{"id":1198,"date":"2012-05-31T13:57:30","date_gmt":"2012-05-31T13:57:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paulaowenconsulting.co.uk\/?p=1198"},"modified":"2015-10-28T17:15:45","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T17:15:45","slug":"the-trouble-with-combination-boilers-a-new-gadget-to-potentially-save-water-and-energy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/2012\/05\/the-trouble-with-combination-boilers-a-new-gadget-to-potentially-save-water-and-energy\/","title":{"rendered":"The trouble with combination boilers – a new gadget to potentially save water and energy!"},"content":{"rendered":"

I upgraded my old dilapidated combination boiler about\u00a04 years ago for an ultra efficient condensing variety.\u00a0 And, fair play, it has worked very well ever since with no issues.\u00a0 Indeed, at a recent efficiency check carried out by my plumber, it\u00a0hasn’t lost any of its efficiency\u00a0in the intervening years.\u00a0 But, there has always been one aspect of\u00a0a combination boiler that has bothered me – and that is the length of time it takes to warm up water for that first shower of the day, or when you are washing up and have not used the hot water tap for a while.<\/span><\/p>\n

I haven’t quantified exactly how much water I have to waste whilst waiting the the shower to get hot, but it is at least a minutes worth before the water has sufficiently warmed for me to get in it.\u00a0 Similarly with washing up, the waste of clean water down the sink whilst waiting for it to get warm enough to wash dishes in is criminal,\u00a0and as I’m also on a water\u00a0meter, it’s a waste of money too.<\/span><\/p>\n

At one stage I was collecting the shower water in a bucket and using it to water the indoor plants, but there is only so much of that you can do.\u00a0 So I’ve often pondered that there should be a solution to this dilemma – and one not involving going back to a boiler with hot water tank, which can be equally wasteful of gas if you do not use the hot water that it regularly heats up in the hot water tank whether you need it or not.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anyway, my wonderful plumber John, of Aqueous Plumbing (a south London based company if anyone is in need of a good plumber), has alerted me to a potential solution.\u00a0 It’s called a ‘Combisave’ and it claims to reduce the water flow at those crucial times\u00a0when the water is heating up from a standing start\u00a0– this, according to their website, saves not only time in getting your hot water quicker, but\u00a0both water and gas too.<\/span><\/p>\n

The claims\u00a0on the website, for a monetary saving for a\u00a0family of 4 in a typical household, are quite ambitious.\u00a0 Apparently, they claim\u00a0you can save:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0– \u00a355 on your hot water bill, but that could be as much as\u00a0over\u00a0\u00a3100<\/span><\/p>\n

– if on a water meter, then the savings here are quoted at\u00a0 \u00a3180 per year.<\/span><\/p>\n

I have a few issues with these figures, as they seem to\u00a0be based on each one of 4 family members using a hot water tap and\/or shower 7 times each a day (28 uses of hot water per day\u00a0in total – more than 1 use\u00a0an hour!)\u00a0– and each time having to wait a minute for the water to heat up!\u00a0\u00a0My big issues with these assumptions are, if as in most normal households, especially\u00a0on weekday\u00a0mornings, the showers are taken in quick succession, then the water will not take up to\u00a0a minute to heat up for all 4 showers, only the first one, after that the hot water is instantaneous as it is still warm in the pipes.\u00a0 So their claim that a 4 person household can save 55,000 litres of water a year seems very optimistic to say the least.<\/span><\/p>\n

But if it saves just the first 6 litres per day of the family’s showers, then that’s an annual saving of\u00a0around 2200 litres of shower water.\u00a0 Then you can add maybe another 6 litres waiting for the water to warm up when washing up in the evening\u00a0(in non-dishwasher households), so that saving could presumably be doubled to about 4400 litres per year.<\/span><\/p>\n

This could save you about \u00a314.50 per year on a water meter (using 0.3pence\/litre – their figure).<\/span><\/p>\n

I’m not clear how to calculate the gas saving in this situation, but if we take their optimistic\u00a0figure for a gas saving, and divide that\u00a0by 12 (this is the reduction in the water saving\u00a0given what they have calculated versus what I estimate it could be, ie 55,000\/4400 litres = 12 times smaller) that gives a yearly saving of 1650 kWh\/12 = 137.5 kWh.\u00a0 Typical price of gas is currently around\u00a04.5pence.\u00a0 Hence saving in gas could be \u00a35.50.\u00a0 Giving a yearly combined saving in gas\u00a0and water\u00a0bills\u00a0of about \u00a320.\u00a0 This might be a conservative low end saving, but I think its more realistic than their \u00a3200 – 300 saving figure<\/span><\/p>\n

So, given a Combisave costs around \u00a390, and then you will have fitting costs too (\u00a0it has to be fitted by a qualified plumber) of around \u00a350 upwards, then we are looking at a payback, if you are on a water meter, of\u00a0around \u00a07 years.\u00a0 I’m not sure how long a ‘Combisave’ is made to run for, but if it’s a ‘fit it and forget it’ device, and the lifetime is longer than\u00a07 years, you will eventually make your money back – but most importantly, in my view, you will be doing your bit to save water in these drought-ridden times.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ve been monitoring my daily water and gas usage over the last week, and will be getting one of these fitted by John my plumber soon.\u00a0 So watch this space for a review of how much it is actually\u00a0saving me.<\/span><\/p>\n

Want to read the results of my first month of use? Click here: http:\/\/paulaowenconsulting.co.uk\/2012\/07\/01\/review-of-combisave-does-it-save-any-water-or-gas-all-is-revealed-here\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I upgraded my old dilapidated combination boiler about\u00a04 years ago for an ultra efficient condensing variety.\u00a0 And, fair play, it has worked very well ever since with no issues.\u00a0 Indeed, at a recent efficiency check carried out by my plumber, it\u00a0hasn’t lost any of its efficiency\u00a0in the intervening years.\u00a0 But, there has always been one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1198","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-energy-efficiency"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1198"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1198\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1712,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1198\/revisions\/1712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}