How to Make Your Central Heating More Efficient
One silver lining of the Covid-19 pandemic is that many offices have realised they no longer need to force their employees into offices in random parts of the country. Many people now work from home for some or all of their working week. This has many benefits for employees and employers, but it does mean that some of the operating expense is put onto the employee. For instance, working at home all day means that more energy is spent on heating our homes. With energy prices rising, everyone is looking for ways to improve their heating systems and make them more efficient; here are a few ways you can do that, including getting an energy-efficient central heating pump.
Clear and Balance Radiators
This is the simplest tip and the one that could be the hardest. The simple part: you should have airflow around all your radiators. In theory, this means you do not put pieces of furniture in front of them and avoid covering them with clothing. If you can’t move your furniture to avoid the radiator, then at least pull anything away during the coldest winter months. For example, pull curtains back onto the windowsill if your radiators are set under windows, and try to place laundry to dry near radiators, not on them. You should also balance your radiators – this will ensure that they are all heating effectively and that you do not have all the heat going out into one room while the rest are cold.
Check Your Water Pump
The water in your central heating system is pumped around with a central heating pump. If you are having trouble with your system (such as not all radiators heating up or the heating working slowly or not as well), you will often find that it is a problem with the pump and not the boiler. Therefore, you should research ‘how can you tell if your central heating pump is broken?’ to see if this is your particular problem. You can get a heating pump online at a cheaper rate and either replace your current central heating pump yourself or get someone in to do it. If you want to decrease your energy costs proactively, then it might be worth looking into buying a replacement pump anyway. Older-style ones are less efficient, so finding the best central heating pump for your needs now will help going forward.
Turn Down Flow Temperature
This isn’t referring to your normal central heating thermostat; this is the temperature that your boiler heats water to before sending it through your system. You should research how to do this for your specific boiler – each one will have slightly different controls. This works best with combi boilers as you can move the temperature down as the weather gets warmer. If your water is stored at any point in a cylinder, for instance, if you have a system boiler or hot water cylinder, it is very important that you always have this set at 600C – this is high enough to kill legionella bacteria. Legionella bacteria breed in stored water areas and are very dangerous to humans. However, lowering it to 600C will still make your system more efficient.
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