Measuring real time gas consumption

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts
  • jdp80
    Automated Home Jr Member
    • Mar 2016
    • 38

    #46
    I haven't noticed it do that, but our heating's on all day. I can understand a little spike showing if you cross a boundary on the dial during a period of low usage. Does your boiler have a pilot light or anything like that?

    I did leave the hob on once or twice though.. I was going to write a little Domoticz event to send a warning if the heating wasn't on but gas was being used. Guess I'll be waiting until Spring to write that

    The exported CSV is hourly on the hour so I assume the graph is the same.

    Comment

    • DBMandrake
      Automated Home Legend
      • Sep 2014
      • 2361

      #47
      Originally posted by jdp80 View Post
      I haven't noticed it do that, but our heating's on all day. I can understand a little spike showing if you cross a boundary on the dial during a period of low usage. Does your boiler have a pilot light or anything like that?
      Yes it does, and it appears that in this instance it was the pilot light. Whoops.

      Normally the pilot light shows as a 0.31kW/hr bump about every 5 hours on the explore graph as the needle crosses the sensor, where I was confused is where the 1.26kW/hr came from.

      I realise now that in both cases you have a single pulse representing 1 cubic foot of gas, one pulse in a one hour period would be 1 cubic foot per hour which is 0.31kW/hr. However the live page is a 15 minute period so 1 cubic foot in 15 minutes would be 4x that or 1.26kW/hr.

      Both readings are misleading because they assume that all of that one cubic foot of gas was consumed entirely within the 15 or 60 minute period respectively, but you can't know that as there is only a single pulse from the needle - in fact it takes about 5 hours for the needle to turn even once from the pilot light.

      You can't accurately measure the rate of gas consumption when it is so low that a single pulse lasts longer than the sampling period. The daily total will still be correct but where on the graph it is shown will depend on where the dial is sitting, and the 15 minute live reading will be more or less meaningless at such a low value. Only when you get at least two pulses in a row in the 15 minute period can you actually measure the current gas consumption rate by timing how long it was between pulses.

      I could have sworn that last time this happened there was no bump on the explore graph, but maybe I was wrong...
      Last edited by DBMandrake; 6 December 2016, 02:38 PM.

      Comment

      • DBMandrake
        Automated Home Legend
        • Sep 2014
        • 2361

        #48
        I've had loop for 3 months now so wanted to do a little mini-review of it and let people know if it ended up helping me or not. The short answer is yes.

        Accuracy of the gas reading is excellent - after two weeks or so the last red digit was only out by one or two numbers, which is very good. Accuracy of the electricity reading will only be average because as discussed it doesn't take into account power factor or voltage. However I believe that this approximate reading is probably within 10-20% (especially when most big loads like electric shower and ovens are resistive) and therefore "good enough" when it comes to watching your usage and trying to keep it down. It will certainly let you compare two different days or observe trends.

        Being able to monitor electricity and gas use on a daily, weekly and monthly basis both in kWh and £ cost, rather than getting 3 monthly bill shock really has woken me up to just what does cost and what doesn't. I have our Evohome schedule set fairly economically - rooms that aren't needed or aren't used much at a certain time of day are ruthlessly set to lower temperatures or set off, and if we do need those rooms unexpectedly we manually turn them up. On occasions where we have got a bit carried away and turned all these rooms up at once the increase in gas usage is immediate and stark - one recent Saturday we were doing a tidy up of the entire house and as such had the temperature turned up to comfortable levels in all rooms for most of the daytime, the look of horror on my face the following day when I realised our gas use was over 50% higher than normal that day was priceless.

        If I didn't have that immediate feedback to say "no, no no, don't keep doing that" I may well have decided that having all rooms in the house toasty warm more often was a good thing, until the bill arrived at least... It also allows you to fine tune your temperature schedules and get immediate feedback on what difference it makes.

        For example Kitchen, Hallway and Living room used to come on to 20 degrees in the morning before work, and in sub zero temperatures the hallway radiator struggles to reach 20 so the boiler (or at least the boiler relay) tends to run continuously to try to reach the target. However I found that just dropping those three rooms to 19 degrees was enough to cut gas usage in the morning down quite a lot - because the room can easily reach 19 and allow the boiler relay to be TPI modulated right down. In fact in recent mornings (8-10 degrees unusually mild) I've actually seen the boiler (and pump overrun) go off completely in the mornings once those rooms were up to temperature.

        Other features about loop that are nice are the weekly reports that get emailed to you, and the energy budget reports, where you can set your target monthly budget, and it will email you at 25/50/75 and 100% of that budget to let you know how you are doing and whether you are making your target or not.

        Being able to see usage in both kWh and £ for a day, week, month or 3 monthly is great, however one small niggle is that you can't specify an arbitrary date range, for example to do a direct comparison with your energy companies bill, as they tend to be billed over odd periods of time. (You could export the data as CSV and do an Excel sum though if you really wanted)

        Also, you can compare your electricity use to previous usage of your own as a graph overlay, but you can't tell it when to compare to (only the previous day/week/month etc) nor can you do a gas comparison. This means if you try to compare Monday's electricity use with previous use your only choice is to compare it with Sunday - but given that you're comparing a week day to a weekend that's hardly fair. There isn't a way that I could compare Monday to an arbitrarily chosen day.

        All in all well worth the £60 I spent on the hardware, and it is something I continue to use and monitor every day to keep an eye on things.

        The other side of loop is that once they gather "enough" data, they will then use uswitch to start offering you "better deals", which has both good and bad sides to it. I remember saying I would be ignoring their recommendations and doing my own research, but the good side of it is that when the feature unlocked after a month and started making recommendations to switch it did (quite painfully) draw my attention to the fact that we were grossly over-paying for gas on an old fixed rate plan, and have been for at least a year now...

        If it hadn't put that right there in my face and nagged me about it I'm not sure that I would have bothered to go out and do the research on my own on dozens of different providers to see what was out there and how our current rates compared, so it got me off my backside once I realised how much we could be be saving.

        Their top suggestion was bulb energy (who I've never heard of before, not that I go looking in my spare time though! ) and I did a little research on the top four recommendations they made, as well as doing a little dig around on my own, but I kept coming back to bulb, especially after reading bulb's blog, customer support forum etc, and liking what I saw. I'm someone that likes to support the little guy rather than the big corporates, so to be honest they had me already at that point given how much better their tariff was, but the fact that their focus is on renewable's (100% electricity and 10% gas at the moment) was a nice bonus, as I'm all for encouraging renewable energy as we gradually transition to the likes of electric cars etc... I reached out to them on their customer forum with some questions and got replies within an hour even though it was late at night, and I've since had some good email dialogue with them as well.

        To give you some idea of the difference between tariffs, our current fixed rate tariff is "Fixed Price Mar 17" with Scottish Hydro, which is a whopping 4.62p/kWh for gas. After March 17 if we did nothing we would go onto their Standard variable tariff which ironically is actually cheaper than their fixed tariff... but only by a modest amount. Bulb is a variable tariff with a current gas price of 2.47p/kWh - yes that's right, only 53% of what we are currently paying...

        Now, their standing charges are quite a bit higher but still don't make much impact on the overall cost, and their electricity rate is a little bit higher too, but that only amounts to about £2 per month as electricity is only a minor cost in our house. On the gas side we're looking at approximately £50 less a month averaged over a year.

        Of course with a variable rate you run the risk of increases, but if you're starting off so much lower in the first place they would have to go up a lot to even get back to where we started, and they also pay your previous suppliers exit fee but have no exit fee of their own so if things did go bad I could just jump ship again, so I decided let's go for it! One drawback with bulb is if you join during the winter your initial payments are set at 20% higher than your normal yearly averaged monthly rate, but only for that first winter. They say this is to stop you getting into debt during that high usage period when you haven't already built up a credit over the previous summer, and it makes good sense to me, however it could be a sticking point if part of your reason for switching is needing an immediate savings rather than long term savings. (However in my case even the 20% higher initial payments are still a lot cheaper than what I was paying before)

        I don't want this to sound like an advert for bulb by the way - I've never heard of them before this and just wanted to share what I ended up doing after getting a loop monitor. I don't even finish switching to them until the 26th, so it remains to be seen how good they are in the long run, but I am hopeful.

        This now brings me to a major flaw in loop - their method of estimating your usage for offering deals via uswitch is flawed. The feature unlocks after 30 days however it attempts to generate a year averaged estimate of your usage based on that first month of using loop. For me that first month was half of October and half of November - both unseasonably warm. So their estimate of my yearly energy use was way out in the "not enough" direction. Ironically this means the savings from switching will actually be more than initially suggested by them as they underestimated my usage.

        However as each month since then went by I kept expecting to see their recommendations change and be updated to reflect a more accurate estimate from more time monitoring my usage - but it never did. Even though I've now been using loop for 3 months and have 3 months of usage recorded their switch recommendations are still using the same inaccurate data from mid October to mid November, and I can't find anything in the user interface to tell it to go re-calculate based on all the additional usage data it has gathered since.

        This became a major issue when I tried to switch to bulb using the loop website - I thought I might as well give them credit for finding bulb for me, (so they can get a commission) however it automatically tried to sign me up based on a monthly rate calculated from that inaccurate extrapolated usage estimate, which would have seen my initial monthly bill to bulb being about £50 below what I knew it ought to be, and there was no way for me to manually change or override it through the loop interface.

        So in the end I looked up my previous yearly summary from Scottish Hydro to use those figures and manually filled that in directly with uswitch, which gave a monthly figure that was very close to what I was expecting. So unfortunately loop missed out on their commission there! So if you're reading loop, you need to improve your website both to update the projected yearly usage as you gather more data, and also allow the user to override the sign up figure if the estimated usage figure is too low!
        Last edited by DBMandrake; 19 January 2017, 04:16 PM.

        Comment

        • HenGus
          Automated Home Legend
          • May 2014
          • 1001

          #49
          An excellent and helpful review - thank you. In case anybody is thinking about switching to Bulb, it is a supplier (and it may be the only one) that makes an extra charge for an IGT gas supply. If I recall, it is about £100 a year extra.

          Comment

          • DBMandrake
            Automated Home Legend
            • Sep 2014
            • 2361

            #50
            What's an IGT gas supply ?

            That acronym went right over my head I'm afraid...

            Comment

            • HenGus
              Automated Home Legend
              • May 2014
              • 1001

              #51
              Originally posted by DBMandrake View Post
              What's an IGT gas supply ?

              That acronym went right over my head I'm afraid...
              Independent Gas Transporter. Used in many new builds by developers. In the days of yore, all suppliers charged a levy as the suppliers have to pay the IGT.

              Comment

              • DBMandrake
                Automated Home Legend
                • Sep 2014
                • 2361

                #52
                Ah I see. Doesn't apply to me then. But thanks for pointing that out to others, I was not even aware there were independent gas networks.

                Comment

                • doni
                  Automated Home Jr Member
                  • Jul 2016
                  • 24

                  #53
                  I've been using smappee for around 3+ years for monitoring electricity usage, and loop for around 15 months for gas (at the time smappee didn't have a gas monitor otherwise I would have gone with them).

                  Smappee is very accurate on monitoring electricity usage, typically <1% error. The product feels more professional then loop, but loop's UI is much better for exploring usage over time. The one bit that really let's smappee down is the claimed appliance identification - this is just not accurate enough to be worth the time spent on setting it up (it gets confused over appliances).

                  Loop on the other hand has been great for monitoring gas uage. It's error rate is much less than 1%, and the Web UI is very good although I would like an easy way of being able to compare this years usage to last years. The story with the loop electricity monitor is not so good - the initial one I had was off by as much as 40% on any given day and was consistently out by around 20% over a long period of time. I have had 3 separate devices sent to me to tailor the measurements to my home, and the last one received is ok (but not as accurate as smappee). Over the last 3 months the total electricity consumption is within 1% of the actual consumption, however any given day can be off by as much as 20%.

                  In an ideal world, I'd combine the smappee monitoring with the loop UI.

                  Don
                  Last edited by doni; 19 January 2017, 05:52 PM.

                  Comment

                  • bruce_miranda
                    Automated Home Legend
                    • Jul 2014
                    • 2307

                    #54
                    I rushed to compare Bulb with my current supplier Extra Energy. The sound of them paying my exit fees made me run even faster. Unfortunately my current supplier's tariff was almost half of Bulb on everything including standing charges. So Bulb wasn't for me.

                    Another question. Can I use Gas Loop without Electricity Loop i.e. I know they can't work independently but can I simply not connect the electric loop monitor and just use gas loop?

                    Comment

                    • DBMandrake
                      Automated Home Legend
                      • Sep 2014
                      • 2361

                      #55
                      Originally posted by bruce_miranda View Post
                      I rushed to compare Bulb with my current supplier Extra Energy. The sound of them paying my exit fees made me run even faster. Unfortunately my current supplier's tariff was almost half of Bulb on everything including standing charges. So Bulb wasn't for me.
                      Really ? Are you getting some special deal with them ? I just went to Extra Energy's website and filled in the quote form with my current yearly usage etc and the fixed rate tariff that they quoted me was:

                      Electricity
                      14.693p per kWh, standing charge 18.88p per day

                      Gas
                      2.941p per kWh, standing charge 19.90p per day

                      There is also a £30 exit fee, and I didn't see any mention of them paying previous suppliers exit fees.

                      Something I found a bit strange was the fine print that said "Estimated costs include all added charges and discounts. All prices shown are inclusive of VAT at 5%.".

                      Why 5% ?

                      On bulb I was offered a variable rate of:

                      Electricity
                      13.40p per kWh, standing charge 27.30p per day

                      Gas
                      2.47p per kWh, standing charge 27.30p per day

                      No exit fee. Yes standing charges are higher but this is a very small proportion of the bill so it still works out better for me.

                      I forgot to mention they also offer a £30/yr dual fuel discount.

                      If you're really getting half the price again from Extra Energy I'd like to know how.

                      Another question. Can I use Gas Loop without Electricity Loop i.e. I know they can't work independently but can I simply not connect the electric loop monitor and just use gas loop?
                      I can't see why you wouldn't be able to - you may need to bind (enter the MAC address) of the electricity sensor on your account before it will allow you to add the gas sensor though, I found I had to add the electricity one first.

                      If you have enough available cable length between your meter and switch board for the clamp to fit (in addition to the electricity monitor you already use) why not just clamp it on anyway instead of leaving it in the box ?

                      If it doesn't detect any usage its possible the Web interface might start nagging you that there's a problem.
                      Last edited by DBMandrake; 20 January 2017, 12:28 PM.

                      Comment

                      • HenGus
                        Automated Home Legend
                        • May 2014
                        • 1001

                        #56
                        I currently pay £663 per year for gas and electricity (fixed for another 11 months and no exit fees). Bulb would be £267 a year more (including the £100 IGT charge) on a variable tariff. It does say on the MSE site that Bulb will refund exit fees up to £120. Not for me - IGT or not.

                        They do get very good CS reviews but at the end of the day it is just gas and electricity. That said, my gas is 'supposedly' different as it has a high calorific value as implied by my latest statement. I sense the supplier is going to be busy reversing bills and using the correct regional averages from the National Grid as required by the Ofgem policy dated late 2014.

                        Comment

                        • DBMandrake
                          Automated Home Legend
                          • Sep 2014
                          • 2361

                          #57
                          Wow. You guys either have really low gas and electricity use compared to me or have access to really low tariffs that I can't find listed publicly anywhere...
                          Last edited by DBMandrake; 20 January 2017, 04:11 PM.

                          Comment

                          • HenGus
                            Automated Home Legend
                            • May 2014
                            • 1001

                            #58
                            Originally posted by DBMandrake View Post
                            Wow. You guys either have really low gas and electricity use compared to me or have access to really low tariffs that I can't find listed publicly anywhere...
                            I use 10,000kWhs for my gas comparisons and then run them again at +/- 2000 just go see how the deal changes. Last year - it was warm - we only used 7641kWhs. Evohome had a part to play in reducing my consumption.

                            Comment

                            • HenGus
                              Automated Home Legend
                              • May 2014
                              • 1001

                              #59
                              Originally posted by doni View Post
                              I've been using smappee for around 3+ years for monitoring electricity usage, and loop for around 15 months for gas (at the time smappee didn't have a gas monitor otherwise I would have gone with them).

                              Smappee is very accurate on monitoring electricity usage, typically <1% error. The product feels more professional then loop, but loop's UI is much better for exploring usage over time. The one bit that really let's smappee down is the claimed appliance identification - this is just not accurate enough to be worth the time spent on setting it up (it gets confused over appliances).

                              Loop on the other hand has been great for monitoring gas uage. It's error rate is much less than 1%, and the Web UI is very good although I would like an easy way of being able to compare this years usage to last years. The story with the loop electricity monitor is not so good - the initial one I had was off by as much as 40% on any given day and was consistently out by around 20% over a long period of time. I have had 3 separate devices sent to me to tailor the measurements to my home, and the last one received is ok (but not as accurate as smappee). Over the last 3 months the total electricity consumption is within 1% of the actual consumption, however any given day can be off by as much as 20%.

                              In an ideal world, I'd combine the smappee monitoring with the loop UI.

                              Don
                              I have just had a response from Loop to save that they should have a PV compatible system later this year.

                              Comment

                              • DBMandrake
                                Automated Home Legend
                                • Sep 2014
                                • 2361

                                #60
                                Originally posted by HenGus View Post
                                I use 10,000kWhs for my gas comparisons and then run them again at +/- 2000 just go see how the deal changes. Last year - it was warm - we only used 7641kWhs. Evohome had a part to play in reducing my consumption.
                                Ah, no wonder Bulb didn't work out for you for such a low usage, due to their higher standing charges.

                                According to this article your 7641kWh for gas (or even 10000kWh) is WAY below the average household:

                                Gas and electricity guides from OVO Energy. Get advice direct from the energy suppliers on gas and electricity bills.


                                Let's just say that my usage is quite a lot higher than their "average" figures, even though Evohome has cut my gas usage by about 30% in the winter and 50% in the summer.

                                Comment

                                Working...
                                X