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Thread: How to heat a very old house?

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    Question How to heat a very old house?

    Hey hey.

    Last month my family and I moved into this epic 450 yr-old listed brick building. A farmhouse surrounded by fields (latter not owned by us).

    I mention listed because no double glazing possible. Has shutters and thick curtains instead.

    Over its history, a bunch of heating methods have been used, inclu a massive incinerator-style boiler, long since gone, supplying large cast-iron radiators via thick pipes, currently decommissioned.

    The house is in a U-shape, with the entrance at the bottom of the U. North wing and south wing. North wing has damp problems due to neglect, being north facing, and earth that sits just below window level in most G/F rooms (not removable).

    North wing has an old Rayburn (sp?) oven off mains gas running 24/7 in the kitchen, heating the hot water for the bathroom, and heating the kitchen. Running very low volume.

    South wing has a serious wood-burning stove in that kitchen (no 2, lol), supplying radiator heat to a series of newer radiators on copper pipe, plus hot water for the bath / kitchen taps. It's not very efficient. The showers in the south wing have electric instant hot water.

    A heating specialist came around last week, and gave us these options:

    1) new gas mains boiler, plus 30 new radiators and plumbing. Annual heating bill £2,800
    Cost: £27,000 inc

    2) a 45Kw Okofen biomass 7-9 ton system, using wood pellets. Annual bill £2,300, plus a RHI of £11,000 over 7 years.
    Cost: £27,500 for boiler & £17,000 for new central heating system - the radiators etc

    3) Geothermal energy hybrid ground source borehole system with back up gas boiler. Annual bill £2,000 plus a RHI of £30,000 over 7 years.
    Cost: £39,500 for the kit plus the radiators at £18,000 (£57,500) overall (if you did horizontal trenches the price would reduce by £10,000)

    If we can get the previous owners to let us use a field to lay the geothermal pipework horizontally, it wouldn't impact their sheep farming, as approx 1m below the surface, though presumably we'd have to pay them something.

    I'd also want to use solar &/or wind energy to reduce electricity costs, esp for the geothermal pump, aside from the overall desire to save electricity costs. Wife is very keen on solar, but that would never be sufficient for heating.

    The house needs to be warmed up after all these years, to restore its health. No damp proofing, and not possible. Previous owners used the bare minimum of rooms, and sold the house to concentrate on farming, and now live down the road.

    What would you do? Money is an issue.

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    Banhammer in peace PeterB kalniel's Avatar
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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    KISS. #1

    I think the idea of importing wooden pellets from america to burn is horrendous, and it's not a environmentally sound method. #3 sounds neat, but to me spells a nightmare of complexity - especially legally as you wouldn't just need right to lay the pipes, you'd need rights to access for maintenance.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Quote Originally Posted by kalniel View Post
    KISS. #1

    I think the idea of importing wooden pellets from america to burn is horrendous, and it's not a environmentally sound method. #3 sounds neat, but to me spells a nightmare of complexity - especially legally as you wouldn't just need right to lay the pipes, you'd need rights to access for maintenance.
    Good points, though in this case, the wood pellets come from just down the road, where pellets are produced from waste at a telephone pole-producing factory. I just don't like the idea of being dependent on something like that compared to geothermal.

    There are already access rights for sewage, road access and water/electricity. This wouldn't make it any worse or complex, really. The purchase took a LONG time to sort due to these issues, so now am well versed in it, plus would simply be a further paragraph in the covenants.

    Cheers.

    Edit: those access rights aren't just held by the previous owners - we own some. A sharing thing.
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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    https://www.nerdalize.com/heating/ ?

    I'm sure I've seen similar in the UK....

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Well what I mean by the pellets is that while you may have a local source, nationwide we don't have enough to burn, so we do actually import from the US. If you take your local supply then fine for you, but that was previously filling a demand from elsewhere that's now not being supplied so overall imports will still have to increase.

    Hope you're sure about the rights.. a friend of mine is a solicitor for a company that deals with exactly those kinds of things and even the most trivial thing sounds a complete nightmare.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Quote Originally Posted by b0redom View Post
    https://www.nerdalize.com/heating/ ?

    I'm sure I've seen similar in the UK....
    lol, yes cryptocurrency mining is the crazy answer! £27000 buys a lot of graphics cards and they earn back their running costs

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Just be wary of listed building consent. You will need it for alterations inside, outside, and in the ground of the house. Friend had to get consent for the gas boiler flue when they had heating installed. Unlike normal planning permission listed building alterations do not have an enforcement time limitation, so you can be forced to put right things done 10 years ago.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    3. Cheapest to install, thanks to that RHI, and cheapest to operate.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Yes, I’d say 3 - although geothermal produces fairly low temperatures so you may need to top that up - use the wood pellets in the wood burner! Ground thermal rather than geothermal makes it an even more attractive option - if you can negotiate the access rights.

    Of course some of these decisions depend on how long you plan to live there.
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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Plan is to live here looooong term.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Wood stoves. Period.

    Good log stores, and a good wood supplier.

    Fitted well, with flues in the house as high as possible before going through the wall and up further.

    You can create gravity fed water systems for radiators if you choose stoves with back and side boilers. Remember that warming water via a stove lowers the burning temperature resulting in tar inside the stove.

    I'd sugest you look at:

    http://www.clearviewstoves.com/stove.../clearview-650 with one of the boiler options

    If you have a central space, a stove windowed on both sides is a good idea.
    https://woodwarmstoves.co.uk/stoves/fireview-double

    Another great solution to longer term heat is a soap stone covered stove. It takes longer to heat, but hlds heat a looooong time

    http://www.contura.eu/english/stoves...one-Stove-34T/

    What I'm saying is: wood fired stoves and a good firewood supplier WITH great storage at home for wood.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    AMD GPUs...
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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Please don't burn wood The particulate emissions are horrific. I've woken up to terrible chimney smoke several times, and now keep my windows closed at night because of it. I could post charts from the SDS011 particulate sensor I've had running for the past several months, but there's not much point - nobody cares.

    There have been three major air pollution events in England & Wales so far this year. If you burn during another one in the future, I will give you a stern look of disapproval through the smoggy ether, while cycling to work wearing my mask.

    At some point many *many* years in the future, there will be restrictions on residential wood burning, probably starting nearer London or around the current air quality management areas. Will there be exceptions for wood-only homes? Maybe... or maybe not.

    Go for gas.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Quote Originally Posted by smargh View Post
    Please don't burn wood The particulate emissions are horrific. I've woken up to terrible chimney smoke several times, and now keep my windows closed at night because of it. I could post charts from the SDS011 particulate sensor I've had running for the past several months, but there's not much point - nobody cares.

    There have been three major air pollution events in England & Wales so far this year. If you burn during another one in the future, I will give you a stern look of disapproval through the smoggy ether, while cycling to work wearing my mask.

    At some point many *many* years in the future, there will be restrictions on residential wood burning, probably starting nearer London or around the current air quality management areas. Will there be exceptions for wood-only homes? Maybe... or maybe not.

    Go for gas.
    Can you post the graphs with some explanations? You've got me interested now
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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    To paraphrase the great Terry Pratchett: Give a house a fire and it'll be warm for a day, set it on fire and it'll be warm for the rest of its life.

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    Re: How to heat a very old house?

    Quote Originally Posted by smargh View Post
    Please don't burn wood The particulate emissions are horrific. I've woken up to terrible chimney smoke several times, and now keep my windows closed at night because of it. I could post charts from the SDS011 particulate sensor I've had running for the past several months, but there's not much point - nobody cares.

    There have been three major air pollution events in England & Wales so far this year. If you burn during another one in the future, I will give you a stern look of disapproval through the smoggy ether, while cycling to work wearing my mask.

    At some point many *many* years in the future, there will be restrictions on residential wood burning, probably starting nearer London or around the current air quality management areas. Will there be exceptions for wood-only homes? Maybe... or maybe not.

    Go for gas.
    yeah.. go for non renewable fossil fuels...not.

    Get a good wood burning stove that runs hot and efficiently, and warms the house properly, with radiant heat and the pleasure of the flames through the glass, radiating a different type of heat.. Something that you can store the fuel for ever, with no leakage.... with no danger apart from splinters in your fingers. Fuel that can be carried by a child, or an adult, that needs no compressed cylinders nor tanks nor pipes. A fuel that, when spilled can be re stacked. Can be borrowed from a neighbour and given back a year later in a diff shape.

    Make sure its DEFRA certified, run it hot and the smoke will be negligble.

    Learn to light it from the top down, like the Swedish authorities teach, so you have a good flame ABOVE the large wood below.. then as the wood heats up and emits the combustible gases they DO ignite. Later when the whole stove is hot they will ALL ignite automatically

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zG_urpcjp7M

    Mr Khan in London is right to start looking at wood burning stoves being banned in CENTRAL LONDON...but in other communities? nope.

    A single bloke on his allotment having an autumnal burn up creates more particulate on one Sunday than my stove creates all winter long. I get my flue swept every two years, and the soot is negligible. Looking from outside, the emmission are less than any cold started diesel.
    log stove.

    Wood is good.

    Quote Originally Posted by Advice Trinity by Knoxville
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