{"id":1279,"date":"2012-07-01T19:39:45","date_gmt":"2012-07-01T19:39:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paulaowenconsulting.co.uk\/?p=1279"},"modified":"2015-10-28T17:15:31","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T17:15:31","slug":"review-of-combisave-does-it-save-any-water-or-gas-all-is-revealed-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/2012\/07\/review-of-combisave-does-it-save-any-water-or-gas-all-is-revealed-here\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of Combisave – does it save any water or gas? All is revealed here!"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have been monitoring my new Combisave device over the past month and have now enough data to\u00a0calculate some initial findings in terms of water, gas and time\u00a0savings.<\/span><\/p>\n

Serendipitously, June is a perfect month to monitor gas use for hot water heating, as even with the non-summer we have been having lately, we have not put the heating on at all through the past month, and as\u00a0I do not cook with gas, the only gas use through the summer months is for hot water use.\u00a0 Also, luckily, I have monthly readings of summer month gas usage for the last two years (yes, I know, I’m a bit geeky) and so have a\u00a0high level\u00a0of certainty about my household’s\u00a0daily summer\u00a0gas usage – typically\u00a0averaging 5.18 kWh per day (as measured over June-Sept 2011).<\/span><\/p>\n

Also, usefully, I have been on a water\u00a0meter for years, so\u00a0 can also easily\u00a0calculate a daily summertime water usage volume from my previous bills.\u00a0 Typically, for our two person household it has been around 200\u00a0litres a day.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, how has the Combisave device performed in this past\u00a0month.\u00a0 Roll of the drums please…<\/span><\/p>\n

In the month of June we used a total of 5470 litres of water (this includes 2 short hose pipe uses, after the hose pipe ban was lifted I hasten to add), that works out at around 90 litres per person per day.\u00a0 Typically, in years past, we have used an average of\u00a0100 litres per person per day in the summer months.\u00a0 So that is a 10% potential saving.\u00a0 The only other variable in this is the fact that, in years gone past, we might have used the hose pipe more\u00a0for watering the garden, as the summers have been a little better and drier in recent years!\u00a0 So it is not totally conclusive.<\/span><\/p>\n

Turning to the gas saving, which can be more conclusive, I\u00a0have seen an average daily usage of gas of\u00a04.77\u00a0kWh per day in June.\u00a0 So, we can say that there is probably\u00a0a small gas saving through the use of the Combisave device of 0.41 kWh per day.<\/span><\/p>\n

In terms of a time saving, well, it hasn’t saved me any time at all in the mornings whilst waiting for the shower to warm up (if I’m first in), it’s still just over a minute’s wait unfortunately.<\/span><\/p>\n

To put some monetary savings to these figures:<\/span><\/p>\n

Water:\u00a0 If we are, on average, saving 20 litres of water per day,\u00a0 then total yearly savings\u00a0could be\u00a0around 7300 litres.\u00a0 Now, the average metered\u00a0price for water in the UK is about 0.25 pence per litre.\u00a0 So we can calculate that my yearly savings on my water bill could be around the\u00a0\u00a318<\/strong> mark.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gas:\u00a0If\u00a0I am saving\u00a00.41 kWh per day on my gas usage for water heating, that will amount to\u00a0 about 150 kWh of gas saved\u00a0per year.\u00a0 Using an average gas price of 4.5 pence per kWh unit, my yearly saving on my gas bill could be around\u00a0\u00a36 – 7<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

That gives me a total combined water and gas saving of approximately \u00a325 per year<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

So, given a total installed price\u00a0for the Combisave\u00a0of approx: \u00a3130 (made up of the price of the unit plus the plumber’s installation charge – but this will vary), we are looking at an approximate\u00a05 year payback.\u00a0 Which is reasonable, as the lifetime on the device is said to be 20 years or more.<\/span><\/p>\n

I’m happy with this, and am glad I invested in the device.\u00a0 However, what I am not so comfortable with is the extraordinary claims that Combisave have on their website regarding the potential savings that people can make with their gadget.\u00a0 I feel people would be quite happy with a\u00a05 year payback (or more than likelyless for a bigger household)\u00a0and then ongoing, year on year, savings on their gas and water usage\u00a0(if on a meter), there is really no need to ‘over promise’ to such a significant degree, only to really cheese people off when they do not achieve those savings after installation. That isn’t the way to get\u00a0‘word of mouth’\u00a0recommendations for your product.<\/span><\/p>\n

So come on Combisave, your product has merit, please don’t spoil it by extraordinary, and, in my opinion and personal\u00a0experience, overblown claims of monetary savings that it will simply not deliver.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Related blog post on the subject: <\/span>http:\/\/paulaowenconsulting.co.uk\/2012\/05\/31\/the-trouble-with-combination-boilers-a-new-gadget-to-potentially-save-water-and-energy\/<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have been monitoring my new Combisave device over the past month and have now enough data to\u00a0calculate some initial findings in terms of water, gas and time\u00a0savings. Serendipitously, June is a perfect month to monitor gas use for hot water heating, as even with the non-summer we have been having lately, we have not […]<\/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-1279","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\/1279","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=1279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1710,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions\/1710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greengumption.co.uk\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}