Using energy monitoring smart plugs, i have identified many places where standby is particularly draining and turned off when not in use.
One area i have yet to solve is the combi gas boiler that supplies heating anD hot water. Until i can get rid of the carbon-nightmare boiler, i realise that there is an opportunity to turn this off at the plug when not required. From a heating point of viee, this is easily done with thermostat and/or outdoor temps in an automation.
However, in an ideal world, i would be able to recognise when a hot tap is turned on and then power up the boiler plig.
I have 2 bathroom hot water taps and 1 kitchen mixer tap.
Is there any cheapish smart detection that i could use, whether it is a replacemnt smart tap, a motion sensor pointing at the tap knob (seems unlikely to be accurate) or some small smart motion detector that can be attached to the knob to record the physical turning of the knob?
I have been having a think and a simpler workable solution is to have a smart button in the kitchen and bathroom that will turn on the boiler plug when I need hot water.
I had also discovered, with some simple experimenting, that the lag between the hot tap commencing running and the time for the boiler to initially set/fire up after the plug was turned on, was causing an interference with the firing up so that it could flag an error and abort the water heating (similar to when pressure is too low). So I think even measuring water flow would cause this delay. Best to stick with a more hands on smart process.
How much power(electricity) does boiler draw?
Is it the same regardless of whether it’s idle, heating water, or room heating considering it’s using Gas to actually create the heat?
12-13W when idle (which seems a lot to me) and over 100W when it kicks in.
It is an old boiler (over 10 years old) but given how much it uses when idle, I really need to think hard about my automations for when I can turn it off. This is the trickiest time of the year in the UK as the ambient temperature inside is generally around the temperature you would want the thermostat to be set to ( in my case 19 degrees C). So how to get the most out of an automation is tricky.
I initially read the 100w as 1000w and assumed it had a fan kicking in…
100w is only an incandescent bulb though, or a small computer. Big LED TV is probably around 160w.
