How many gas and electricity units are people using a day ?

[LaurieFairyCake]

I moved house a few weeks ago and I'm attempting to track my usage.

Currently using 4 units gas a day, 18 units of electricity

How does that compare?

(3 bed house, very well insulated)

can't help with gas as we don't have it, but electricity is about 8 a day. Home a lot, dishwasher every other day, washing 4-5 times a week, no drier, electric cooker, one TV.

Hmm, that suggests I'm using quite a bit of electricity. My usage sounds similar to yours though I do use the drier about 5 times a week.

14.5 units per day. ( Averaged over 87 days) Victorian detached , I am at home most days. 3 adults plus some washing and drying from other DD.

Our year-round average is about 18 units gas, 5 units electricity. This time of year gas is much lower (probably 2 units), but we are using solid fuel stove. Leccy remains fairly constant throughout the year.

We also have 3 bed house (semi, ~80 m^2), well insulated. No tumble drier, out most days. Tumble drier is the devil for electricity bills.

This time last year was about 10 units per day for electricity. Am not good about turning off lights and appliances although don't use the tumble drier too much. Need to get October's bill to see what it was for then as forgot to give meter reading in September and so it was estimated .

Gas was 0.4 ish units per day in September - last October was about 1 unit per day. Again will see what it was for this October soon.

Our year-round average is about 18 units gas, 5 units electricity.

Doesn't sound right. Is it the other way round? Is your gas meter measuring cubic metres?

Don't forget one cubic metre of gas is actually more in kwh.

In our old house one cubic metre was 10kwh.

about 11.2kWh per cu metre.

Old imperial meters (yes there still are some) are IIRC about 33kWh per hundred cubic feet.

nope, about 31.4
It varies with gas quality.

Apols... Working purely in kWh. It's been one of those weeks.

how do you tell how many units you use a day? I have no idea!!

going by what our annual usage next year will be it works out at roughly 14 kWh of electricity and 48 kWh of gas per day (dont know how to work out the units from the kWh though)

although if i go by PigletJohn's figure of 11.2kWh per cu metre it would be about 4 units of gas per day

ArtemisatBrauron

You look at your gas and electric meters. Preferably regularly once a month, keeping a record and also inputting the readings online or by phone to the supplier so you need never get an estinated bill.

IMO it is sufficient to record just the meter readings so you can see variations in usage, you can calculate the kWh equivalent for gas if and when you want to. It can be informative to see the difference betwen your average daily usage this year compared to last; or in a cold month compared to a warm month; or with adjustments to the timer or thermostat settings, or improvements to insulation. You will find the current price per kWh and the daily standing charge on your bill or the website.

Electric meters show the kWh usage anyway.

PigletJohn, in your opinion is it more economical to keep the gas on as background heat all day or let the house cool down and give it a blast of heat when it gets too cold?

not that one again!

heat loss is directly proportional to temperature difference and to time, in any one house at its size and level of insulation. You can reduce the basic figure for your house by insulating it better.

So keeping your house hot for 24 hours will lose twice as much heat as keeping it hot for 12. There will be a warm-up and a cool-down period that can be managed using the timer.

Keeping it at 20 degrees above outside temperature will lose twice as much per hour as keeping it at 10 degrees above outside temprature. Note this is not the same as keeping it at a temperature of 20 or 10 degrees. It is the difference between inside and outside that drives heat loss.

You might find it more comfortable to heat it 24 hours, but comfort is not the same as economy.

Thanks, PigletJohn. It's interesting how you talk about heat lost or "warming the outside" as opposed to heating the house.
I suppose I could do a comparison for two days just by looking at the meter.
Luckily our house is reasonably well insulated, since having cavity wall insulation put in and all the windows replaced.

Summer - electricity around 10 per day.
Winter - electricity around 17 per day.
Yearly average around 13/14.

Heating and hot water is oil, around 2000 litres a year.

Quite a big summer/winter difference. If no electric heaters or airers, what sort of lamps do you use?

was that to me PigletJohn? It is my underfloor conservatory heating I think!

and the electric kickboard heaters in the ajoining kitchen where we had to take the radiator out.

so about a pound a day on winter top-up electric heating

When you put it like that, it seems cheap compared to the oil!

26 - 28 units a day of electricity, no idea with gas.

5 bed detached house, well insulated, 2 x dishwasher loads per day, 3-4 x washing machine loads per day and everything is tumble dried year round.

We use 7-8 units of electric and this includes a tropical fish tank, occasional electric fire in use, 2 electric showers a day and electric cooking. We use about one unit on the gas meter every hour. At the moment we've only got it on a couple of hours a day, so we're probably using about 2 units but when it gets colder, it'll be more like 4-5 units.