Sold my house and have been viewing one with oil heating never had this type of heating before its got an external boiler with a flue of 6' and 1000 ltr tank both 1 year old, How to you find the prices compared to gas the same, talking to the owner they fill it up twice a year and sometimes just a couple of 100 ltrs to get them to summer time as you can better prices in the summer. 4 bed house.
Research it well. Significantly more expensive shooting from the hip… And the current government wouldn’t instil confidence on this score.
Heating oil: ~ 5.6 p per kWh (before considering boiler efficiency and assuming 55p per litre) Natural gas: ~ 6.29 p per kWh (before considering boiler efficiency) So purely by unit energy cost, oil appears slightly cheaper per kWh at present (5.6p vs 6.29p). However, this doesn’t factor in differences in system efficiency, installation, maintenance, or other costs (which can tip the balance differently). Boiler/-furnace efficiency: If your oil system is much less efficient than your gas one (they usually are) the advantage may disappear. Price fluctuations: Oil prices are more volatile. Recent range: 55–82 p per litre. Availability & servicing: Oil heating may involve more logistic/maintenance issues (tank, delivery, etc). Carbon/energy policy: Taxes and regulation may shift costs over time.
We have an oil fired boiler in our current house and had one in our previous house also - so have been using oil for around 10 years now. We also have a 1000 litre tank. We use between 1200-1400 litres / year, both 3 bed, stone built character houses with consequently poor energy efficiency ratings. Kerosene prices are almost entirely dependant on the prevailing crude price and the GBP Dollar exchange rate. I keep quite a close eye on both & time my purchases accordingly. I’ve just ordered 750 lites @ £0.55 / litre Inc 5% VAT, £413 total, which will see us through to next summer no problem. In my experience, it’s no more expensive to run than gas (notwithstanding the ongoing thermostat dispute with my wife…).
Only had one real experience with Oil heating and the external tank. Hide it well. Local 'travellers' used to use the external plastic pipe sight glass tube as a private filler hose for their vehicles.
Make sure that the oil tank is insured against corrosion and leaks, I've seen the devastating effects because corrosion leaks on oil tanks and the extensive and costly groundwork needed to remove the oil from the soil. Consider getting a heat-pump and an AC attached battery, charge and discharge the battery 3 times per day with low cost electricity (7p per kWh). There is a significant grant available (£7,500) to upgrade to a air or ground sourced heat pump in England and Wales.
It is important to ensure the oil tank is a double skinned type, otherwise there is a rather high potential risk associated with leakage, which as has been mentioned above, can be incredibly costly. Some neighbours of ours had a leakage issue just prior to us moving in, which due to the property being adjacent to a small tributary of the Axe, cost in excess of £40k................. We have found since moving a little over 5 years ago, having had a gas system for 15 years previous, that oil use is pretty efficient and if serviced annually, is far less potentially troublesome than we ever found gas, which had an issue within the system every year! Yes, getting deliveries made can be slightly more complicated, depending upon the location of your tank, however, we've seldom had any issues. Regarding oil prices, they are quite volatile currently due to the totally unbelievable state of our world as it is, however, current pricing is at £0.52 + 5% per litre and when we first moved, was down at £0.38 / litre. If locally practical, try to get involved with an oil heating group, who can then leverage prices from local suppliers. It is also a really genuinely good idea to add an oil heating additive, which will usually increase burning efficiency by up to 10%.
I've never had oil heating. It would have to be virtually free to operate for me to want it instead of gas and all its convenience. I can only imagine the house you are looking at simply does not have mains gas. As the oil system is pretty new, it will likely be OK. But a shame the people didn't go for electric combined with solar panels to supplement the energy supply.
Interesting & useful thread as we might well be in a similar situation when moving next year. So with an oil boiler do you need to have a hot water tank or can it be used like a gas combi and provide hot water on demand? Is a heat pump's electricity usage sufficiently high enough to make it worthwhile investing in & running it off a battery? Can a heat pump be run off solar panels? So the $64k question is what are the expectations of oil prices in the medium to long term? You'd think they'd stay pretty low as the green agenda reduces demand. Although what swingeing taxes may be applied as part of that same agenda is anyone's guess.
One of the main oil price drivers appears to be world conflict, as well as tariff driven madness, but let's try to keep away from anything the Orange Lunatic pursues shall we, if at all humanely possible that is!!! With most, if not all oil powered systems, it depends on the type of boiler being used. A system boiler does require a hot water tank, whereas a combi boiler can supply heating as well as hot water directly. We have a system unit, plus solar panels + battery and will next year, get an upgrade to our hot water tank, which can have power diverted from the solar system to heat the hot water storage unit, which in itself will reduce oil usage for probably 6-9 months of the year. In general terms we tend to use circa 200 litres of oil in the period April - mid-October, with 500 litres during the remainder. We live in rural Somerset, where there simply aren't that many current options available, in a mid-1980's property, which although insulated to a reasonable standard, without other significant home modifications, simply won't address the performance issues derived with an air source heat pump. For that reason we have recently installed a new oil tank, boiler, solar etc. The direct costs associated with an ASHP simply didn't add up for us, as return on investment + running costs would have been very long indeed and just not worth the upheaval. The solar system has begun to perform brilliantly, driving down our electricity usage costs seriously even though only moved across to an export tariff in July this year and the new boiler is far more efficient than our previous version which was 20 years old!
Useful stuff there... I'm looking to downsize to help reduce running costs, a proper downsize mind & not one of these, oh but we still need 3 or 4 bedrooms 2 receptions & large kitchen etc. There's only me & Mrs Bee so a compact 2 bedroom job with a garage larger than the house would be ideal Many of the ones we've seen have oil fired already installed as there is no other viable option in the area. And as you say an ASHP doesn't always make financial sense unless it's combined with larger works that need to be done to the property. I think solar is pretty much a no-brainer and there may be enough left over capital after the move to pay for both. So are batteries pretty much a pre-requisite for solar panels and whilst on topic has anyone researched small home use wind turbine generators?
