Lived experience
The intersection of my worlds (diabetes. cyber security, developing interesting tools, cyclist, motorcyclist, skier, driver, keen walker, sustainable living, and cooking) leads to some observations. Not least when it comes to this term: lived experience. When medical studies are conducted and are published to the masses, this is the caveat emptor, your experience may vary.
I was reminded of it while sitting in my endo’s office, waiting for my 11:10 appointment. One of the slides auto-playing in kiosk mode said about when you travel to hot and cold climes and the impact on your insulin requirements.
Now the nights are drawing in, we’re getting questions about how comfortable we are – now these are from friends but I suspect the inquiry is less to do with our general wellbeing and more to do with the heat pump replacing our gas heating system.
To be honest, it’s lovely. It took a couple of days to tune the radiators and the heat distribution system, but we are warm when we need to be and cooler when want to be doing things.
We do have an emergency heat source with our newly cleaned (and CO monitored) log burner in the lounge, which we tend to use when staying at home during the weekend and the place is below 10°C – mostly because the room is unbearably hot otherwise – over the space of two hours the room temperature rises above 12°C, even with only burning a log or two an hour.
Now, it our aim was to reduce our carbon footprint – use fewer kWh of energy to keep warm and clean (hot water). Which is a good job, because electricity prices have risen in the UK.
Oh, well worth the effort then!
Like I said, the proof will be if our total energy usage this winter is less than last year. I say winter, as we started using the heat pump in mid July and the boiler broke end of March, which was freezing this year.
And so far, it looks good. Our SPF (seasonal performance factor) is currently 4.7 – so for each 1kWh of electricity we buy, we get 4.7kWh out or 470% efficiency. This is compared to a great gas boiler giving out 0.8kWh for every 1kWh of gas burnt.
The colder it has got, the better it has been. Also great for us. More importantly, it is outperforming the combined totals most days:
Comaprison of this month with this month last year in terms of combined energy consumption.
A few of the colder days we didn’t do so well, but so far this month, the heat pump is heating our water and house for less than the boiler did – of course, what we are not seeing in the graph above is the fact the car took more energy charging than it did the other days!
Oh, so it is worth the effort then?
Well, it looks good so far. Of particular note is Tuesday 15th October – the temperature in Ipswich was 9-14°C. We were both at home and both were comfortable, lit, bathed, and cooked for, all for 25.95kWh electricity compared to a combined score of 74.75kWh in 2023 when the temperature was very similar 13-14°C.
Of course, we cannot make our own natural gas. We do have solar cells making some of our electricity though 😉
Posted: October 19th, 2024 under 42, Driving off the grid.