Cost of living crisis

[S-Westerly]

Presumably guys who use their vans for work are going to have to increase their prices as you can hardly expect people to swallow those kinds of costs without passing it on. Something else to blame Vlad the Mad & Bad for!

[Gerontious]

36 minutes ago, S-Westerly said:

Presumably guys who use their vans for work are going to have to increase their prices as you can hardly expect people to swallow those kinds of costs without passing it on. Something else to blame Vlad the Mad & Bad for!

I prefer Rootin Tootin Shootin Pootin!!

[Bender]

5 hours ago, S-Westerly said:

Presumably guys who use their vans for work are going to have to increase their prices as you can hardly expect people to swallow those kinds of costs without passing it on. Something else to blame Vlad the Mad & Bad for!

Unfortunately yup. 

[MikeHorton]

‘Heat battery’ invention could make millions of homes gas-free | The Independent
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/battery-heat-salt-gas-russia-b2067404.html

 

 

This article just came up on my newsfeed

[onesea]

4 hours ago, MikeHorton said:

‘Heat battery’ invention could make millions of homes gas-free | The Independent
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/battery-heat-salt-gas-russia-b2067404.html

 

 

This article just came up on my newsfeed

https://www.tue.nl/en/news-and-events/news-overview/25-04-2022-how-the-eindhoven-heat-battery-can-quickly-make-millions-of-homes-gas-free/
 

It’s an interesting concept…

[MikeHorton]

10 minutes ago, onesea said:

https://www.tue.nl/en/news-and-events/news-overview/25-04-2022-how-the-eindhoven-heat-battery-can-quickly-make-millions-of-homes-gas-free/
 

It’s an interesting concept…

Yes indeed but these ideas can't come quick enough. There's more money spent on buying up social media companies than looking I to stuff like this. On a sustainability point of view I've just linked up my 3rd water butt in the garden to try keeping everything looking green through the summer 

[Fozzie]

These batteries might be fairly ineffective for small applications, as they take up a lot of space. Flat buildings might have a solution where you can use a district heating style system, with a battery like this however. 

I've just done training on large scale heat pump systems, and the amount of control they require leads me to think there will be a high service cost. There's a lot that can go wrong.

 

I think residential solar/wind powered heating is a good way forward. The advantage of a grid full of renewables is when there's too much, the first option is to pay you a small fee to absorb it via running it into a thermal store. This then valves into your hot water circuit for heating your home. Imagine being paid to heat your home? Even if it's 1/10th what they'd sell it to you for. 

[MikeHorton]

2 hours ago, Fozzie said:

These batteries might be fairly ineffective for small applications, as they take up a lot of space. Flat buildings might have a solution where you can use a district heating style system, with a battery like this however. 

I've just done training on large scale heat pump systems, and the amount of control they require leads me to think there will be a high service cost. There's a lot that can go wrong.

 

I think residential solar/wind powered heating is a good way forward. The advantage of a grid full of renewables is when there's too much, the first option is to pay you a small fee to absorb it via running it into a thermal store. This then valves into your hot water circuit for heating your home. Imagine being paid to heat your home? Even if it's 1/10th what they'd sell it to you for. 

Sounds so bloody technical that the retrofitment of a flux capacitor would help

[Fozzie]

10 minutes ago, MikeHorton said:

Sounds so bloody technical that the retrofitment of a flux capacitor would help

 

I forget I use a lot of jargon, it's all I hear at work!

 

It wouldn't be too hard to achieve, a smart meter with an output that the supplier can activate over the internet when they need you to take some power in the event there's too much wind/sun. This would just flick a relay on that switches on a hot water tank, or/and a battery pack hidden in your loft. The meter just measures the power during these periods, and it is deducted from your bill, rather than added. 

 

Same applies the other way, if the grid needs power and you can export as you have a solar array. Your bill is reduced for being paid to export when called for. 

 

I'm most interested in the synthetic methanol by hydrogenating CO2 with hydrogen. Internal combustion could become carbon neutral, and be far from finished. I know a few manufacturers including Yamaha are looking into this, along with the big German car manufacturers. 

[S-Westerly]

Shipping companies are looking into methanol as fuel and my own outfit have just taken delivery of 2 tankers designed to carry methanol in bulk and using it as fuel themselves. Not sure where the methanol is coming from though.

[Mississippi Bullfrog]

27 minutes ago, S-Westerly said:

Shipping companies are looking into methanol as fuel and my own outfit have just taken delivery of 2 tankers designed to carry methanol in bulk and using it as fuel themselves. Not sure where the methanol is coming from though.

I used to use it in my glow engines. I think that at the time there were only two factories in the world producing it, and then one of them blew up so the price of a gallon of glow fuel rocketed.

[Bender]

On Thursday I did something I never thought possible, I paid more for 1 tank of diesel than I did to insure the bike for a year...

[Fozzie]

14 hours ago, S-Westerly said:

Shipping companies are looking into methanol as fuel and my own outfit have just taken delivery of 2 tankers designed to carry methanol in bulk and using it as fuel themselves. Not sure where the methanol is coming from though.

At the moment it’s coming from natural gas, or biomass digesters. 
Essentially it’s proving the concept that it works, and will allow modular hydrogen/CO2 facilities to produce methanol on an industrial scale chiefly for tankers. I think the aim at the minute is to produce 3 million tonnes a year by the mid 2020s. 
Not a huge amount given how much shipping as an industry uses admittedly, but a good start.

[MikeHorton]

This is worth taking a look at. My dual fuel energy fixed rate ends middle of next month I pay about £110 pm by DD. If I do nothing I'll pay £172.15 on the variable tariff. My suppliers fixed rate is £389.33pm for 12 months . Best fix is ovo energy at £251pm for 2 years. According to our Martin he reckons only fix if its no more than 30% above the standard variable, I'm still within that with my current supplier, its a minefield and a gamble! 

 

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/-are-there-any-cheap--fixed-energy-deals-currently-worth-it--/

[onesea]

7 hours ago, MikeHorton said:

This is worth taking a look at. My dual fuel energy fixed rate ends middle of next month I pay about £110 pm by DD. If I do nothing I'll pay £172.15 on the variable tariff. My suppliers fixed rate is £389.33pm for 12 months . Best fix is ovo energy at £251pm for 2 years. According to our Martin he reckons only fix if its no more than 30% above the standard variable, I'm still within that with my current supplier, its a minefield and a gamble! 

 

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/-are-there-any-cheap--fixed-energy-deals-currently-worth-it--/

We have been variable rate for years...  

Switching to fixed rate at the moment would double our bill.  At no point so far would switching to a fixed rate of saved is money.

 

However as you say it's all a big gamble...

 

Although I will be buying my winter logs earlier this summer.

 

[Guest]

Fixed ours last night. 30% over. Figured we will be paying over the odds for our lowest usage months but then should be lower for autumn winter with a 40% price cap increase so should be better off overall but who knows. It's also no exit fees so can change again if needs be. That's electric only. We're on oil and will need to buy 1000litres over the summer. Firewood is predicted to rise in cost as a lot is imported from Eastern Europe. Bought a pallet a month ago on a cheap deal and luckily picked up a good stock of birch,beech and sweet chestnut from work.

[Mississippi Bullfrog]

I worked out that our current energy bills are 15% of our disposable income, so any rise in the autumn is going to push that higher. 

 

My office is at home but it's a single storey room with three outside walls on the north side of the house and it's always freezing. I think next winter I'll be working in one of the spare bedrooms.

[MikeHorton]

Echo all that on the logs I have a few left over from this year and I'll be sticking up too

[bonio]

Inspired by you lot, I've just signed up for Ovo Energy 2 year fixed rate for gas and elec. The early exit fee is about 2 weeks' bills (£120) which I thought made it a reasonable gamble.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, bonio said:

Inspired by you lot, I've just signed up for Ovo Energy 2 year fixed rate for gas and elec. The early exit fee is about 2 weeks' bills (£120) which I thought made it a reasonable gamble.

At one point ovo gave 3% interest on credit balances, not sure if they still do.

[Hornets nest]

Yes OVO Still give interest if you are in the black with them.

Depends on how long you have been with them as to the level on interest you might be entitled to, the best is 5%.

 

[Guest]

On 25/05/2022 at 18:46, bonio said:

Inspired by you lot, I've just signed up for Ovo Energy 2 year fixed rate for gas and elec. The early exit fee is about 2 weeks' bills (£120) which I thought made it a reasonable gamble.

Not looking like a gamble now eh? 80% rise plus extra in January. Just had someone round to quote for solar. Figure it will pay for itself by the end of next year the way things are going.

[Mississippi Bullfrog]

The smart money is moving into shares in thermal underwear. 

 

Our house is tied accommodation so it's not a size of house we would choose to live in. The bills before all this kicked off were over £2k so this winter we're just going to have to close up parts of the house. I've bought a small desk so I can work in one of the bedrooms which means we can turn the heating downstairs off. 

[Mississippi Bullfrog]

Why is the price of electricity rising so much? We don't get it from Russia. I understand some is generated by gas powered generators but surely not enough to warrant the huge rise in price per kWh. Last time I looked most suppliers offered electricity generated by renewable sources. 

[Bender]

37 minutes ago, Mississippi Bullfrog said:

Why is the price of electricity rising so much? We don't get it from Russia. I understand some is generated by gas powered generators but surely not enough to warrant the huge rise in price per kWh. Last time I looked most suppliers offered electricity generated by renewable sources. 

We are very reliant on gas powered power stations unfortunately,  I believe 2 coal are been brought back online and a couple of nuclear are going to be running longer,  we also have diesel farm generating capacity that's expensive when needed and prices for imported electricity are way up. 

 

Germany and Europe having to go to open market to replace Russian gas will be having a huge impact,  its coming up to winter so all the producers are rubbing their grubby little mits in glee.