Most of this site is dedicated to giving its visitors useful indicative cost information related to the use of energy in and around your place of residence. Depending upon what is within your control where you live, it is hoped that this information will help you save money and help you make sensible cost based decisions regarding what equipment to invest in, to reduce costs.
Getting to the actual cost of energy in your area, in you type of accommodation and with consideration for your personal circumstances is close to impossible because there is so much variety. The best that can be achieved is to have an average for each major fuel type. For those of you that are interested the range of prices in the UK for most fuels is presented in the table below . It should be noted that the values presented here vary with time and the cost of fuel in the overall economy, as a consequence these values are regularly updated and as they are updated all the costs in the site change automatically.
The most accessible figures are for electricity and natural gas since these are the main sources of energy for most households in the UK. Using the BERR (Department for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform) quarterly review, the following tables summarise the three main billing methods and provide the largest and smallest unit rates in the UK and then the average of these. The total annual rates are based on the average use per household in the UK. Prepayment is a lot more expensive so get off this form of payment if you can, typically those who can least afford these payment terms are forced onto them!
| Last Updated | 28th December 2008 | |||||
| ELECTRIC | Standard Credit |
Direct Debit | Prepayment (meter) | |||
| Unit (kWh) cost | Average annual cost | Unit (kWh) cost |
Average annual cost | Unit (kWh) cost |
Average annual cost | |
| Highest | 15.27 pence | £ 504 | 15.27 pence | £ 504 | 18.38 pence | £ 607 |
| Lowest | 9.84 pence | £ 325 | 9.41 pence | £ 311 | 9.92 pence | £ 327 |
| Average | 12.24 pence | £ 404 | 11.33 pence | £ 374 | 12.69 pence | £ 419 |
| An average annual energy consumption of 3,300 kWh is assumed for all calculations, and all figures include VAT | ||||||
| Last Updated | 28th December 2008 | |||||
| GAS | Standard Credit |
Direct Debit |
Prepayment (meter) | |||
| Unit (kWh) cost |
Average annual cost | Unit (kWh) cost |
Average annual cost | Unit (kWh) cost |
Average annual cost | |
| Highest | 3.62 pence | £ 652 | 3.24 pence | £ 583 | 3.71 pence | £ 668 |
| Lowest | 2.74 pence | £ 494 | 2.53 pence | £ 456 | 2.98 pence | £ 536 |
| Average | 3.18 pence | £ 573 | 2.93 pence | £ 528 | 3.50 pence | £ 630 |
| An average annual energy consumption of 18,000 kWh is assumed for all calculations, and all figures include VAT | ||||||
Direct debit payment and standard credit are equally used as payment methods for both electricity and gas, and about 15% use prepayment meters. The figure used for the electrical unit price and the gas unit price in this site is half way between the direct debit tariff and the standard tariff and is currently
- £ 0.118 per unit (1 kWh) for electricity, last updated 28th December 2008
- £ 0.031 per unit (1 kWh) for gas, last updated 28th December 2008
Almost all other energy sources are used for heating and hot water, and this is a huge and very important cost element in your accommodation. The table below shows all the heating fuels in common use, there are others (corn pellets, wood chip and even cow dung!) but we only show the main ones in use in the UK. For consistency and sensible comparison with electricity the final price of energy is given as pence per kilowatt hour (kWh). For further clarity this is the amount of potential energy in the fuel, and not the energy delivered from an appliance, it is therfore important that the efficiency of the heating application is also factored into cost calculations within the site and you will see efficiency factors in some of the tables.
| Heating Fuels | Range of Prices | Energy | Average Price Used in the Site | ||
| Low | High | ||||
| Gas | Unit | £ 0.029 per unit | £ 0.032 per unit | 1 kWh per unit | £ 0.031 per kWh |
| Heating Oil (kerosene) | litre | £ 0.42 per litre3 | £ 0.43 per litre3 | 10 kWh per litre | £ 0.043 per kWh |
| Wood Log | 50kg bag | £ 12 per bag | £ 15 per bag | 3 kWh per kg | £ 0.09 per kWh |
| Wood Chip | ton | £ 80 per ton | £ 90 per ton | 3 kWh per kg | £ 0.028 per kWh |
| Wood Pellet | ton | £ 190 per ton | £ 200 per ton | 4.5 kWh per kg | £ 0.043 per kWh |
| Coal | 50kg bag | £ 12 per bag | £ 13 per bag | 9 kWh per kg | £ 0.028 per kWh |
| Smokeless Coal | 50kg bag | £ 20 per bag | £ 21 per bag | 6 kWh per kg | £ 0.067 per kWh |
| Bulk LPG | litre | £ 0.36 per litre | £ 0.4 per litre | 7.08 kWh per litre | £ 0.054 per kWh |
| Butane* | 4.5 kg Cylinder | £ 13.5 per cylinder | £ 16 per cylinder | 13.7 kWh per kg | £ 0.239 per kWh |
| 7 kg Cylinder | £ 19 per cylinder | £ 21 per cylinder | 13.7 kWh per kg | £ 0.209 per kWh | |
| 15 kg Cylinder | £ 25.75 per cylinder | £ 29.5 per cylinder | 13.7 kWh per kg | £ 0.134 per kWh | |
| Propane* | 3.9 kg Cylinder | £ 13.5 per cylinder | £ 13.5 per cylinder | 13.9 kWh per kg | £ 0.249 per kWh |
| 6 kg Cylinder | £ 16.4 per cylinder | £ 16.4 per cylinder | 13.9 kWh per kg | £ 0.197 per kWh | |
| 13 kg Cylinder | £ 21.9 per cylinder | £ 21.9 per cylinder | 13.9 kWh per kg | £ 0.121 per kWh | |
| 19 kg Cylinder | £ 29.75 per cylinder | £ 29.75 per cylinder | 13.9 kWh per kg | £ 0.113 per kWh | |
| 47 kg Cylinder | £ 52.65 per cylinder | £ 52.65 per cylinder | 13.9 kWh per kg | £ 0.081 per kWh | |
*Please note that there is usually a rental charge for cylinders of gas of about £ 30.
