WHG Brownhills Case Study

Project scope

23 Silver Court is a three-bedroom maisonette built around 1960. Although the property benefits from double glazing and some loft insulation the only heating in the property were gained from an electric convector fire which had recently replaced an open hearth coal fire. There is no insulation to the fabric of the building which consists of tile hanging and storey high combination windows to the front and rear of the property.

The most recent EPC (Energy Performance Certificate) undertaken on the property rated the home as an F Grade the lowest level on the EPC scale.

The challenge for the team was to provide a heating and hot water system to the property which was both controllable and energy-efficient.

The solution

Following research into electrical heating solutions, Enviroheat HET  were contacted in relation to their Econo suite of products. From consultation with the company, a solution has been found that will provide our customer with controllable heating and hot water which can be controlled in the same manner as

a standard gas central heating system via a standard Honeywell two channel programmer using water-filled radiators which can be individually temperature controlled and centrally timed to provide total controllability, and also allows the hot water facility to be programmed to switch on and off to meet the customer’s needs.

By working closely with Enviroheat, a bespoke retrofit solution has been designed which will not only fulfill the requirements of this home but will also be suitable for other retrofit situations.

The feedback

To provide information on how the radiators have performed, during the installation of the radiators we also installed a consumption meter to the heating circuit to record the electrical Kilowatt Hours used by the radiators for the periods the customer used the system. In this case for one week the customer used 14.27Kw/hrs.

Heating the property to the level required by the customer has cost £2.06 per week, a projected cost of 49.46 per year (assuming electricity cost of £0.144p Kwhr) Showing the system to be 98% cheaper than Economy 7 and standard electric panels and 77% cheaper than gas-fired radiators.

The current customer underused the radiators, but if standard predicted usage was recorded we would anticipate usage costs of £199.20p per year. This cost would drop again if the property was insulated to current Building Regulation standards.

In addition to the monetary savings, the customer of the property said she was “very happy” with the new radiators and “would not be without them now”.

It is clear to see that the Enviroheat option not only provides viable heating options to compete against electrical systems but can also match gas-fired central heating options.