By the year 2012, the  UK Government’s Smart Meter scheme is due to be launched and  every UK  home will be fitted with its own meter which will stand out by having it s won easy-to-read monitor.  The importance of the meter installation has been overshadowed slightly by discussions of the wide range of advantages that self-reading digital monitoring that these smart meters will bring, and how much money they will save for the average householder. To begin with, the average cost per home to install a new smart meter will be just £15, while installing a smart meter today independently will mean a layout of at least £100.

It is expected that by the end of 2020 all 27 million homes in Britain, even the most remote, will be have been fitted with meters that will monitor electricity use.  Detailed information of every UK family’s energy use behaviour will be   use transmitted in real time to the supply companies who provide electricity on a localized basis. This information will then pass through an ever-widening series of data gathering points till it eventually reaches “big brother” – The Government’s Department of Energy. Sources say that the advantage of having access to national energy consumption will bring with it the ability to anticipate peak and troughs of demand.

From the consumers view point, estimates are that the average UK household will save around 2% of their average energy bills each year. The theory behind that piece of think was based on the projection that most families will be able to clearly see that see that they are going over their monthly budget and start to curtail their daily use of gas and electricity. Trials in the UK have stated many positive examples of energy savings, while there were widespread reports of people failing to take the meter reading exercise too seriously, with many not bothering to change the meter’s auxiliary batteries once they ran out.

On a larger scale, critics were no slow to point out that the  projected £8 billion scheme would only save around £30 for each of the 27 million families who ware due to be hooked up to the smart meters, meaning that it will take around ten years before the costs are recovered, with  most of them falling eventually on the consumer.

Tags: Department of Energy, Electricty, Fuel, fuel consumption, Smart Meter scheme

There is something in us all that likes to compare the bad things that happen to us. From surgical scars to how long we waited for a bus, the list is very long. One of the biggest competitions, and especially after emerging from a long and especially cold winter is, how high was your electricity bill? To be honest, the completion should be handicapped, for some people have naturally higher demands for electricity which is set by the size of their family, the number of rooms in their home, and any special needs that they may have.

Taking these factors into consideration, in any event, should allow a person to calculate how much to expect when their electricity bill comes along, especially if they have gathered statistics from previous years and according to season. If the bill has appeared to climb from the previous years for a season, then no time should be wasted in analyzing what went wrong, and correct before the next competition comes along.

It would be easy to say “well just switch off all the lights and sit in the freezing cold without a television, and that way you will save a fortune on your electricity bill.” But that would not be the point of the exercise. Energy is there to be used, but used wisely.

That means switching off lights whenever they are not needed, with the same rule applying to the television or television as well as the home computers.  Preserve warm or even cold air in a room by sealing all the doors and windows to preserve an even temperature. This is a low cost solution to a problem that will save a lot of money all year round.

Washing machines and tumbler driers are notorious users of energy, and are particularly in use over the winter months as people wear a lot more clothes, and cannot hang their washing out to dry. Try and use the off-peak hours to do your washing. You will be amazed how much you save. If you have an electric water heater, make sure that you don’t let it heat water to a temperature.

Although they take very little time to heat up food, microwave ovens use huge amounts of electricity. Instead use your home oven to re-heat food. It may take a lot more time, but will save a lot of money.

If you invest in fluorescent bulbs, and even change the existing ones in high-use fixtures, you will save around sixty percent in electricity consumption.  It all adds up.

There are many ways to cut down electricity consumption and with it the amount of money you will need to lay out. That way you can join the lowest electricity bill competition. It’s much more fun to win.

Tags: British Gas, electricity and gas, electricity bills, Electricty, Fuel, Fuel Bills, fuel consumption

British Gas Wales trades under the name of Nwy Prydain.

And although Cardiff-based Nwy Prydain provides exactly the same service as British Gas, there are some interesting variations.

These include no standing charge, so customers have the advantage of only paying for what they use. This innovation was first introduced by Nwy Prydain and has proved very popular with customers. They also offer a significant discount if you take both electricity and gas from them.

A further bonus is their Free Bill Payment Cover which offers to clear your energy bills in case of accidental death – something not to be sniffed at these days.

And British Gas Wales, under the guise of Nwy Prydain, has a Welsh language service, meaning that Welsh language speakers can get the best from the company and its various offers.

Nwy Prydain is a one-stop energy company.

It not only provides an extensive range of competitive tariffs for gas, electricity, or duel fuel (gas and electricity), it covers your home maintenance and repair needs. This includes anything from installing a complete new central heating system, to providing hassle-free maintenance over its long life. For existing systems, it also provides a comprehensive repair service, meaning that most parts of your system, including your boiler and radiators, can be repaired quickly and cost-effectively.

But http://www.britishgasboilers.co.uk/about-us.htmis not only about energy and central heating systems. It can effectively cover all your home repair and maintenance needs, including most plumbing and drains; electrical appliances; gas appliances; and, kitchen appliances.

It also sets out to help its customers by offering advice and tips on all the major issues connected with running a home. These include understanding how your bill is calculated; how to pay your bill; suggesting ways that your bill could be reduced by sensible practices around the home; tips on basic maintenance to help avoid future problems; what to do in the event of a breakdown; and, take some of the mystery away from central heating systems in general.

Nwy Prydain also promotes active energy efficiency, with reports and advice available on general energy savings; energy efficient products (including light bulbs); how to save energy and help your wallet; and, the introduction of new technologies and grants that are being made available for domestic use.

All in all, Nwy Prydain is one of the most pro-active energy companies operating today.

Tags: British Gas, Central Heating, Electricty, Fuel, Gas, Nwy Prydain

With ever increasing fuel bills, it’s good to know that there are a number of ways by which you can get some help.

Most benefits come through eligibility to one, or more of the state benefits, such as Income Support, Disability Living Allowance, Housing Benefit, or Jobseeker’s Allowance. And various fuel grants and schemes are available from the government backed initiatives which come under the umbrella title of the Home Energy Efficiency Scheme and include such names as Warm Front, Warm Deal and Warm Homes.

And help can also come from your energy company, like British Gas, which has devised a number of products and schemes to reduce the pain of rising fuel bills.

Brought together under their Essentials Advance package, British Gas works with its qualifying customers to not only help with bill payments, but also to pro-actively help them save energy.

The Essentials Advance package includes advice on energy efficiency, free insulation (which could help you save well over £250 off future bills) and a discount of £50 off your next bill, after your free insulation has been provided.

To be considered for Essentials Advance, you need to be an existing British Gas customer and receive any following:

• Disability living allowance
• Pension credit
• Attendance allowance
• Council tax benefit
• Housing benefit
• Income support
• Income based job seeker allowance
• War disablement pension (which includes either mobility supplement or constant attendance allowance)
• Disablement pension ( which includes constant attendance allowance)
• Child Tax credit (where relevant income is £15,592 or less)
• Working Tax credit (where relevant income is £15, 592 or less).

If you think you are eligible, British Gas have a network of energy experts who will come around and visit you, talking you through the various schemes and plans that exist to help.

They can be reached via the telephone on 0800 072 7100.

They also provide help with debt support, recommend charities that also help and suggest other home energy plans.

But if you are having a problem with your British Gas bill, do call them on 0800 048 0404 and talk it through with specialist advisers.

British Gas also has established an independent charity, the British Gas Energy Trust, which offers existing customers help via grants and Further Assistance Payments.

For further information, visit: www.britishgasenergytrust.org.uk.

British Gas also has links with six other charities and regularly liaise on how to help people with their fuel bills. They also offer a ‘here to HELP’ programme which offers free, or subsidised insulation, and other key advice, via four of their charity partners, namely Help the Aged, Scope, RNIB and Money Advice Trust. More information can be obtained by telephoning 0845 605 2535.

Furthermore, the British Gas Home Energy Care Team provides help and advice for over half a million of its most vulnerable customers, including providing bills in alternative formats, gas safety checks and appliance controls that are specially adapted for older, ill, or disabled customers. Call 0845 955 5404 for more information.

And if English is not your native language, then British Gas can discuss your bill in a number of other languages, including Polish, Somali, Urdu, Turkish, Bengali and Punjabi.

All this is one very good reason to make sure British Gas is your energy provider.

Tags: British Gas, Energy Bills, Energy Efficiency, Fuel, Fuel Bills

A social tariff is there for those that need help to pay their fuel bills.

With fuel prices gobbling far more of people’s home budgets than ever before, rules are now in place which try and make it clear who is needy and how the energy companies should respond.

The regulator of the Office of the Gas and Electricity Markets, Ofgem, has set some quite strict guidelines.

But, firstly, who qualifies for the help? It is those people that are deemed vulnerable customers and those that are seen as fuel poor customers (defined as spending on energy more than one tenth of their income).

After some confusion when the idea of social energy tariffs were first introduced, Ofgem stepped in to clarify the situation, now demanding that social tariffs should be equal to the energy provider’s most competitive (cheapest) tariff. It was thought unfair in many quarters that those having a hard time to pay their energy bills, were those that were, ironically on the most expensive deals.

So following Ofgem’s stance, the energy companies had to commit to a spend of £225 million between the years 2008 and 2011 on social tariffs.

One of the U.K.’s largest energy companies, British Gas, was the first to introduce a social tariff, having recognised the concept of fuel poverty way before many of its competitors.

The British Gas social tariff, known as The Essentials Tariff, is currently the largest in the U.K. It has the laudable aim of reducing the energy bills of over 750,000 of British Gas’s most needy customers.

These include people with Pay-As-You-Go electricity and gas meters, those without a bank account and the ones who have signed up to the British Gas Winter Rebate plan. For many of these customers, the new guidelines will make a meaningful difference to the prices of their electricity and gas.

And there are other ways to get help with your fuel bills, including grants and schemes, which tend to be grouped under the heading of the Home Energy Efficiency Scheme.

It depends in which part of the U.K you live to who administers the scheme and who sets the eligibility criteria.

In England, it’s called the Warm Front Scheme and in Wales, the Home Energy Efficiency Scheme. You are eligible if you are on a wide number of benefits.

For more information have a look at the EAGA website at www.eaga.co.uk or phone 0800 408 0694. Details about home energy efficiency schemes, and how to apply, are available by calling your local Energy Efficiency Advice Centre on freephone 0800 512 012. For other grants, contact your local authority or energy supplier and find out if they have any information.

You can also phone the Energy Saving Trust on 0845 727 7200 to ask about grants and schemes in your area.

In Scotland, it’s called the Warm Deal Scheme; for more information visit: www.scotland.gov.uk. In Northern Ireland, its called the Warm Homes Grant and have a look at the EAGA website at www.eaga.co.uk.

On a general basis, a home energy efficiency grant is not something to be sniffed at. They range from £500 to a very significant £5,000; so there’s no excuse not to try and use the grant system to keep warm.

---

For more information on Social tariffs Visithttp://www.britishgasboilers.co.uk/

---

Tags: Electricty, Fuel, Fuel Bills, Gas, Social Tariff

British Gas Wales trades under the name of Nwy Prydain.

And although Cardiff-based Nwy Prydain provides exactly the same service as British Gas, there are some interesting variations.

These include no standing charge, so customers have the advantage of only paying for what they use. This innovation was first introduced by Nwy Prydain and has proved very popular with customers. They also offer a significant discount if you take both electricity and gas from them.

A further bonus is their Free Bill Payment Cover which offers to clear your energy bills in case of accidental death – something not to be sniffed at these days.

And British Gas Wales, under the guise of Nwy Prydain, has a Welsh language service, meaning that Welsh language speakers can get the best from the company and its various offers.

Nwy Prydain is a one-stop energy company.

It not only provides an extensive range of competitive tariffs for gas, electricity, or duel fuel (gas and electricity), it covers your home maintenance and repair needs. This includes anything from installing a complete new central heating system, to providing hassle-free maintenance over its long life. For existing systems, it also provides a comprehensive repair service, meaning that most parts of your system, including your boiler and radiators, can be repaired quickly and cost-effectively.

But Nwy Prydain is not only about energy and central heating systems. It can effectively cover all your home repair and maintenance needs, including most plumbing and drains; electrical appliances; gas appliances; and, kitchen appliances.

It also sets out to help its customers by offering advice and tips on all the major issues connected with running a home. These include understanding how your bill is calculated; how to pay your bill; suggesting ways that your bill could be reduced by sensible practices around the home; tips on basic maintenance to help avoid future problems; what to do in the event of a breakdown; and, take some of the mystery away from central heating systems in general.

Nwy Prydain also promotes active energy efficiency, with reports and advice available on general energy savings; energy efficient products (including light bulbs); how to save energy and help your wallet; and, the introduction of new technologies and grants that are being made available for domestic use.

All in all, Nwy Prydain is one of the most pro-active energy companies operating today.

---

For more Information on British Gas or their Products visit http://www.britishgasboilers.co.uk/

Tags: British Gas, Electricty, Energy Bills, Fuel, Gas, Nwy Prydain, Wales

Which boiler to choose for your home can be a little daunting as there is quite a choice, each with a number of pros and cons.

Lets quickly run through the main types of boiler: condensing, combination, green, oil, gas, electric and duel fuel.
If this was a test, you would of course get full marks for guessing that the first two, a condensing boiler and a combination boiler, are really designs of boiler, as opposed to the others, which are marked by the type of fuel they burn. So, you can have a gas-fired, or oil-fired condensing boiler.

A condensing boiler is the boiler of choice at the moment. Because they are so efficient – nearly 90%, compared with the 70% of a standard combination boiler – they are the ones that should be installed in our environmentally conscious world. The downside with a condensing boiler is that although they burn less fuel and therefore cost less in the long run, because they are more complicated in design and require more equipment, they are more expensive to install.

A standard combination boiler is great for smaller properties and households. But as they heat water on demand, they can struggle to cope with heavy workloads. Manufacturers have developed various improvements for the combi boiler, allowing it to cope with the need to store hot water and be more efficient, this does increase their cost.

The green boiler is something which you will see more of over the coming years. Currently, because the burning of green fuels for domestic purposes is in its infancy, most green boilers are being operated by local authorities, companies and schools. But that’s set to change as we become more confident with burning ‘new-age’ green fuels. These include straw, wood chips, forest waste and even sewage sludge.

Various lobbying groups are keen to point out that with over 20 million tonnes of green fuels available every year, there is much the domestic consumer can do to help the country’s target of reducing carbon dioxide emissions by over three million tonnes annually.

But, domestic boilers that run solely and efficiently on biomass fuels, are arguably not yet developed enough to hit the mainstream market.

So, it’s back to the good old basics of oil, gas, electric and duel fuel.

Oil is possibly the fuel of the past, but for many rural, or remote regions of the country, it’s the main option for domestic heating systems. One of it’s biggest downsides is that it is an actively traded commodity and price rises and drops can hit within days.

At the time of writing, oil has dropped to half of its value as the coming recession bites, but when the economy picks up, it is now understood that the oil will rise once again, and possibly to very high levels.

But you could argue that gas is becoming as volatile commodity as oil. Now that North Sea gas reserves are becoming depleted, the U.K. is buying more gas on the open market and therefore, costs are as much in the hands of global economics as oil.

Electricity has always been seen as too expensive and an inefficient way to run modern heating systems in the U.K., but as the government seriously considers a new generation of controversial nuclear power stations, this might well indeed become the future fuel.

Of course, duel fuel systems might become popular as a way of hedging your bets, believing that there will always be an expensive fuel commodity and a cheaper one. This would, in theory, allow you to switch between the two and maximise your household budget. But, how practical that is depends on the boiler manufacturers.

So, the choice of boiler is usually affected by one major consideration: cost. How much will it cost to install and how much will it cost to run. You need to do a bit of homework to decide which will work best for you.

---

Tags: Boiler, British Gas, Combination Boiler, Condensing Boiler, Fuel