Heating nightmare in France

[julesb]

Hello everyone - merry christmas - I should be worrying about all the christmas prezzies I've not bought, or being Sunday evening I should be relaxing watching the TV (no chance!). No - not me, the born panic merchant. Our latest concern is 'how do we heat our next gite'. The gite is a complete renovation (like the first), but has no obvious method of heating. I need to have a reasonable standard of heating as we want to try to get Spring + Autumn lets, plus we may have to live in it ourselves for the next couple of winters. As always we are on a very tight budget. Gas central heating is out as there is no-where to place the big gas tank. Oil is an option, but I believe very expensive to run. Electric plug in fan heaters are no-go as in our current property more than 2 on at once and it pops the electric. Our best bet seemed to be night storage heaters as we have cheap nightime electricity and there is less chance of the trip setting off in the early hours, but we are finding it really hard to find this sort of heating unless we pay a fortune for each radiator. Anyone know of any alternatives or have any suggestions? The gite is an old farm house, will have bedroom + on-suite + Kitchen on ground floor, living room + bedroom on second floor, bedroom + bathroom on third floor. There is an old defunct, part built chimney from living room up through top bedroom + out of chimney. Any advice gladly received. Julesb x

[marcus]

Hi,

Town gas is almost always cheapest, but I expect you don't have access to that. But gas in tanks (propane) is more expensive than oil, and I understand there is a formula that keeps it that way. However perhaps you have nowhere to put an oil tank?

Oil tanks are not usually buried, but gas tanks often are - you enter into a contract with a gas supplier, they come along and bury a tank in your garden, then keep it filled up for you. The supply and burying of the tank is free if you sign up for a contract in which they can supply your gas for a certain period of time.

Oil tanks are not too obtrusive if boxed in (that's what we have here).

In the majority of places you can ask EDF to raise your supply of current so that electrical items don't trip out all the time. There are a few places where they will say the line can't deliver any more power but this is unusual. A higher supply costs a little bit more - the exact cost depends on your contract.

Electric fan heaters are useless because they create drafts, and regions of hot and cold. So there is a perception of heat and cold that doesn't work very well, and you end up having them on all the time and still feeling cold, and freezing as soon as you turn them off.

Modern storage heaters are good but as expensive as central heating to install. In our little gite we have a couple of 'oil filled electric radiators'. These are cheap to buy and work very well.

We also have wood burning stoves in all three properties which are the cheapest way to heat but guests may not like having them as their sole heating because they involve a bit of work. If I was starting from scratch for ourselves I'd have a 'closed in fireplace' wood burning system with hot air ducting to all rooms wood - cheap and very efficient. Needs somewhere to keep a big pile of wood of course.

I have ignored geothermal which is expensive to install and cheap after that because you don't seem to have much land?

Last word - pay meticulous attention to insulation during your renovation. Roof, floors, walls, windows, doors are all important. Check out the up to date standards and follow them. This makes an enormous difference to heating costs and overall comfort (and the environment). We heat our large barn (newly renovated, ceilings to 5m, heated with oil and wood) for less than half the cost of what a lot of people here pay to heat smaller properties because we focussed on insulation during renovation.

Marcus (thermometer says -7.8 C as I write this and I think your area will be colder)

[Giddy Goat]

Jules, we have modern electric wall mounted radiators, and as Marcus says, are on a rate which doesn't seem to trip the system when they're in use. I think they're oil-filled like the free-standing ones, which are pretty efficient, but our vendors installed them so I'll find out more.

Another tip: are you thinking of putting in ceiling fans? Our vendors (architects) lived in the property through the winter, and had the ceiling fans on low, to push the warm air down again. It does seem to work!

We're spending Xmas at the house, so this will be our first experience of how truly efficient their system is. We put the largest of the Jotul woodburners in the salon in Sept to give this room a further boost. High ceilings, no carpets (just the odd rug) or curtains, absence of internal doors in some areas, and thick stone walls do take a bit of getting round.

I'm a bit of a panic merchant too, but watch this space!

[alexia s.]

" absence of internal doors in some areas"

Jane, pet, do goats sew?

Curtains across openings stop draughts in winter. We even put curtains against the external doors which have glass in them.

[la vache!]

As it is a gite and unlikely to be rented all winter, I would go for oil filled electric radiators. I put replaced the fan heaters in ly gites with Acova heaters last year and they are a lot more efficient to run. I have gas central heating in my house, but that's because I live out here permenently - it is very expensive to install and run (buried tank in the garden) and would certainly not be worth the expense of installing for a few, at the moment, "potential" winter lets. Electricity is expensive, but for Autumn and Spring lets the usage won't be too high. If you do choose electricity, it would be advisable for you to check out which EDF tarif would be most suitable.

[Alan Knighting]

Jules,

I would endorse everything Marcus has said particularly the necessity for good insulation, and draught proofing. Underfloor heating is perhaps another alternative to be considered.

My own house has double glazing, insulated walls and roof. There is gas fired central heating and a ducted air system powered by a large multi-fuel open/closed fireplace. I use wood which is cheap and highly effective.

My gites both have wood burners, the smaller one a stove, the larger one an open/closed fire with ducted air to the bedrooms.

Make no mistake, it can get very cold in inland France during the winter months.

Alan

[julesb]

Thanks for the help - I think I will check out the oil filled radiators as a possible option with a poelle wood burner in the living room. Unfortunately as far as electricty goes we have already had an upgrade to our system + can't go higher. Being an old farm in the middle of no-where we are on 3-phase, which causes its own problems in itself. It certainly does get cold here - last Feb it never got over 0 degrees all month + we had lows around - 16!!! Still when the sun arrives the heat comes too, we are basking in minus 2 today because the sun is out!

Merry Xmas to all
Julie

[Giddy Goat]

Alexia - no, can't sew, but maybe I could have a go, using my mouth - very carefully!? A human would have to thread the needle though. We were left some curtains for the purpose for two doorways, which was kind, but really need something heavier to do a proper job.

[la vache!]

Jules,
what tarif are you on with your 3 phase? We have that too and changed to a tempo tarif last year. We have saved a fortune on electricity by doing this as most of our consumption is in the summer for the pool when the units are cheapest. In the winter (Nov - end March) most of our guests (Frenc) come for the week-end when the rate is also blue. Incidentally, I get quite a few Spring and Autumn guests because the pool is open (and heated!) from 1st April to end of October. And that is in cold, wet Brittany. People (especially kids) still love to use the pool, even if the ambient temperature isn't great.

[julesb]

Hi Susan

We are on a normal domestic tarif with options 'heures creuses'. We have a puissance of 18KW, then it says code 020. When we moved in we had to have all our electrics changed, then we had to ask them to increase it because it was ridiculously low - they said at that point that we would not be able to change our supply again for a period of one year! It may be that they meant we could not change it without paying a charge fee - or that we could not change at all. I can see that your tarif works really well for the renting side, but do you live at the property full time?. We are currently living in our first gite whilst renovating the second, then we will renovate a barn which will be our eventual residence. I want to have a totally separate supply for the barn though. It may be at that point that we need to put the two gites onto the supply you are suggesting - it really is so complicated - especially when trying to do it in school-girl french!

Jules

[marcus]

I think the problem you have is not the supply - 18kw is sufficient for most purposes except a very large number of electric heaters (or perhaps for heating a pool? I don't know how much that uses).

So I think your problem might well be the way you have distributed the 3 phases.

We have 3 phase 18kw total and we had to carefully plan the electrics across the 3 buildings because really you are dealing with 3 'circuits' of 6 kw each. So It is easy to find that all the sockets in all buildings are on the same 6kw supply if the electrics wasn't planned carefully, and the remaining 12kw is sat going to waste or is used for a single bulb in a shed and so on -

Note that your trip switch will go if you exceed 6kw on any one of the 3 supplies, not only if you exceed 18kw overall.

Our electric meter box has a LCD display section that tells us how much each phase is using at any time but I don't know if that is just because we have tempo? That's useful because I can always plug things in at the same time and check there is no danger of a kettle in one gite cutting offthe elctricity in the other, and so on.

Another thing you can consider after sorting that out is that you can get a box fitted (also by an electrician) that automatically reduces the supply before the trip switch fails - turning off the hot water temporarily, or the heaters for example, when you put the kettle on. This costs a few hundred euros though I think.

We had 3kw (unearthed, only 1 socket in the house) at first. Now that was a challenge.

Marcus

[enid]

We are on tempo with 18kw and we live here - just the abonnement (standing charge) for 18kw was half the price on tempo so we saved there. Then we don't do lets between Nov and Feb so don't use much electricity in the gites when the red days come. For ourselves we have a monitor to show us what colour day it is and whether it is heures pleines or heures creuses. You can also look on the internet. If it is going to be a red day the next day it also beeps after 8p.m. - so we organise our life accordingly - e.g. we don't wash or use the dishwasher on red days. The weekends and bank holidays are blue. Overall we are paying the same for electricity for our house and 2 gites as when we were on the normal tariff for our house alone.
Re effectiveness of heating - we have fuel for the house and it also heats our hot water - very good and not too pricy - we also use woodburning stoves . In the gites we have woodburning stoves and electric convectors, water also heated by electricity. As we are living in a gite this winter we can confirm that this is very efficient - the woodburner does nearly all the heating with the convectors in the bedrooms and bathroom just on at #2.
As everyone says, insolation is crucial - the gites are very well insulated - we know we did it! - the house hardly at all - so when we have finshed the work on the house we expect to reduce costs even more.
Hope this bit of experience helps - all into the melting pot for you to consider over the turkey!

[alexia s.]

Jane, pet, I don't know about sewing with your mouth, but you could certainly knit with those ears.
I'd definitely go for ear-knitted, goats' wool (unless you STILL haven't had your beauty treatment, in which case it will be goat's wool) double thickness curtains.
(If you could do a special rate for laymyhat members you might be able to start a new business. )

[la vache!]

Jules,
There shouldn't be a problem if you have 3 phase to change to a tempo tarif if you want to. I have 3 gites and a house I live in permenently. In the one I live in I have a seperate counter and the 'base' tarif - low abonnement, no heures pleines/creuses. 2 of the gites and the swimming pool have the 3 phase and the tempo tarif (very low abonnement), I have another gite with the option heures pleines et creuses(higher abonnement). If I have people staying from Nov 1st - 31st March during the week, when there is the potential of red days on the tempo tarif, I put them in the other gite with heures pleines and creuses. It gives me a little flexibility - I wouldn't be able to sleep at night if I knew I had guests in with the electric radiators on full 24/24 on red days!
Our supply is 18kw, which does 2 houses and the pool heating. I don't think you have the option for tempo for less than 18kw, so you should be OK.
Incidentally, if you are ever thinking of doing long term lets, it would pay you to have at least one house with its own counter, so guests can pay their own electricity.

[Giddy Goat]

Jane, pet, I don't know about sewing with your mouth, but you could certainly knit with those ears.

I think any curtains I get will have to be off the peg, Alexia. My ears aren't quite rigid enough to be used successfully for knitting, and I can't get them to cross over. But keep your suggestions coming, and thank you!