My heating was on for two hours yesterday…

[AchillesLastStand]

My heating was on for two hours yesterday, on in the morning for an hour and in the evening. We had one bath yesterday which the boiler heats the water for. We shared the same water. I logged onto Bulb to see the energy costs for yesterday, £4.50 for gas, £3.50 for electricity. It’s unsustainable if it goes up again in October. My 8 year old DS is under his bedcovers with his tablet because the heating has had to go off.

We just got our gas bill from 48 days until 31 March. It was 62 pounds. Going forward it will be 110 pounds approx for the same period on the new rate. Bit of a shocker. H won't turn off the heating as it was snowing yesterday. We have it set to come on twice a day for a short period of time and if it gets very cold. Hot water is instant from gas boiler.

The uk is a rich country with plenty of talent. Not entitled to cheap energy by any means but it would be easily available (as it is here where I am now) if the right investments had been made. Like Cameron not getting rid of the ‘green shit’ in the building regs 12 years ago for example. Thousands of households would be in a much stronger position right now.

FFS. Ice inside houses is BAD AND UNPLEASANT AND A POOR STANDARD OF LIVING It wasn't. I hate overheated centrally heated houses.

Yesterday Electric cost us £3.44 we do use a lot of electric has our cooker is electric.
Gas was £4.00 we had the heating on for 1 hour in the morning, an hour in the afternoon and 4 hours throughout the night to keep the bedroom warm for the baby.

The Tories have taken us back into the 1950's in so many ways, Except for housing costs, they kept those in the 21st centaury

@AchillesLastStand Renewable energy isn't the answer. You can't run a country on a bit of wind or a bit of sun. Solar panels and wind turbines are also resource hungry items to manufacture and cannot be recycled at the end of their lives either ( as can't lithium batteries). However many turbines you put up - you could cover the country with them - if the wind doesn't blow they don't produce power, so a back up supply is always needed to cover periods when there is little wind (like this winter just gone). Similarly, fields of solar panels spend a large part of 24 hours producing nothing at all. For the government to expect a first world country to rely on such means of power generation is ill thought out, to say the least. It is their fault we are in this situation, for failing to make a move to build more nuclear power stations, and allowing our gas storage to go unmaintained and become unusable. They also allow the electricity companies to profit greatly. You watch them rake it in. Champagne all round for them, while the rest of us shiver, or even freeze to death. And all this when the UK only produces 1% of CO2 that enters the atmosphere, so our struggling to become net zero with have virtually zilch effect on world emissions, so what exactly is the point? We could just have gone on as we were and nothing would have changed!
Anyway, my particular bugbear is illuminated cities. What a waste. It should be illegal to leave lights on in unoccupied buildings, or else all the lights should be PIR. Just look at Britain from space, lit up like a christmas tree.

[quote Porcupineintherough]@newstart1234 and why are the options to households either fossil fuels or a cold home? It's not like there havent been alternatives available for years. Anyway, we can burn all the fossil fuels we want worse luck if we are willing to pay for them. Difference is that a lot more people in the world are in a position to buy them also. We arent entitled to cheap fuel just cause were British.[/quote]
I had a look yesterday, out of curiosity, what it would cost to install a wood burner.

Which would be an environmental issue yes, but given the choice between the environment and their family freezing, most people will go with the fossil fuel option.

I live in a relatively new build, one of thousands of new builds hurled up with gardens way too small for heat pumps to ever be a possibility. I could make the (several thousand pounds) outlay for said fossil fuel heat source in the house, however it isn't possible in this house. There isn't anywhere one could be safely put, these small houses were never designed for it.

Unsafely put, yes. We're going to see, as discussed on radio this morning, deaths from people trying to use fire pits and bbqs in their houses and carbon monoxide deaths from trying to find experimental sources of heat as well as just plain hypothermia.

People have got too comfortable with hot houses

Fucking hell. This will teach us for having comfortable lives and daring to stay warm when inside. 🙄.

I can’t imagine what kind of health problems will make a come back when people are cold all the time. Breathing difficulties, chest infections, Pneumonia and bronchitis. But we’ve got too used to affordable medicine and free at point of care health system too. This will bring us back down to Earth thankfully. 🙄.

Entitlement is a tricksy concept.

I do think we need heating though, being British, because Britain is quite far North so there are a lot of days in the year when temperatures are below 15 degrees or so which means indoor unheated temperatures can fall below 18 degrees. This is the point at which low temperature starts to have physiological effects eg raised blood pressure etc. Also being Britain there's a lot of moisture in the air which together with our stupidly high water table means that we're more likely to have asthma and other breathing conditions, all of which are exacerbated by cold.

So we do need indoor heating in this country and there are public health impacts if we don't have it.

There are also lots of other things we can do - house batteries, giant storage batteries - other ways of capturing excess energy and storing it for when we need it.

A diverse mix of power generation, energy efficiency, energy storage - but that is for the future.

There are issues now about the cost of energy.

@newstart1234

I’m at home now, it’s about -3 outside and it’s warm in here the heating is on almost always. It’s connected to a not-for-profit, privately run district heating provider, who are given a license to do so from the council. It cost less than the cost of a new boiler to connect our house around 10 years ago. The price hasn’t risen for 6 years. It’s powered by burning a combination of household waste and biomass, totally sustainable. The next price review will be in 2024 and if they put prices up too much the council will remove their license. Thousands of houses in this area are connected and the more than connect, the more efficient it becomes meaning the price may actually drop at the review. Local British councils actually pay this company to dispose of their waste. Needless to say, my house in not in Britain.

I appreciate the environmental argument for not burning fossil fuels to make heat, but the options available to households in Britain are fossil fuels or a cold home. I don’t know why people say in the 70s it was the case so it’s fine now. I assume it was considered unpleasant/dangerous in the 70s also to be cold. And technology has improved a lot since and surely we can expect warmth as a basic norm.

Minus 3?! Where are you? It's 12 degrees here in north yorks! We're at a theme park in t shirts

Can I ask what the average price is per kwh is now for electric.

I am in another country and the pricing is crazy here as well.

@vickibee

I have a fully lined chimney so I don’t think it would take much to get to get an open fire pit in. I am considering this, would it be a good idea? I am happy to sit in the cold and will get a blanket or HW bottle but my son seems to think it’s ok to sit in shorts and T Shirt and have CH on full blast. He has three or four showers a day he’s going to have to reduce it down It’s just me and him

3 or 4 showers a day? Are you exaggerating? If not I'd genuinely be very concerned he was in the beginnings or OCD - genuinely

@Artichokeleaves and if the government hadnt wimped out of upping the building regs 10 years ago your new build would be snug in winter, cool in summer and cheap to as chips toheat. It would also come with solar panels on the south facing part of your roof and there would be a south facing part of roof because the entire estate would have been orientated for solar gain (with suitable overhangs on the windows to prevent overheating in summer). I'm sorry that didnt happen, a lot of us campaigned for it.

All European countries are facing the same issues but in France for example their prices are rising bumpy just 4 Percent.
We have had no long term energy plan for years and it has come back to bite us.

@isthismylifenow

Can I ask what the average price is per kwh is now for electric.

I am in another country and the pricing is crazy here as well.

The price cap is set at:

About 28p per KWH for electricity AND a daily charge of about 45p
Gas - about 7p per KWH and a daily charge of about 27p

Some people will be on fixed rates though - which can vary widely depending on the deal you got at the time

@newstart1234

I’m at home now, it’s about -3 outside and it’s warm in here the heating is on almost always. It’s connected to a not-for-profit, privately run district heating provider, who are given a license to do so from the council. It cost less than the cost of a new boiler to connect our house around 10 years ago. The price hasn’t risen for 6 years. It’s powered by burning a combination of household waste and biomass, totally sustainable. The next price review will be in 2024 and if they put prices up too much the council will remove their license. Thousands of houses in this area are connected and the more than connect, the more efficient it becomes meaning the price may actually drop at the review. Local British councils actually pay this company to dispose of their waste. Needless to say, my house in not in Britain.

I appreciate the environmental argument for not burning fossil fuels to make heat, but the options available to households in Britain are fossil fuels or a cold home. I don’t know why people say in the 70s it was the case so it’s fine now. I assume it was considered unpleasant/dangerous in the 70s also to be cold. And technology has improved a lot since and surely we can expect warmth as a basic norm.

Are you in The Netherlands?

[quote Porcupineintherough]@AchillesLastStand absolutely but the tories have had a lot of support over the last 12 years and the public squeal every time they are expected to shell out for environmental protection. "Green tax" is very unpopular.

@beattieedny the vulnerable have been dying for years, just in dusty countries a long way away. And they are dying now of famine and innundation as the climate changes. Many dont get to reach old age before doing so. Meanwhile we huff if we cant flush wetwipes down the drain or heat our hot tubs. The uk is plenty rich enough to clean up its act and stop its own people dying - if it wanted to.[/quote]
Yes, I am aware of that, given most of my relatives live in Israel, which, although a rich enough place itself, has some poor neighbours. Don't be patronising, it's clear I was referring to this country specifically. Sheesh.

@PlainJaneEyre

We just got our gas bill from 48 days until 31 March. It was 62 pounds. Going forward it will be 110 pounds approx for the same period on the new rate. Bit of a shocker. H won't turn off the heating as it was snowing yesterday. We have it set to come on twice a day for a short period of time and if it gets very cold. Hot water is instant from gas boiler.

I don't see where the press quoted % increases are coming from as we were using 1.30 worth of gas a day and now will be 2.30 a day. 77% increase.

[quote MurmuratingStarling]@MyNameIsAngelicaSchuyler

The planet has limited resources and we’ve created a world where we take take take without replenishing. No one cares until it hits their pockets.

100% this. ^[/quote]
Who says it has limited resources?

@springssprung
It’s a sensory thing he seeks out water, he sits under the water and it calms him down. He doesn’t actually use soap becuase of the smell.
He has asd and spd.

@MrMrsJones

When I was a kid, we only had heating in the lounge.

People have got too comfortable with hot houses

I know these damn kids don’t know they are born. We should probably bring back working from 14 and send the kids out to make some extra money. Remove these choices for higher education and get more in the workforce right?

There are households with people living with long-term conditions, including dementia and frequent delirium.

Even for peripheral arterial disease and heart failure, we're supposed to encourage our family and friends to move around, even if it is within the house.

I doubt many people would be OK about policing how many layers their loved ones wear at such times, especially if they have sensory issues, and they do wander/move around the house (at odd hours for those with dementia) so houses can need some degree of heating that is far from a hot house.

I don't have the heating on overnight. the only thing running is the fridge and freezer which I use because I batch cook once a month then microwave the meals I eat daily.
I have the heating on for an hour only if the house drops below 13 . wear thermal base layers, scarf, fingerless gloves and a hat in the house to keep warm. I boil the kettle once a day and put the water in a thermos for the day. . I have a heated throw. I do laundry 1 wash a week. I can't cut my usage anymore its still £90 a month doing that.. I,m on a fixed pension. My 77 year old mother is beside herself with worry. she is only on a state pension so even worse position.

We need to be proactive and start taking the government to task on this. They clearly don’t give a shit and are happy to sit back and let people freeze, starve and lose everything. Are there any protests planned?