Record-high electricity prices

 

Wholesale prices for electricity hit record levels last week, reaching a new high of £1,750 for a MWH during the peak period on Tuesday 7/September. 

Increases in the cost of gas (as almost half our electricity is generated from gas plants) coupled with low wind speeds through summer, has driven up the cost of electricity. 

As a result, it is predicted that an additional half a million people will be pushed into fuel poverty for the first time where they cannot afford to heat and run their homes.

How an Elite NuGEN/Elite Offsite home with Wondrwall technology avoided these high costs

 

Contrast this to a home built by Elite NuGEN in Gosport using Wondrwall technology:

On the same day with record-high electricity costs (Tuesday 7/September), the house generated 32 KWH of solar electricity and imported a mere 3.9 KWH of energy, all during the early morning off-peak period. The house also exported 25 KWH of electricity back to the grid, 10% of which were through the peak evening period.

As a result on the most expensive day ever for electricity, this house had energy bills of -£2 (minus two pounds).

Besides this, it reduced the need for more coal-fired power stations to be brought online by exporting back to the grid; helping fight climate change by not just generating its own electricity but also sending its surplus renewable electricity back to the grid.

How the home has performed since then

 

Since 24/June, the home’s energy bills totalled £51, it has net CO2 emissions of -40 KG and net energy consumption of -164 KWH i.e. it generated more energy than it consumed and fed electricity back to the grid.

This included charging an electric car sufficiently to drive 2000 miles as well as all the hot water, cooking, washing,  refrigeration, entertainment and computing demands.

Without the car charging, the bills would have been -£29, net CO2 emissions -94 KG and net energy consumption -660 KWH for the same period.

Conclusion 

 

Of course, you could say this is due to the summer weather being so good. However, if we consider that the same house using an air source heat pump would have had energy bills of £368; that’s £317 higher. CO2 emissions would have been 297 KG higher and net energy consumption 2054 KWH higher as well.

Imagine if ALL of our houses were built the same way as these Elite NuGEN houses. We would eliminate fuel poverty, reduce CO2 emissions and strengthen and support the needs of the electricity grid.

Surely this should be the future home’s standard we set for our new homes?