Cheaper option to heat water?

Moanin

What's the cheaper option to heat water during the summer months when the central heating is switched off?
Im on natural gas for my central heating and this heats the water also.
I've been experimenting by leaving the immersion on all the time and my electricity bill hasn't increased an awful lot.
The other option is to set the gas to heat the water only at certain intervals during the morning, afternoon and evening.

Anybody any views or comments on which way is more efficient?

Thanks

Outkast_IRE

Moanin wrote: »

What's the cheaper option to heat water during the summer months when the central heating is switched off?
Im on natural gas for my central heating and this heats the water also.
I've been experimenting by leaving the immersion on all the time and my electricity bill hasn't increased an awful lot.
The other option is to set the gas to heat the water only at certain intervals during the morning, afternoon and evening.

Anybody any views or comments on which way is more efficient?

Thanks

Have your bills been estimated or read since you started leaving the immersion on?
and do some digging and you will find a topic on this already im open to correction on this but i believe the concensus was , if its hot water only the immersion is cheaper , but if you will be running the heating aswell as hotwater the gas is cheaper.
Get a timer fitted to the immersion switch it will be useful in your situation.

DoneDL

Agree with outcast I would choose an immersion on a timer.

Moanin

Thanks to all.
I spoke to a plumber and he said to leave the immersion on all the time when the heating is turned off (during the summer months) as it costs more to heat the water from cold and if it's on constant it's using less electricity. It does make sense really........

Outkast_IRE

Moanin wrote: »

Thanks to all.
I spoke to a plumber and he said to leave the immersion on all the time when the heating is turned off (during the summer months) as it costs more to heat the water from cold and if it's on constant it's using less electricity. It does make sense really........

It makes sense if you have a preinsulated cylinder that wont lose too much heat, and if you will be using water at various times , i would still say you would see a energy saving with a timer, as theres plenty of hours during the night there is no need at all for it to be on and as i said if its a good preinsulated one it wont lose much heat anyway.

DoesNotCompute

You could have a solar heating system installed, to heat the water all the time. Although it would cost a fortune to install, so it's hard to argue that this is a "cheaper" option.

JJJJNR

Turn everything off, when you need hot water boil the kettle.

Moanin

JJJJNR wrote: »

Turn everything off, when you need hot water boil the kettle.

What about when the kids need a bath?????

creedp

JJJJNR wrote: »

Turn everything off, when you need hot water boil the kettle.

I know your probably being facetious here but to be fair why do we bother building houses at all, shouldn't we just live in a shed. Be much cheaper and very environmentally friendly.

In relation to the OP, some people claim that if you have natural gas you would be better off heating the DHW with gas rather than the emersion especially if you have a seperate zone for DHW. If you don't and simply manually turn off the radiators during the non-heating season I don't know if there would be much of an advantage when you take the heat loss from the radiator circuits into a/c- would need to do the math!

M cebee

i would assume gas is cheaper if it's zoned separate or even turn off rads as suggested already

if it was year round electric water heating you could consider nightsaver(dual tarriff) and insulated cylinder-but prob not here for a season

i don't know any maths on solar

slavetothegrind

a fully insulated pressure cylinder will loose no more than 1 degree celcius in a 24 hour period if there is no draw on it. ( properly plumbed)
based on this leaving the immersion on all the time costs feck all.

an uninsulated cylinder or jacketed cylinder will cost ya plenty.

paddy147

DoesNotCompute wrote: »

You could have a solar heating system installed, to heat the water all the time. Although it would cost a fortune to install, so it's hard to argue that this is a "cheaper" option.

On Tuesday the 14th I will be gone solar,as thats when I get my solar system installed.

Lots of pics to follow.:)

NIMAN

paddy147 wrote: »

On Tuesday the 14th I will be gone solar,as thats when I get my solar system installed.

Lots of pics to follow.:)

Looking forward to it, as I have been googling a lot about cost benefit of solar myself recently.

Not sure if you will want to mention money etc, but looking forward to the pics.

By the end of the year people should be able to buy cylinders with air to water heat pumps, they are plugged in then plumbed the same way as a normal indirect cylinder with a coil but the larger ones need flueing to outside, they have a cop of 4.1ish, I don't know if they are going to be better than or worse than solar but they are going to be a lot cheaper/simplistic to install and something else to consider.

NIMAN

I was interested in this piece of kit

http://www.willis-renewables.com/how-it-works.htm

From what I can see, its like a solar immersion heater.

air

OP, I have the same setup and would recommend turning off your radiators and using your central heating boiler to heat the water twice a day or as required.
It almost never makes sense to heat water or anything else using electricity.
If you think about it, a good portion of our electricity is generated using gas. So gas is burned at the power station, turned into electricity, transported to your home and turned back into heat. There are major losses along the way and so you're far better off burning the gas where the heat is needed - in your home.
I use my gas central heating for hot water only during the summer months and find it very inexpensive - approx 20 euro per month.

In my opinion electric showers and other unncecessary high powered consumer devices should be banned, they have a huge impact on the size of demand swings on our national grid from day to night and this has a big knock on cost for everyone.

Moanin

air wrote: »

OP, I have the same setup and would recommend turning off your radiators and using your central heating boiler to heat the water twice a day or as required.
It almost never makes sense to heat water or anything else using electricity.
If you think about it, a good portion of our electricity is generated using gas. So gas is burned at the power station, turned into electricity, transported to your home and turned back into heat. There are major losses along the way and so you're far better off burning the gas where the heat is needed - in your home.
I use my gas central heating for hot water only during the summer months and find it very inexpensive - approx 20 euro per month.

In my opinion electric showers and other unncecessary high powered consumer devices should be banned, they have a huge impact on the size of demand swings on our national grid from day to night and this has a big knock on cost for everyone.

Thanks I think I will give this a go and see how it works.