Converting from Oil to Gas

[Zola.]

In a pickle at the moment... seriously considering spending £4000 converting from Oil to Gas. Its a fair chunk of cash of course. :/
Have any of you converted before?

Plus sides would be constant supply of hot water, never running out. TRV valves fitted so the rooms always sit at room temperature.... getting rid of the oil tank, the water tanks in attic, hot press and a serious upgrade to our 1960s home. Some of the radiators here are 40 years old. I did change two, but 5 more need done.

The thermostat is also so old that you can only program a morning and night heat blast, so our son gets no extra heat at the moment at night unless we get up and switch the heat on manually at 3/4am hah.

It would add value to our semi detached home, but may be approaching the ceiling of what the house would be worth on the street already. It's the type of thing I would be happy to do if we stay here long term. Although if we have another child (no plans yet) the house will maybe become too small for us all.

Downside is, its 4 grand!

Appreciate any thoughts :)

[MarcherLady]

I am a fan of gas fuelled heating but I think there are several different issues here, and you could fix most of them without paying for the conversion to gas, and some might be more important to you, and also more cost and energy efficient than others.

Have you costed making all the required upgrades but keeping your oil fuelled system?

TRVs are cheap and pretty easy to install, and are fuel agnostic, and probably DIY-able.
Fitting a new timer and thermostat, ditto.
Replacing radiators and installing an on-demand hot water system are more expensive and intrusive, but again, are fuel agnostic.

As someone currently house-hunting I can confirm that having gas fuelled heating is really important to me, but if you think it won't affect the resale value all that much, I think upgrading individual components is a better way to go. What % of the houses in your street do you reckon have gas vs oil?
What is the ROI in terms of reduced heating bills and increased quality of life?

[PhilB]

I'm with MarcherLady on this one.  The boiler and the rest of the system need to really be thought about separately.  If the boiler is working fine then replacing it with gas probably doesn't give a good return on investment from fuel savings alone.  If the boiler goes wrong though, I'd replace it with gas like a shot as new oil boilers cost an arm and a leg.  Unfortunately we don't have gas in the village so I don't have the option :0(

[Zola.]

Having slept on it a few nights I am leaning more towards really keen to get it done, but still wary of the cost.... I am printing out the 3 quotes and will compare with my wife tonight like for like.

I have drawn up the pros and cons...

Pros

• Never running out of heat / hot water
• Can pay bill by monthly direct debit and earn 3% cashback
• A warmer house, 5 new more powerful radiators
• system flushed and serviced, peace of mind that all is in good working order
• modern thermostat to program heat whenever we want
• A new shower unit with x3 more power
• Water tanks in attic, hot press, boiler in garage and oil tank in garden all removed
• Option to pay half up front and £100 a month for 2 years @ 0% APR[/i]
  
  • makes the house more attractive for future sale[/i]
    
    
    
  Cons
  
  
  • £4,000 outlay
  • ROI may take a number of years
  • Although gas is regulated, at the mercy of price hikes, probably no different to oil volatility though
  • If the infrastructure was ever attacked or failed, I would have no heat. Having my own oil supply brings somewhat temporary control
  
  .

[Linea_Norway]

Does your country or your community have plans to forbid oil tanks and oil heaters in the near future? In Norway this is the case. Home owners now have to remove their oil tanks. They even can get financial aid to replace an oil heater with a warmth pump.

In your case, instead of only looking at gas, I would also look at alternatives for warmth pumps (either air-air, air to boiler, or ground-air). In our previous house we had an electric air-air warmth pump and that gave a nice room temperature inside. But it did not warm up the water.
Also have a look at solar boilers. Can you get financial aid to replace an oil heater with a solar boiler? Maybe solar up to a basic temperature, combined with gas to heat up further? I think many people in the Netherlands have that currently. Many have put solar panels on the roof, connected to their boiler and they all have a gas pipe to their house. They probably received financial aid as well.

Your house will be more attractive in the future with an investment in a modern, energy saving heating solution.

[Zola.]

No real incentives on the oil tank sadly.

There are some incentives, but that I qualify for sadly.  My boiler is 5 years too young to get up to £1000 off :( and we apparently earn too much to get £500 cashback

[PhilB]

If you want a complete list of Pros and Cons, there's the fact that oil leaks smell bad, but gas leaks go bang!

More seriously, another thing that may help defray the cost is, I believe, that you get better deals when switching energy suppliers if you can do gas and electric together.