costs from next 1st of January).

Shane

Well in all the houses that i lived in we had what we call a Geyser, im not sure if this works the same way as an immersion heater but it looks the same? Just a big round tank looking thing. We only ever used solar to heat our pool.
I guess the energy cost thing does make sense, not sure why its more expensive here though? Does the weather affect the power stations or is it the technology?

The_Conductor

Endurance Man wrote:

Well in all the houses that i lived in we had what we call a Geyser, im not sure if this works the same way as an immersion heater but it looks the same? Just a big round tank looking thing. We only ever used solar to heat our pool.
I guess the energy cost thing does make sense, not sure why its more expensive here though? Does the weather affect the power stations or is it the technology?

There is no good reason why its more expensive here to be honest.
The ESB were granted their rise in prices by the Energy regulator by virtue of the fact that they "only" generated 720 million in revenue in 2005- an undershoot of some 280 million. So..... consumers and businesses who thought they would save themselves some money and help the environment by being more energy efficient and using less energy are contrarily being hit with price hikes for not buying enough electricity. The production cost is not factored into this (nor the ESBs profit- which rose 12% in the year to the end of 2005), simply the raw cashflow......

As for gas..... arrrrgghhhh...... the week the Energy Regulator granted Bord Gais its 34% rise in prices was also the week where gas futures hit a bizzare level of -4c per cubic meter- that is the whole sale gas market was paying large consumer 4 cent per meter gas, not the other way around....... How that translates into a 34% rise in prices for domestic consumers- even the most hard nosed economist would be hard pressed to hazard a guess......

The only things these companies have in common- both have defacto monopolies in the domestic market place, both are state owned, both have silly average earnings (the average salary in the ESB is slightly over 3 times the average industrial wage at almost Euro 97,200 per annum), and concessions to unions have donated 15% of each company to the workforces. In short- they have the consumers from every possible angle, you can't win......

Its a wonder Eddie Hobbs never dug his teeth into the Irish energy market..... Maybe he reckoned he couldn't win either.......

DublinWriter

Endurance Man wrote:

Reason?

Look how much energy the average eletric kettle uses it terms of Wattage.

Now, imagine a great big 20 Litre electric kettle that always needs to be kept warm to almost boiling 24X7 so you can have hot water on a whim.