How winter-prepping your home in summer saves money

With a few weeks to go before the nights close in, this is the time to get homes to the best level of energy efficiency and comfort

Even enjoying the carbon-neutral performance of an air-source heat pump, it's vital to fully understand the system and its settings to get the best from your central heating. Picture: Daiken

After a rocky winter for all of us in 2022/2023, and with a few weeks to go before the nights close in, this is the time to get our homes to the best level of energy efficiency and comfort we can manage. There’s always something more we can do. 

Rather than taking on the most nerve-shredding, expensive retrofits, let’s take on some positive straightforward prepping, increase our understanding of our mothership and its systems, and acknowledge self-defeating bad habits.

Getting over-familiar with the central heating. Whether you have an old non-condensing oil boiler or a brand-spanking-new Daiken air-source heat pump, failed areas of design or a lack of proper control settings can leave room and water heating at less than the optimum performance. 

Starting with heat pumps (HP), several readers have told me they are mystified by an air-source heat pump (ASHP) they have “inherited” with a property. Their electricity bills by December are rocketing, and unsure of how to twiddle the pump to good behaviour or who to even call, they are stifling or slightly cold during the course of the day. Heat pumps, working well, can be set up and left alone, but they do not have a brain, and with slow reactivity, they turn like a cruise ship, not a speed boat. It’s up to you to learn exactly how the system works including vital “set back” temperatures (lowering the heating by night).

If the original installer is not helping you out, contact the supplier of the branding in Ireland, and engage a dedicated heating specialist recommended by them for your heat-pump type. It’s well worth the expense of a call-out by the right guy or gal to go over the system and settings. 

CLIMATE & SUSTAINABILITY HUB

If the controls are not spanking the problem, there may be an issue with the pump itself or more likely system design flaws. It could simply be sludge from unfiltered water in pipes and radiators, or one under-sized radiator that’s dragging heat from the rest of the house as it tries to deliver a constant temperature to a room flanked with cooler, outside walls. 

Whatever central heating system you rely on — have your boiler serviced every year, well in advance of firing it up for the first time. Summer servicing often has a % discount. Gas boiler technicians must be RGII registered, and those dealing with oil boilers, OFTEC registered.

TWO GRANTS

Does your heating system only have timed settings to a single temperature on the boiler, and no form of zoned performance? We can improve even this situation instantly with better heating controls, and thermostatic radiator valves or TVRs (effectively zoning the temperature within areas and rooms with individual on-rad thermostats). 

The SEAI-managed grant system gets a lot of criticism as being inadequately funded and impractical for many households. However, the smaller grant amounts you can cherry-pick as you can afford the work, are often the most economical and effective. The Heating Control Grant comes in at €700.  “Heating controls work by matching your heating and hot water schedules to the way you use your home. All homeowners, including landlords, whose homes were built and occupied before 2011 can apply,” states the SEAI.

If you cannot heat your domestic hot water without switching on your radiators or an electric immersion heater, you need to split these systems up, and you certainly need new heating controls. The potential savings? Up to 20% on a bald, largely unregulated CH system.

Period windows can be problematic to insulate to a high standard. Deploy long curtains and secure them all around the reveal. Double linings can add comfort where money is tight. Picture: Furnishings by Mind The Gap, mindtheg.com

Secondly, there’s the SEAI Attic/Rafter Insulation Grant of €800-€1,500. This generous and easily accessed grant can cover up to 70% or more of the cost of having a snug 300mm of batting on the floor of your loft space. It is the SEAIs most cost-effective upgrade, cutting heating bills by up to 30% in the case of balding 100mm insulation. 

“Homeowners availing of the attic or rafter insulation grants under the SEAI Better Energy Homes programme are required to install insulation achieving the minimum required U-values of 0.16 W/sqm K for ceiling-level insulation or 0.20 W/sq m K for rafter insulation”. Find out more about the designated steps to attic/rafter insulation grant aid at the SEAI Home pages. 

This is a perfect moment for a green loan at a low-interest level to supply the extra funds for a worthy, single-day project that will pay for itself in just a few seasons riding on the high Domestic Technical Standards and the NSAI Agrément certified products specified by the SEAI.

DRAUGHT DETECTION

Yes, we’re back to nosing the floor with an incense stick. Draughts move in an insidious mapping around most houses and apartments. Fluctuating pressure in the building will pull in and push out cold and warm air in unregulated sighs. This is aggravating when you’re trying to maintain predictable, comfortable temperatures and determine your heating bills. 

Even small conduits like the gap around the base of a radiator pipe or the wiring position for your cooker or other appliances, can leach energy. Happily, these small, outwardly banal problems are easily addressed with the wide range of insulating materials from expanding foam shot out with a gun, to stick-on compression seals, snuggling up everything from gaps in the floor to rattling windows and doors. 

Sometimes period windows are awkward to draft seal, and even secondary glazing will fall short. Try thermal blinds or interlined curtains — or both. Drape the curtains to the floor with a few inches to spare and cap them off with a pelmet or keep them as tight to the top of the window recess as possible. 

Use Velcro strips on the wall if needed. Blackout and thermal lining also offer some level of heat and sound retention.

AIR QUALITY

Now, as soon as we tighten up the air exchanges in the house, it’s time to look at ventilation and crucially, domestic air quality. Sealing the house up, blasting the CH and then spending more time at home, can not only denigrate the condition of the air you are breathing, but it can have a material effect on the building in terms of condensation, black mould and damp. 

PM2.5 created when burning any fossil fuel (particulate matter with a diameter less than 2.5 micrometres) is small enough to be inhaled deeply in the lungs. Right out of the gate — change the batteries in your CO alarm, and if you don’t have one, buy at least one, or two for a rangy home. 

Yes, if you only burn wood with a moisture content of 25%, you still need a CO alarm. Keep any stove front shut except when you’re loading the fire, and ensure all wall vents are working, above ground, and cleared of debris outside. If you rely on window trickle vents, keep them open and explore improving the situation to introduce refreshing, regular air exchanges to your atmosphere. 

NZEB-guided new builds and deep renovations have seen the arrival of mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) as a standard inclusion. Placed near humid areas like bathrooms and kitchens, MVHR conditions the air 24/7, straining it of not only stale moisture but pollutants and allergens. Ensure your mechanical ventilation system is serviced and ready with any necessary change of filters carried out to the letter. 

Dr Marie Coggin, Exposure Science Lecturer at the School of Physics at University Galway, reminded me: “The main sources of indoor air pollutants include combustion products — burning fossil fuels for heat or cooking or smoking indoors, and also burning incense or candles. When smoking occurs indoors it dominates as a source.”

POWER SWITCH

Considering changing power suppliers. Electricity prices have fallen, and your supplier’s numbers should at this point reflect that fact (allowing for them to bank tranches of power over several months at a set price). If you haven’t looked at your power bill for six months, you should. 

Now, gated into a contract of 12 months, there’s a price to pay for breaking up with our supplier. Still, for a real deal, that €50 kick-in-the-pants as you sprint for the door can still be worth it (€100 for dual fuel). When exploring bundled deals (gas and electricity) examine the numbers independently. 

If you don’t know your habits regarding power usage over the course of a typical day, now is the hour. Signed up for a Smart Meter, this is a simple process that can be brought down to 15-minute increments if you’re truly determined. 

Do not feel compelled to sign up for a Smart Meter or any deal based on time-of-use tariffs unless you know it will save you money over a 24-hour period. You are not under an obligation to take a Smart Meter at present, but once you have one, you may be offered only Smart Meter deals. 

A simple plug-through Energenie monitor can show you what any 3amp appliance is devouring (€24, screwfix.ie). For everything else? Spoiler alert — your electric shower is a slathering beast. 

What should we do when we move out of contract and our unit price goes up? Daragh Cassidy, Head of Communications for switching portal Bonkers.ie, advises: “Once you get moved onto a standard rate with your supplier, you should immediately do one of two things: Call your supplier and ask them to extend your discount for another year and hope they will, or switch to a new supplier — whichever one is offering the best discount to new customers.”