Biomass Boilers

ey86798

Still in the process of organising the "Green Deal" assesment that's required before making the RHI application. I'll post here when it's all done and I have some numbers to report.

mikeburns

Can I be nosey and ask how much it was costing in gas to heat your house? We're presently on oil and looking to replace to either biomass or gas.

Thanks

ey86798

I didn't keep *exact* figures, given that gas prices were consistently rising, but it was definitely very close to what I subsequently paid for pellets. That seems to be consistent with what other people have reported. Of course when I start getting the RHI payments, I expect those to offset the pellet cost to quite a large extent.

malariaboy

Any one looking into biomass could have a look at Treco website just started selling domestic biomass boilers . I install commerciall biomass and they sell the domestic version by guntamatic hope this helps


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Dunbar

A couple more things to consider, one being the many reports about breakdowns, and problems if you take winter holidays, the property will be without heat if no one is available to replenish the fuel.

Dunbar

Very noble of you ey86798 but a second installation after two/ three years is hardly economical costing, would you say a conservative £15k per installation? working out at over £10k per year plus fuel. The lowest price I found for installation was almost £20k which would pay my gas and electric bill for 10 years as well as the installation cost of a new ‘reliable’ gas boiler, giving the added benefit that the house would not freeze up when I have a 2-3 weeks away in winter, without the need to shift tones of pellets each year.

Biteman

Hi we've just 2 months ago changed our condensing oil boiler costing £3600 a year to run(draughty old vicarage type house) to a 35kw Klover Italian biomass boiler.
The house is definitely warmer but we are using 5 ten kg bags per day at the moment. That works out at a ton every 20 days.(£250)
The plus side is that the RHI grant is about £2100 every quarter for 7years and that my 17 year old and I are getting a good workout humping the bags from the out house, but in 7 years or sooner if my back doesn't hold out we are going to have to move to a smaller house.

danmc_82

Instead of spending all the money on wood it would be a good idea to get the house insulated as much as possible. Otherwise like you said you'll end up moving.

Lors

Hi, I know this is an old thread but I would like to share my experience of the biomass boiler I had installed about 9 months ago. I had an oil fuel boiler before and my landlord had the biomass installed to save money and lower carbon emissions. The trianco biomass autofeeder ran okay for the first 3 months, I did not use it for 2 months in summer and when started it up again it kept cutting out saying error no fuel, there were plenty pellets in it so I had to switch it off then on and cancel the alarm.  Every hour this happened and i can say 2 months on i am still having to go outside every hour to restart it. Anyway the engineer came out to look about a month ago and said it was the panel control board and ordered a new one; it was fitted earlier this week to no avail, the problem is still the same. Now they are ordering a thermostat which tells me its a process of elimination and the industry is too new to have experienced engineers. If you have a fault you will wait a long time, the manufacturers had one engineer to cover the whole country but luckily I was able to contact the installation team who had less of a waiting list by a couple of weeks.
This is just my experience, my neighbours have the same boiler but have not had this issue; although they are not overjoyed by the new system either due to cost and installation issues.
The cost to run for myself in a 2 bedroom house Is £110 every 25 days, give or take a day or two. My neighbours and I order a pallet between us at £220 for 96 10kg bags. Therefore i use 4800 kgs of wood pellets every 25-28 days. My neighbours last about 22-24 days as they are home all day.
As someone said above, putting in 10kg bags is okay for a younger person but elderly would struggle. The auto feeder does hold up to 1500 kgs of pellets which is good if you can spare a half hour to fill it up. Cleaning of the ash pan is relatively straight forward although not for those who don't like getting a bit mucky. The grate that needs unscrewed and taken out to clean every 6 weeks or so is very difficult, a less abled person could not manage this. It involves basically lying on the ground and trying to get underneath the grate to unscrew it.
One final issue for me is the electricity cost to run which I never even considered as it's said to be around 5p per kWh. I am paying an extra £30 per month for electricity, dont despair though i think this is due to the fault with my boiler as it has to restart again every hour.  So to sum up I am disappointed by my experience so far. The positives are the instant heat and hot water. Relatively easy to work. You will need a large space inside for the 6 foot tall tank inside your house, once the tank water is hot you will have heat instantly.  It does take a day or so after installation to reach its capacity.
Installation was relatively straight forward for my home but my neighbours had to have lots of floorboards lifted and pipes running outside their house. The boiler was installed in one of their bedrooms as the engineers thought it would be easier to fit it there. Now they have an eyesore in the bedroom that takes up alot of space. I would advise anyone thinking of having a biomass boiler fitted to be sure they have space in their home and think of the pipe work needed. The surveyor doesn't do the work so his idea of the installation may not match reality.
I will keep persevering with this boiler in the hope it improves and also because I have no other option. Given this situation again and if I had a choice I would still have the biomass boiler fitted but a much easier version. If i had to pay for this myself i would be very angry by now.
A final word of caution if you have a coal fire with a back boiler, you will no longer be able to use your fire unless you have the back boiler removed.  

Happy fuelling

sneakyweeone

Thanks for sharing this information. These are the issues that are sometimes lost in the rush to move to renewables. Food for thought.