Heating your home makes up for around 60% of your energy bills. So this is vitally important to help you save money and cut your CO emissions.
With energy bills only going one way, now is the time to get your home efficient and start saving you money.
Your boiler is the most important part of your heating system. There are ways to improve the efficiency of your system as a whole. Some of the things that we are going to look at are going to be costly, but there are also some cheap, quick fixes, you can do to improve the efficiency of your system.
Your home needs to be as warm and comfortable as possible. So let's get cracking......
Heating Controls
- Turn Down Your Room Thermostat - By turning down your room thermostat by just one degree could reduce your heating bill by 10%. Recommended temperatures should be between 18-21 degree's.
- Do Not Heat An Empty House - Only programme your heating to come on when you are actually at home. This may sound silly but people do leave their heating on when they are not at home. There is no point in having your heating on when you are not there.
- Location of Your Thermostat - With a lot of wireless room thermostats now, its easy to just put it down anywhere and forget about it. Keep it away from heat source's and hot spots within your house.
Heating System
- Turn Down Your TRV's - TRV's (Thermostatic Radiator Valves) are a great way to control the heat on each individual radiator. Turn down the TRV's in the rooms you use less. There is no point heating up a room you don't use. TRV's also give you better control of the heat throughout your house.
- Do Not Obstruct Radiators - This one is pretty simple. Do not put washing on the radiators, or put furniture in the way of your radiators. This will just obstruct the heat from circulating around the room efficiently.
- Bleed Your Radiators - Ensuring there is no air within your heating system will help the system circulate better. It will also improve the heat going to your radiators.
- Insulate Hot Water Cylinder - If you have a cylinder for your hot water ensure it is lagged. If you can just see copper then you can buy a tank jacket for it. This will help retain the heat within the cylinder.
- Lag Pipe Work - This is a really cheap and effective way to keep your heat loss down. You can do this yourself. This will really benefit you, if you have heating pipe work in a garage or loft space. You can buy this from most DIY outlets for around £1 per meter.
Boiler
- Keep Your Boiler Pressure Maintained - Your boiler will not operate properly when the pressure is to low. The correct pressure is between 1-1.5bar when the system is cold. You can check your pressure on a gauge on the front of your boiler.
- Power flush - Over time sludge will build up inside of your heating system and reduce the efficiency of the system. A power Flush will remove the sludge and improve the efficiency of the system. This will also increase the life span of the boiler and the system itself. For more information a powerflush, Click Here
- Get Your Boiler Serviced - Getting your boiler serviced annually will help to maintain its efficiency and safety. It can also help to see potential problems that may be arising
- Fitting a New High Energy Efficient Boiler - Fitting a new high energy efficient condensing boiler can reduce your heating bills by up to 20%. Older boilers may be running as low as 70% efficiency. A modern condensing boiler can run at around 94% efficiency. Coupled with new controls you can expect to save up to £350 per year.
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Keeping The Heat In
Ok, so we've had a look at how to make your boiler and heating system more efficient. We now need to look at how to keep that heat from escaping out of your house. Once again, some of these will be expensive, but others will be some cheap, quick fixes you can do yourself.
- Put an Extra Layer on - Putting on an extra layer of clothing is a great way to keep your heating temperature down. If you just have a t-shirt on, go grab yourself a jumper. This will enable you to keep the heating temperature down.
- Draught Excluders - Anywhere there is a draught needs to be blocked. Under doorways, letterboxes, around windows, old dis-used fireplaces. ** Important** Please ensure, if you have a gas appliance in a room and there is an air brick, then this is vitally important not to block. Take particular attention if you have a Gas fire or Back Boiler. If you are unsure, then contact your local Gas Safe engineer for further advice.
- Insulation - Insulating your property is the best way to retain the heat within your house. Your loft should be insulated and cavity walls if you have them.
- Double Glazing - Double glazing will massively improve the heat loss within your property. It will also help to keep the heat within your property.
So there we have some great energy saving tips and how you can help the environment and save a few quid at the same time.
If you would like any further information, or looking to get a new boiler installation then contact us today
