Politics: Cameron - climate change or not

31 to 60 of 91

- CommentAuthorjamesingram
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014 edited
trying to change something by tackling the wrong end (the demand end) rather than where the problem is (the supply end).
Still cant see why demand cant influence supply, going back to the power of the purchaser and ethical consumer etc. we touched on previously.
Or in this instant do you mean only regarding the energy market as we seem to currently have little control or opertunity to influence as consumers
- CommentAuthorjamesingram
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014 edited
If it was a "Collective Consciousness" then what would it be?
Humanism?
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014 edited
Posted By: jamesingramStill cant see why demand cant influence supply
It can, and it will be influences by demand, but slowly.
If you are trying to quickly cut demand while also creating a cleaner supply, then dealing with 20 or so suppliers is easier than 30 million users.
Trouble is that the government is scared of upsetting the voters, what all that nonsense about the recent price rises has shown. Most people are not in any real difficulty in paying their bills but do waste too much. Pushing up the price is a fast way to make them think twice (on here we are not typical), creating a system that is complicated, costly and open to abuse is not the way to do it, especially when it is openly acknowledge that it is not going to save the consumer any money. All that has to happen is that you have to use less than any price increase raises it by. For most people that is quite achievable. Even I have managed to save some more on my very small usage at very low cost (the payback is going to be under 2 years and I initially thought it would be decades).

Might be time for some arithmetic.

Usage 10,000 kWh/year
Increase from 16p to 16.8p/kWh (that's 5%)

Price at 16p/(kWh.year) is Â£1600
Price at 16.8p/(kWh.year) is Â£1680
Reduction needed 476 kWh or 4.8%

I think most households could save that amount without much difficulty. The biggest problem is that it is only an Â£80 saving a year, so hard to charge someone more than that even if they do save that amount year on year. Gets even harder when you look at gas prices and E7 at 6p/kWh.
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014
All be discussed before but many people do not bother with better energy efficiency as it takes to long to pay back. If however everyone got a basic minimum living quota of electricity at a cheap rate and all electricity over this base amount was expensive it would have the effect of shortening the payback time considerably. If it takes 15 years to recoup the outlay on EWI or solar panels most people with little spare cash won't do it but if the payback time were reduced to say 2 or 3 years then maybe people would think about it.

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014 edited
Would that minimum quota be a personal allowance or a household allowance? Would it take into account different geographic areas, different types of builds or SAP ratings, how about just different sized housing, larger houses use less per square metre than small ones, that would hurt the very old in small houses more than the very rich in large under occupied housing.
- CommentAuthorjamesingram
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014 edited
I've always thought a tax shuffle works well .
HMG says ' we've put 10% on energy cost , in return well reduce Vat on insulation and related products and service to equal that amount ( which was kind of what they have been doing with CERTs prior to the green deal , unfortunately to much confusing layering to eat up the potential saving to consumer). Unfortunately it's all a bit bent with the big 6 plus who knows who's profiteering and skimming

I was thinking about my PV heat dump today and if it would be better to export . I walked outside and looked at my neighbours 250W security light blazing away midday and thought , stuff that,better I make use of it myself
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014
Posted By: SteamyTeaWould that minimum quota be a personal allowance or a household allowance? Would it take into account different geographic areas, different types of builds or SAP ratings, how about just different sized housing, larger houses use less per square metre than small ones, that would hurt the very old in small houses more than the very rich in large under occupied housing." alt="" src="http:///forum114/extensions/Vanillacons/smilies/standard/wink.gif" >

Yet ST, you seem to favour a system where the poor old in their small houses would be priced out and only the rich could afford energy For an intelligent man you really are stupid sometimes

So to reduce the amount of energy used by people on average without pricing out the poor how would you do it then ST

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014
Posted By: JontiFor an intelligent man you really are stupid sometimes
Not as stupid as the people that can claim for funding and don't. These are the preople you need to talk to. There so many mechanisms in place to help these people, why are they not benefiting from it. As we have already discussed, if they have saved every bit of energy they can, then they will not be in fuel poverty.
If you give out free money you don't raise people out of poverty.
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014 edited
Posted By: JontiSo to reduce the amount of energy used by people on average without pricing out the poor how would you do it then ST
Something along James idea, raise money on fuel to directly subsidies those that cannot understand, be bothered, cannot afford etc to get the building improved. I think that most people could make a 25 to 30% saving with just a few hundred pounds of investment, not thousands that the GD and ECO think is needed.
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2014
ST,

so instead of reducing the amount of energy they use you think they should be subsidisedHow do you think you can make them save the 25% to 30% after all it is not every tenant who is lucky enough to have a landlord who forces them to see the error of their ways

Jonti
- CommentAuthorfostertom
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014
Posted By: SteamyTeaIt is the sum of human behaviour
'It' meaning Economics? ALL human behaviour?? - I give you a chance to qualify that incriminating statement!
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014 edited
Economics is a social science, not really a real science (which has to have a mathematical underpinning and be proved to infinity, but that is another issue). What it looks at is human behaviour and has little to do with money. What it does look at is how people behaviour in the market place. A market place can be a small isolated village or a global corporation, it makes no difference. What economics looks at is how people behave and respond.

So take a grain market in Algeria or the World Grain Trading Markets and you will see that when the resource is scare the price goes up, when it is plentiful the price goes down. That is simple supply and demand. What you will also see is that if the price is too high then alternatives are bought instead.
Now let us transfer that to the energy market.
In the UK we have about 20 suppliers, 6 or 7 main one. The price is pretty similar across the board. There is a little bit of swapping of supplier to take advantage of short term price reduction, but over about 4 years they tend to even out (can argue about fractions of a pence on a kWh or meter rental, but not worth it).
Now all the supplier put their prices up by 5% or so, there will be a little flurry of swapping supplier, but again not a significant amount to actually change the mean price paid across the board.
Now, and this is where it gets interesting, some people will seek alternatives, those may be home generation (a bit of PV) or reduction in usage though insulation and newer existing (to the home owner) technology i.e. a new gas boiler. You would not see this sort of swapping if the price dropped. Also what happens, but is harder to monitor, is people swapping one seemly unrelated item for another, say a newer car for not having a foreign holiday, or to just pay the bills.

So you can see that human behaviour is changed by the capacity to purchase a resource, though not always in the way you think. And that is Economics.
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014
Yes ST, all very good but those who cannot afford the electricity can also not afford the improvements nor are many LL interested in improvements to housing. All of what you say applies to the present situation yet not enough people have been convinced.

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014 edited
The reason that land lords and tenants are not improving their properties is because the cost of energy is not that high, they can choose not purchase something else to pay the bills.

If we took a scenario where energy prices quadrupled overnight, making the price of energy about 20% of income, land lords would have to reduce rent in the least energy efficient housing (there is not an endless supply of very low income tenants). While energy costs are about 5% (on average, not for everyone) this will not happen. Rents will rise to mop up any spare cash in that market sector. Tenants have a responsibility to themselves to manage their expenditure, just because they are not property owners does not mean they have no choices at all. A friend of mine works for a fuel poverty charity and he is often amazed by the spending choices and decisions of the fuel poor. Possibly why the definition has been changed to take this into account. If we had no definition for fuel poverty would we be able to classify a group of people like this. I seem to remember that under the last definition (10% of household earnings) that the Queen was in fuel poverty.
But rather than accept my description of what is going on, let us take your idea of giving away a minimum amount of energy, but you have to specify exactly what that amount is before I can counter it. So how much in kWh/year would you give away as the bare minimum?
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014
Posted By: SteamyTeaThe reason that land lords and tenants are not improving their properties is because the cost of energy is not that high, they can choose not purchase something else to pay the bills.

ST, do you really believe this?

I would suggest that the reason that LL do not improve the properties is because they do not have to pay the energy bill indeed the only LL I know of who was interested in his tenant reducing their use of energy use was one where the live in LL was also paying the energy bills.

On the other side, do you seriously think that a tenant on a 6 month contract is going to spend several thousand pounds of their own money on EWI insulation or other expensive improvements?
I agree that many people have some very interesting choices on what to spend their money on when at the same time pleading poverty and can imagine that your friend is often exasperated by many of the people she/he has to deal with.

However not everybody is that way and some people who are responsible with the little money they have are still struggling to pay the bills. Electricity is a necessity and as such there should be a safe guard that everyone can afford the bare minimum whatever this level is deemed to be. At the same time we as a nation are committed to reducing our emission levels and are also facing an ever nearing gap in the level of production compared to demand.

So far the increase in energy prices seen in the past few years has had no effect on LL in regard to improving their buildings nor has it had much effect on tenants paying to improve other peoples property. I fail to see any reason that your solution of quadrupling the cost of energy would not alter the attitude of LL or tenants. So in effect all it does is boost the profit margins of the energy companies from around 5% to an eye watering 300%+

I admit that my concept is very simple but I would suggest a minimum unit allowance of say 8 kWh per person per day at a cost of say 10p per unit including the standing charge. Then let the energy companies set whatever price that they need to be able to make a profit and that they believe the market will carry. This would have the effect of shortening the payback time on home improvements considerably and so encourage more people to carry them out.

For LL there would have to be an energy rating whereby they would have to have the basic heating energy costs of their properties below a certain level or they would not be able to rent out.
This should lead to people improving their energy use, lower emissions and energy consumption whilst still allowing those who wish to spend more money on.

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014
Posted By: JontiST, do you really believe this?
Yes, I believe the reason that we do not do much to improve energy usage is because it is not financially worth it.

Land Lords charge the maximum they can. As long as tenants can afford it then everyone is happy, what contract law is all about. It is not one sided. Land lords want a full house, tenants want somewhere to live. The price suits both parties.
Tenants only have so much money to spend, if they could afford the rent and council tax only, but could not afford the utility bills, then the choices is to move/find somewhere cheaper, renegotiate with the land lord or just sit tight till they are evicted. I think that most tenants are realistic enough to take energy bills into account and most land lords will check that their tenants (or future tenants) can afford to pay.
Increasing the price could be via taxation, it does not have to be via excess profits for the energy companies. I would prefer it via central taxation.

I currently pay a little under11p/kWh all in (that is meter rental, all taxes, etc). I thought you wanted cheap power for the people. Also at 8 kWh/day, for a house of 2, that would be 5,840 kWh/year, just slightly over what I use (but I am not typical but I am not freezing, going unwashed or living by candlelight). You have to bear in mind that I have what is considered the most expensive and uncontrollable heating system there is, I made it work. So you are not really offering anything that is not available at the moment. It is there for the taking if people care to take an interest.
Read this if you want to know how 3 similar households use energy differently:
http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/forum114/comments.php?DiscussionID=9794&page=2#Item_2

Rental properties already need an EPC and I believe some local authorities have a compulsory register for land lords and that they can enforce improvements, though not sure if that is just for safety/health rather than reducing the energy use to make it more affordable.

If you want to see very low energy housing in the marketplace, raise the price of energy than improvements will happen. Start creating a complicated system of 'cheap necessary energy', or worse still price control and you will see higher rents and higher energy bills.
- CommentAuthorbrazenscroll
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014
As a building services engineer who has to design buildings to meet ever more stringent SBEM requirements I see more and more that it is the electricity we use in buildings which is the killer criteria. To effectively reduce CO2 emissions we have to reduce electricity. Think about your own house. How many appliances do you have which are switched on all the time? 5? 10? Would you believe the UK average is 23?

How many of us have security lights, doorbells, burglar alarms, bedside alarms, ovens, routers, washing machines, microwaves, TVs, surround sound, VHS, DVD, Wii, Xbox, cordless phones, phone chargers, laptop chargers,......ALL always on. We call this "parasitic power" and if you add it all up it becomes significant and frightening.

TURN IT OFF was never more appropriate......
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2014
How many of us have security lights No
doorbells No
burglar alarms Disconnected as faulty
bedside alarms No
ovens Disabled timer
routers Yes and back up and my worse parasitic loss
washing machines Yes, but use at night
microwaves No
TVs No
surround sound No
VHS No
DVD No
Wii No
Xbox No
cordless phones No
phone chargers Yes, but really used and unplugged
laptop chargers Yes

I also have 4 radios, two DAB's ones that I have not checked the usage of yet and two windup/solar ones that last weeks before they need a top up charge.

All my lighting is now 8W CLF but rarely more than one light on at a time.

My biggest parasitic usage was a PC used for energy monitoring, got rid of that now as it was using 2.4 kWh/day.

Since fitting my set back timers to my heating and water I have very rarely had to use my fan heater, though it is a mild winter.

I am trying to get the bulk of my energy usage between 4 AM and 6AM as the Grid Intensity is pretty low (for electricity) then.
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 11th 2014 edited
Posted By: SteamyTea
Posted By: JontiST, do you really believe this?
Yes, I believe the reason that we do not do much to improve energy usage is because it is not financially worth it.

I just have difficulty believing anyone is serious in the belief that a tenant on a 6 month contract is going to spend Â£25K on EWI, 3G windows, etc. because the price of electricity goes up four fold. There is no evidence that I have seen to show that when energy prices increase there is an equivalent increase in expenditure on rented properties energy performance. Weren't the energy certificates available on a self assessment basis over the internet where owners filled in the house details and the online company sent the certificate through the post?

Posted By: SteamyTea
Posted By: JontiST, do you really believe this?

I thought you wanted cheap power for the people.

No, as I have explained to you on other occasions I want affordable energy to cover a minimum amount.

Posted By: SteamyTea
Also at 8 kWh/day, for a house of 2, that would be 5,840 kWh/year, just slightly over what I use (but I am not typical but I am not freezing, going unwashed or living by candlelight).

Yet by your own figures you are using 3 kWh more per day at the moment and I do not believe that you are one of those people who is wasteful.

Posted By: SteamyTeaYou have to bear in mind that I have what is considered the most expensive and uncontrollable heating system there is, I made it work.

If your system is so bad why have you not changed it for a more efficient one. You moan on about tenants doing such things yet you yourself have been unwilling to do this in a property you own. Oh well maybe you think you tenant is going to pay for it

Posted By: SteamyTea So you are not really offering anything that is not available at the moment. It is there for the taking if people care to take an interest.

Am I? Could you please show me link to any offer that is on the basis I have described please.

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 11th 2014 edited
Posted By: JontiI just have difficulty believing anyone is serious in the belief that a tenant on a 6 month contract is going to spend Â£25K on EWI, 3G windows, etc
I would not expect the tenant to pay, move if they cannot afford the place yes. I would expect a Land Lord to pay, if they found they could not rent the place because it was priced out of the market segment, or reduce the rent to make the total outgoings the same i.e. what the market can stand.
Posted By: JontiThere is no evidence that I have seen to show that when energy prices increase there is an equivalent increase in expenditure on rented properties energy performance.
Rather supports my argument that current energy prices are not high. If they go too high then something will have to give, probably rents as a Land Lord does not want an empty property or a tenant owing money.

Posted By: JontiNo, as I have explained to you on other occasions I want affordable energy to cover a minimum amount.
But your minimum is not so far off what I pay, so you want to charge what you consider is already expensive. Make your mind up.
Posted By: JontiYet by your own figures you are using 3 kWh more per day at the moment and I do not believe that you are one of those people who is wasteful.
The key is in your answer "at the moment", it is winter. Come April I will be reducing the heat load and use less, bringing the average to below the 8kWh/(day.person) that you want as a minimum. Could encourage waste.

Posted By: JontiIf your system is so bad why have you not changed it for a more efficient one.
Two reasons:
I have got it working for me
Not financially worth it (see, the cheapness of my 'expensive electrical heating' energy is still cheaper than the alternatives)

Posted By: JontiCould you please show me link to any offer that is on the basis I have described please.
Bear in mind my usage pattern and tariff structure (open to all, no special discounts for me)
http://www.edfenergy.com/products-services/for-your-home/documents/product-terms/standard-variable.pdf
http://www.britishgas.co.uk/products-and-services/gas-and-electricity/our-energy-tariffs/Tariffs-A-Z.html
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 11th 2014 edited
Posted By: SteamyTea I would not expect the tenant to pay, move if they cannot afford the place yes. I would expect a Land Lord to pay, if they found they could not rent the place because it was priced out of the market segment, or reduce the rent to make the total outgoings the same i.e. what the market can stand.

So are you happy that the poor energy efficiency is kept as long as people can afford it? I would prefer an improvement in the energy efficiency of the poorer properties but then each to his own.

Posted By: SteamyTea Rather supports my argument that current energy prices are not high. If they go too high then something will have to give, probably rents as a Land Lord does not want an empty property or a tenant owing money.

The fact that increasing energy prices have had no effect on energy efficiency is proof for you that an increase in energy prices will improve energy efficiency. Well I guess there is no arguing with with such logic.

Posted By: SteamyTea The key is in your answer "at the moment", it is winter. Come April I will be reducing the heat load and use less, bringing the average to below the 8kWh/(day.person) that you want as a minimum. Could encourage waste.

But at the moment you are using more due to a poor heating system. With a system where you would pay much more for your poor heating system then maybe this would encourage you to change it

Your response to why you havenâ€™t altered you heating is interesting
Posted By: SteamyTea Two reasons:
I have got it working for me

But it is still inefficient and

Posted By: SteamyTea Not financially worth it (see, the cheapness of my 'expensive electrical heating' energy is still cheaper than the alternatives)

Which kind of supports the 8 kWh a day thing. It would just need the 3 kWh that you are using to cost enough to make you change your system. Yes, even someone like you might be persuaded.

Finally, I failed to find an offer on either of the links where the deal was X number of units at a certain price and then the rest at a higher rate. There are of course deals done on times of day energy is used but that is something different.

Jonti
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
ST,

upon reflection it seems to me that we are actually talking about the same thing namely altering peoples habits through price. I think you are correct that the price needs to be as such so as to force the owner to make the alterations. I still think that 8 kWh would be a good target but can see your point as to the amount you are using being close to this mark and so it seems that maybe a staged increase would be in order.

So how about

from 2015

0 to 8 kWh per peson being at 10p
the next 2 kWh at Â£1
above that at Â£2

Every 2 years there after the amount would be reduced by 1 kWh.

This would mean that at your present usage of 21 kWh with an allowance of 16kWh for the 2 people would cost 0-16kWh Â£1.60, 16.1 to 18 kWh Â£2 and 18.1-21 kWh Â£6 giving you a total bill of Â£9.60 per day. By 2025 this would have risen to 6 kWh giving Â£0.60, 6.1-8 kWh at Â£2 and 8.1 -21 kWh at Â£26 giving a grand total of Â£28.60 per day if consumption stay the same. Now wouldn't that be incentive to make a few improvements because the payback time was shorter.

Having said that I still prefer the idea of having a minimum allowance set by the state at a fixed price also set by the state and then allowing the energy providers to set what ever price they think the market can take above this.

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
Exactly, though I am not keen on Â£1 a unit let alone Â£2 a unit, but that is detail.
I am not sure where the optimum price break would be to encourage large scale investment without having to subsidies the technology directly, and I don't know the ideal payback period either, though anything over 5 years becomes very uncertain.

The real challenge is for the PV/ST and insulation/airtightness industry to come up with ways to improve housing cheaper while keeping up quality.
Not sure how they would respond to a massive increase in energy prices, probably push the 'payback' element strongly rather the 'investment' element as they do at the moment.
- CommentAuthorMikel
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
I presume any idea of an allowance is for whole house energy and not just electricity. Otherwise, it would merely encourage a switch from electricity to other forms of heating.
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014 edited
Yes Mike.
Energy is energy, what you do with it and what you can to with it, is up the individuals. So to answer Jonti's criticism about not being able to find different rates for the first units and for other extra units it is there under the E7 tariff. 70 to 80% of my energy usage is at 6.5p/kWh, some of that will be my first units in any day (cause it comes on at 1AM). So even if I proportioned all the meter rental to the first units I would still be buying in at under 10p/kWh (cause I use about 12 kWh in 3 hours for water and space heating).

If it was worthwhile I would probably fit an A2AHP, but as I would only need a 300 W output unit (900 W if run constantly during hours not sleeping or unoccupied) it would have to be very cheap (less than 5 years savings), very reliable (my heating has cost nothing in servicing in 28 years to the best of my knowledge), quiet (current heating is silent) and easy to use (all I have had to do is set some timers once). Big ask that, but that is the challenge for the 'home improvement' market.
A quick calculation shows that it would have to cost Â£350 to install, maintain and run for 5 years to make it worth me changing (though all my improvements except my windows have paid back in less than a year so far).
- CommentAuthorMikel
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
ST, I can see that, under the present situation, it is not worth your while to change your setup. It is possible that an A2AHP would reduce your energy consumption figures but not your costs. Does your house have a high thermal mass?

I just done a quick calculation based on Jonti's figures:

Prior to installing our heat pump, we (2 persons) used about 3000 kWh per year on electricity and 1500 litres of oil. So in round figures that is 18000 kWh, which is 49kWh per day. Cost would be Â£65.60 per day, nearly Â£24000 per yr.

It looks like we will not use more than 6000kWh of electricity this yr including our solar thermal/heat pump system. Cost estimate Â£1.60 per day, around Â£600 per yr.

I think I agree with Jonti that that would be an incentive.
- CommentAuthorJonti
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
Look, okay maybe I over did it a bit with the costs but hey

It is the principal that I think is important and I think it would be best to leave the higher tariff to the free market. I would actually suggest that the long term idea should be to a) reduce the use of energy in general and b) to make sure as much of the energy used was renewable so I would actually push the idea of stopping using gas all together though I suspect this would be pretty unpopular.

ST, your answer to my criticism is you know full well it is not what I mean. You know as well as I there is no such tariff. There is no shame in not being right all the time and being able to face up to this will make you a stronger person

Jonti
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
I think that if the overall costs of electricity was between 22 and 25p/kWh (just over double what I currently pay) then changing my heating system would be worth while. For a laugh I could do some scenarios based on my old bills to see what the outcomes would have been if I had changed technologies, could be interesting.
The house is timber frame with low thermal mass. I don't think that there is any advantage to having high thermal mass in the UK, you just end up paying somewhere else. Even the studies I have seen from the USA, mainly the Denver ones and one from Nevada, show only a tiny advantage, and they would not apply with the UK climate (though maybe East Anglia might benefit, but they all have bungalows there so starting from a different place).

Jonti
E7, is precisely what you describe, a fixed (by the fuse limit) at a cheaper rate. It may not be in the format you want, but it is a cheaper rate for a fixed amount, just not fixed at your arbitrary 8 kWh/(person.day). If a house had a 100A fuse and used 80% of that capacity (have to take diversity into account), then it could support 20 people, but I am just being silly there.
Trouble is most people do not think it is a good system as they feel it is uncontrollable. Too many people are now used to gas and the ability to heat on demand. Cost me very little to get a more manageable system (3 timers).
When we get smart metering and variable pricing, most people are not going to be able to cope with it, one reason I am wary of it. It will be a tax on the stupid or disinterested and do little to change behaviour unfortunate.
I agree that we should use more renewables, but we have a storage issue. One cheap and well tried storage method that we have a lot of historic data about is E7, so I may be ahead of the curve with it. Could be a case of 'Back to the Future'.
There was a letter in the Sunday Times claiming that the only technologies that can make demand are Coal, Nuclear and Gas. I agree that Gas is pretty good, not so sure about the other two. Though they all have their place, just like any technology (except for comical ringtones).
- CommentAuthorMikel
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
OK Jonti. It was a bit of fun. Sorry!

There is, however, a serious point here in that trying to set a rate will have consequences and probably unintended consequences too. Moreover, you would have to set a rate for oil, gas and coal as well. I am someway from being convinced that a centralised control system setting rates is going to be better that what we currently have. Would you put the politicians in charge?

ST, we have just joined this trial of a heating control system for heat pumps. One part of the trial is to see whether a time of use tarrif will give cost savings. As such, I have discussed this with those running the trial and pointed out that part of our house is timber frame and part modern block. They accepted that the timber frame having low thermal mass would not retain heat and therefore not benefit from running the heat pump at times of the low rate but did seem to think there might be a benefit in the block construction part. I'll keep you posted on this.

Mike
- CommentAuthorSteamyTea
- CommentTimeJan 12th 2014
Mike
Have they fitted some temperature loggers around the house?

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