I've just watched this on YouTube. It is lengthy but David, the producer has done a lot of research and come to some interesting conclusions.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlI1420g3N8
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Current Cost of EHU.
- Thread starter Paullus1959
- Start date
I watched that video and he has a few things incorrect like the cost per kwh if on a commercial site who is paying the commercial rate and not the domestic rate.
He makes it sound scary, but if you are cooking in the microwave in the unit you are not cooking at home. He should have looked at the difference in cost between the commercial and domestic rates because if at home you would have used power anyway to use the microwave.
Who on earth would use 16amp of power constantly in 24 amps? I appreciate that it was to get some sort of benchmark.
Caravans are well insulated and we have ours set to 20C on cold days and at night between 10pm and 6am it is set down to 16C. If I remember correctly I think we used about 7 -8 kwh per 24 hours so at £1 a kwh we would have used about £8 at today's prices, but if at home we would have used about £3 anyway so on the commercial the reality is that we are paying £5 extra.
However if that had been the case of a £1 per kwh, we would have turned off the boiler during the day and used gas for the ALDE heating system. At about £0.70 a litre for gas, it probably would be the cheaper option.
Not sure if anyone else agrees with me, but he comes across like a journalist trying to make sensational headlines. Others may think differently and that is their choice.
He makes it sound scary, but if you are cooking in the microwave in the unit you are not cooking at home. He should have looked at the difference in cost between the commercial and domestic rates because if at home you would have used power anyway to use the microwave.
Who on earth would use 16amp of power constantly in 24 amps? I appreciate that it was to get some sort of benchmark.
Caravans are well insulated and we have ours set to 20C on cold days and at night between 10pm and 6am it is set down to 16C. If I remember correctly I think we used about 7 -8 kwh per 24 hours so at £1 a kwh we would have used about £8 at today's prices, but if at home we would have used about £3 anyway so on the commercial the reality is that we are paying £5 extra.
However if that had been the case of a £1 per kwh, we would have turned off the boiler during the day and used gas for the ALDE heating system. At about £0.70 a litre for gas, it probably would be the cheaper option.
Not sure if anyone else agrees with me, but he comes across like a journalist trying to make sensational headlines. Others may think differently and that is their choice.
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However if that had been the case of a £1 per kwh, we would have turned off the boiler during the day and used gas for the ALDE heating system. At about £0.70 a litre for gas, it probably would be the cheaper option.
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That's the cost of gas if using a refillable cylinder, but the cost per litre for the gas in an exchange (I.e. Calor) cylinder is considerably more.
It's just a shame that number of places you can fill a refillable cylinder is in steady decline and probably will be non existent in a few years time.
However if that had been the case of a £1 per kwh, we would have turned off the boiler during the day and used gas for the ALDE heating system. At about £0.70 a litre for gas, it probably would be the cheaper option.
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That's the cost of gas if using a refillable cylinder, but the cost per litre for the gas in an exchange (I.e. Calor) cylinder is considerably more.
It's just a shame that number of places you can fill a refillable cylinder is in steady decline and probably will be non existent in a few years time.
To be fair he did make it clear that the price of electricity is dependant on the the circumstances and presently its very volatile. He also made it quite clear his calculation based n 16A for 24 hours was a worst possible case and most peopel would use less, so in that respect it was accurate.
I wasn't keen on his presentation which I think contained a lot of unnecessary duplication of information have been simpler, and rather than majoring on the cost per kWh at the outset, if he worked purely in the power or current each appliance used, and the allow the view to do the cost multiplication based on their own rates, it would have been simpler and it would not date expire when tariffs change.
I wasn't keen on his presentation which I think contained a lot of unnecessary duplication of information have been simpler, and rather than majoring on the cost per kWh at the outset, if he worked purely in the power or current each appliance used, and the allow the view to do the cost multiplication based on their own rates, it would have been simpler and it would not date expire when tariffs change.
That's the cost of gas if using a refillable cylinder, but the cost per litre for the gas in an exchange (I.e. Calor) cylinder is considerably more.
It's just a shame that number of places you can fill a refillable cylinder is in steady decline and probably will be non existent in a few years time.
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I did refer to "us" as I am aware that not every one has a refillable gas bottle. At the moment there does not seem to be any steady decline in the number of places where one can refill a bottle and many farmers seem to use LPG for whatever reason. So far we have not encountered any issues and just recently an LPG station opened up not too far from our residence.
However by the time there are no LPG stations, we will probably too old to caravan or using a caravan will be unaffordable however by that time we would have recoup our outlay.
16A for 24 hours is about 96 kwh per day - many sites using metering estimate that 8-10 kwh per day is likely to be used - IMO 16A for 24 hours is a pointless figure to use.
On the gas vs electric debate, I would love to know the losses using gas compared to electric on the various caravan heating systems. I very much doubt the gas systems are designed around economy and they are probably very inefficient.
Pitch prices are undoubtedly rising on sites where electricity is included due to the increased unit cost, which is understandable. However, it will be interesting to see if these sites reduce their pitch prices accordingly. If they don't things could get very expensive if you use a UHU for all your needs.
Definitely don't modify any element that burns gas unless you are gas safe and propane qualified. I would be very concerned about impacting the flow of air to the burner resulting in deadly CO emissions.
The loss in efficiency of gas appliances is more to do with heat going out the flue, rather in than into the van, so additional insulation wouldn't help anyway.
Couple of points.
1. The combi is totally isolated from the interior of the caravan, which by law it must be.
2. The boiler fresh air intake trunking surrounds the exhaust trunking co-axially so any insulation would not have any effect whatsoever on the air going to the burner, or the products of combustion leaving .
3. The heat I am talking about is that which is radiated from the body of the combi and not the exhaust (which, as I said earlier, runs co-axially inside the air intake trunking anyway)
4. The heat disapates into the caravan anyway so there would be nothing to be gained unless I wanted hot water to stay hot and no heat to be radiated into the caravan when the ambient temperature is high anyway.
1. The combi is totally isolated from the interior of the caravan, which by law it must be.
2. The boiler fresh air intake trunking surrounds the exhaust trunking co-axially so any insulation would not have any effect whatsoever on the air going to the burner, or the products of combustion leaving .
3. The heat I am talking about is that which is radiated from the body of the combi and not the exhaust (which, as I said earlier, runs co-axially inside the air intake trunking anyway)
4. The heat disapates into the caravan anyway so there would be nothing to be gained unless I wanted hot water to stay hot and no heat to be radiated into the caravan when the ambient temperature is high anyway.
Caravan energy use from practical experience of a daughter with Covid isolating in our caravan over Christmas / new year in 2021 / 2022. I put a plug-in energy meter in the garage and connected the van to that, the caravan used on averaged about 24 kWH each day. This kept the van nicely warm. Heating, no cooking, the occasional cup of tea …. Just for the caravan. According to Octopus our house averages 6kWh a day, consumption In most months. So the caravan uses 4 x as much electricity as the house (we use gas heating) over this period.
24 kWh per day at current rates for domestic electricity is about £8 a day. In the video mentioned at the start of this post a question asked was asked about “ how much per day does it cost to leave the heating on for 24 hours to keep the chill off in my camper van”. The answer was £8.
the van was a 2013 swift challenger SE with a fixed bed and Alde heating system.
perhaps the estimate of 8 to 10 kWh per day, by site owners, is in the summer? Friends visited us with a camper van last summer in July. Our electricity use was about 10 kWh higher than normal for one day according to my Octopus graphs
24 kWh per day at current rates for domestic electricity is about £8 a day. In the video mentioned at the start of this post a question asked was asked about “ how much per day does it cost to leave the heating on for 24 hours to keep the chill off in my camper van”. The answer was £8.
the van was a 2013 swift challenger SE with a fixed bed and Alde heating system.
perhaps the estimate of 8 to 10 kWh per day, by site owners, is in the summer? Friends visited us with a camper van last summer in July. Our electricity use was about 10 kWh higher than normal for one day according to my Octopus graphs
I can assure you that by law gas fueled space and water heaters have to be a minimum of 70% efficient at converting the calorific value of the fuels to useful heat, and most are better than that.
For example the old Truma SB1800 had a gross efficiency of 98%, which cooled its flue gasses below their condensing point with just natural convection through the heat exchanger, enough to allow the thermal drive from the burner to push the exhaust gasses down and exhaust them under the caravans floor.
The SB1800 was exceptional in that regard, but even its bigger brothers with roof flues could hit 90% or better depending on the installation.
Electric resistance heaters are 100% efficient, as all the energy put into the heating appliance is ultimately converted to heat , even the energy used to run the fan or the control panel ultimately converts to heat.
Cost comparisons for heating a van using refillable lpg , electricity at domestic rates and commercial electric rates..
lpg gives 13.6 kWh per kg burnt
1 kg of lpg is 2 litres approx
Refillable lpg is currently averaging 88p / litre
1kg cost 176p
1kw hr costs 14p
alde 3020 is 93% efficient
so useful cost of 1 kwhr of heat is about 16p
figures approx, but refillable lpg appears to be substantially cheaper than electricity for heating a caravan, about half the cost of domestic rates. If you compare with commercial rates reported at 80p / kwhr then refillable lpg would be one fifth of the cost Of heating the van
I suggested in an earlier post that my van used 24 kWh of electricity for heating in a day
the costs today would be (1 unit = 1 kWh)
domestic rate electricity at 34p per unit about £8 per day
commercial rate electricity at 80p per unit about £19 per day
refillable lpg at 1p per unit £3.50 per day.
a Safefill 7.5 kg cylinder would last approx 4 days.
assuming my calculations are correct!
lpg gives 13.6 kWh per kg burnt
1 kg of lpg is 2 litres approx
Refillable lpg is currently averaging 88p / litre
1kg cost 176p
1kw hr costs 14p
alde 3020 is 93% efficient
so useful cost of 1 kwhr of heat is about 16p
figures approx, but refillable lpg appears to be substantially cheaper than electricity for heating a caravan, about half the cost of domestic rates. If you compare with commercial rates reported at 80p / kwhr then refillable lpg would be one fifth of the cost Of heating the van
I suggested in an earlier post that my van used 24 kWh of electricity for heating in a day
the costs today would be (1 unit = 1 kWh)
domestic rate electricity at 34p per unit about £8 per day
commercial rate electricity at 80p per unit about £19 per day
refillable lpg at 1p per unit £3.50 per day.
a Safefill 7.5 kg cylinder would last approx 4 days.
assuming my calculations are correct!
Nothing really wrong with what Malx has posted, except one detail point which doesn't detract from the essence of his post.
Describing LPG by its volume is problematical becasue the quantity or mass of the material changes with temperature and pressure, and under the right conditions the it will undergo a phase change between liquid and vapure of vise versa, and that means the mass of the material contained within a volumetric space will change.
That is the reason that LPG cylinders are always sold by weight rather than volume, as the mass is the only consistent measure that can be used.
LPG can only be sold by volume if it is delivered in its Liquified form and delivered between a specified range of temperatures.
Describing LPG by its volume is problematical becasue the quantity or mass of the material changes with temperature and pressure, and under the right conditions the it will undergo a phase change between liquid and vapure of vise versa, and that means the mass of the material contained within a volumetric space will change.
That is the reason that LPG cylinders are always sold by weight rather than volume, as the mass is the only consistent measure that can be used.
LPG can only be sold by volume if it is delivered in its Liquified form and delivered between a specified range of temperatures.
However there is a big difference if on a caravan site as you will not be using that electric at home so one needs to look at the difference as the extra cost and not the total amount. Also a lot depends on the temperature set in the caravan as there will be a big difference on whether you set the internal temperature in the caravan to 20C or higher i.e. 22C or 24C and whether you have the boiler on 24/7.
Beg to differ with you on the efficiency point.
On gas our van warms up in half the time it takes on electric.
You are comparing apples with bananas !
A gas fired central heating system will warm a house far quicker than a heat pump will. But at different energy consumption rates (and cost)
Our blown air system heated up more quickly on gas than electric. But it isn’t efficiency it was because the gas energy input was significantly higher than the electric input. What are the relative power inputs on your system. I suspect the gas is higher than electric.
When using gas I think it is rated at 3200kw, but when using electric switched to 3000kw it is only 2800kw with the ALDE system? Explains why gas heats up the system quicker. This what i was told by ALDE.
There may be different versions - but my Alde will run at 5.5 kw on Propane (6.4 kw on Butane) and 3.15 kw on electric - that's why gas heats up faster.
Efficiency and effectiveness can be very different issues. So for example: An electric convection heater is 100% efficient at converting electrical energy in to heat energy out, the majority of the heat is released through convection as hot air but much smaller proportions will escape by conduction through the body of the appliance to whatever the appliance touches, and through radiation. That makes a convector effective for heating air in a closed room, but ineffective as a patio heater, where it's radiant heat that's wanted.
You are correct. Age meant I could not remember the exact figures. LOL! The Alde 3020 Compact HE boiler has two 230 V electric heating elements, outputting 1050W and 2100W, or 3150W combined,and drawing 5A, 9A, and 14A respectively.
This is a hot topic on the Safefill Users Facebook group at the moment - latest report from there is that rumours that Morrisons are about to stop LPG are just that, unfounded rumours.At the moment there does not seem to be any steady decline in the number of places where one can refill a bottle and many farmers seem to use LPG for whatever reason. So far we have not encountered any issues and just recently an LPG station opened up not too far from our residence.
However by the time there are no LPG stations, we will probably too old to caravan or using a caravan will be unaffordable however by that time we would have recoup our outlay.
As I commented in that group, given how Calor have just given a rude gesture to the whole leisure sector, and Safefill appear to be selling cylinders as fast as they can import them, I think retailers will find LPG becoming more sellable in the future. Certainly if I owned a caravan shop or site I'd be investigating getting an LPG filling point.
I have read that BQ are changing over from selling Calor to selling Flogas. A leisure outlet near to us changed to Flogas and Gaslight last summer. But B&Q current website needs a good work over 😂
b&q to sell flogas - Bing
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