Government Green Day - Gas Prices to increase

[ChocolateFrog]

JagLover said:

To take this point

"To meet an existing target to free Britain's heating system of gas, all homes will eventually have to get rid of their gas boilers. Many homes will install heat pumps instead, but uptake so far has been slow due to a lack of awareness and supply."

Many are well aware and also aware of the many drawbacks.

Exactly.

It's the sensible people that are saying "yeah, no thanks" on the whole.

Here's a couple of grand off enjoy heating your victorian house to 14 degrees for 5 grand a year for the foreseeable.

[jameswills]

J4CKO said:

I dont know where they think folk will magic the money from for all this ?

We spent seven grand upgrading our heating system to a new boiler and various bits, to my mind thats done for twenty years or so, not going to spend ten or fifteen grand ripping it out to replace with something that isnt as good as the government say so.

We have two cars, both are fine, could go and buy an EV but dont particularly want one or to have to lay out 30/40 grand for one I would actually consider, even then I do minimal mileage so seems pointless for some minimal environmental angle, its a Fiesta that does 100 miles a week if that.

And we have no mortgage, a decent income, no debt, some savings, no kids at home and spare cash each month, so how do they expect people who are on the back foot financially to go that way ? I cant really afford to capitulate so damn sure a couple both on min wage with two kids wont be able to.

Alternatives need to be as good or better and compete on price, none of it is quite there yet.

The whole thing is utterly bonkers. I don’t know what planet they live on, they certainly have a complete disconnect on how people in the UK live, and what they actually earn.

[crankedup5]

Going to have to have a rethink regarding crematoria, they are mainly gas fired with a few using oil or LPG. That’s going to be a no no soon I expect. Maybe get zapped by lazers is the future

[cb31]

blade runner said:

just who is going to fit all these systems? A very conservative estimate of 1 week per house to rip out all the gas components and install ASHP with new piping, new rads, immersion heater etc. With 27million homes currently on mains gas, that's over 77,000 homes per week that would need to be converted to get the whole job done by 2030. This is also assuming that there are 77,000 plumbing companies even available stop all their other work for the next 7 years to undertake the conversions.

When it is put like that it shows how stupid this ideal is. We recently had our gas heating system replaced, took months as in typical tradesman fashion they were like the scarlet pimpernel most of the time. They inevitably cocked parts up which had since been rectified by other plumbers over the following months.

I would love to see the crack team of plumbers that will replace our whole heating system in a week, along with the other 76,999 other crack teams doing other houses in the same week. Utterly bonkers.

[CT05 Nose Cone]

jameswills said:

J4CKO said:

I dont know where they think folk will magic the money from for all this ?

We spent seven grand upgrading our heating system to a new boiler and various bits, to my mind thats done for twenty years or so, not going to spend ten or fifteen grand ripping it out to replace with something that isnt as good as the government say so.

We have two cars, both are fine, could go and buy an EV but dont particularly want one or to have to lay out 30/40 grand for one I would actually consider, even then I do minimal mileage so seems pointless for some minimal environmental angle, its a Fiesta that does 100 miles a week if that.

And we have no mortgage, a decent income, no debt, some savings, no kids at home and spare cash each month, so how do they expect people who are on the back foot financially to go that way ? I cant really afford to capitulate so damn sure a couple both on min wage with two kids wont be able to.

Alternatives need to be as good or better and compete on price, none of it is quite there yet.

The whole thing is utterly bonkers. I don’t know what planet they live on, they certainly have a complete disconnect on how people in the UK live, and what they actually earn.

Indeed, just what proportion of homeowners have a bare minimum of £10,000 laying around, or will be living planning to there long enough to actually break even? Which of course won't take into account how prices will still keep rising even after you have no choice but to run an air pump.

[monkfish1]

cb31 said:

blade runner said:

just who is going to fit all these systems? A very conservative estimate of 1 week per house to rip out all the gas components and install ASHP with new piping, new rads, immersion heater etc. With 27million homes currently on mains gas, that's over 77,000 homes per week that would need to be converted to get the whole job done by 2030. This is also assuming that there are 77,000 plumbing companies even available stop all their other work for the next 7 years to undertake the conversions.

When it is put like that it shows how stupid this ideal is. We recently had our gas heating system replaced, took months as in typical tradesman fashion they were like the scarlet pimpernel most of the time. They inevitably cocked parts up which had since been rectified by other plumbers over the following months.

I would love to see the crack team of plumbers that will replace our whole heating system in a week, along with the other 76,999 other crack teams doing other houses in the same week. Utterly bonkers.

The thing is, assuming Starmer wins the next election, the next one will be 2029. So he likely wont be around when the day comes to turn of the supply to however many millions of homes are still running on gas.

Question is, who advises him? Do they tell him its impossible, but he says they are doing it anyway, or do his advisors believe its possible? In which parallel universe do they live in. And are they all that far out of touch with reality?

77000 installs a week. Sure..............................................

[Biker 1]

cb31 said:

.

I would love to see the crack team of plumbers that will replace our whole heating system in a week, along with the other 76,999 other crack teams doing other houses in the same week. Utterly bonkers.

This is the crux of it.
I work in construction, higher end of the market where people can actually afford heat pumps in their new build 6 bedroom detached £1million houses. We use a half decent installation company - the paperwork & hoops you need to go through just for the building regulations certification is a joke. I talked with their MD - he says there's only a handful of people in the industry who actually know what they're doing; he's considering chucking in the towel & moving over to traditional plumbing as most of his clients complain that the heating & water is simply not hot enough. He reckons he's suffering depression as he's getting zero job satisfaction out of it.
I suppose it's probably best to buy an oil boiler right now & hope for the best....

[Hants PHer]

CT05 Nose Cone said:

Indeed, just what proportion of homeowners have a bare minimum of £10,000 laying around, or will be living planning to there long enough to actually break even? Which of course won't take into account how prices will still keep rising even after you have no choice but to run an air pump.

Well, quite. Another thing: where I live it's nigh on impossible to get trades to fix your roof, or mend a fence, or lay a new driveway or.........you get the point. Where are all these expert tradesfolk going to come from to install tens of millions of heat pumps?

Never mind, I'm sure that Ed Miliband has all the answers. He seems well briefed and sensible; a man with a track record that shouts "trust me".

[mjb1]

As long as we're in a global market for gas and electricity the UK government has no control over energy prices (other than increasing them with taxes and tariffs).

[Biker 1]

Hants PHer said:

Well, quite. Another thing: where I live it's nigh on impossible to get trades to fix your roof, or mend a fence, or lay a new driveway or.........you get the point. Where are all these expert tradesfolk going to come from to install tens of millions of heat pumps?

It's even worse than that. Pretty much all our decent staff, sub contractors & tradesmen are over 50 years old, with almost no younger people seemingly interested.
Income can be pretty good, so what puts them off? Too much like hard work? Too cold & miserable on a building site in the winter??

[Oliver Hardy]

Labour keeps going on about the green revolution and new jobs and so on, but does not explain how it will be done.

The media are doing a very poor job in grilling our politicians about how they will carry out these new green policies.

[CoolHands]

We’ll end up like Nigeria with illegal pipelines and refineries dealing in stolen gas and oil

[glazbagun]

Biker 1 said:

Hants PHer said:

Well, quite. Another thing: where I live it's nigh on impossible to get trades to fix your roof, or mend a fence, or lay a new driveway or.........you get the point. Where are all these expert tradesfolk going to come from to install tens of millions of heat pumps?

It's even worse than that. Pretty much all our decent staff, sub contractors & tradesmen are over 50 years old, with almost no younger people seemingly interested.
Income can be pretty good, so what puts them off? Too much like hard work? Too cold & miserable on a building site in the winter??

When I phoned around stonemasons to try & get a job at 19 I was told I was too old to be an apprentice and NMW was too expensive to take me on with no skills. I scraped along in unskilled work until going to uni seven years later. That was in the days of £3K tuition fees and when you could still get cost of living grants.

Might be different now, but I got the impression that no business wanted to burn money training you only to see you leave once you had your skills.

I don't envy anyone being 20 in this decade. Apart from their ability to still look great after partying for days and eating loads of crap.

[Mr Whippy]

Terminator X said:

"But what is expected to really drive the switch from petrol and diesel to electric cars is the "zero emission vehicle mandate", requiring a minimum percentage of manufacturers' new car and van sales to be zero emission from 2024.

A new consultation document today sets out minimum sales targets. These would be 22% in 2024, increasing to 80% in 2030 and 100% in 2035."

Will be interesting if they are obliged to build them and they just sit their un-bought.

TX.

A load of pedal powered Tuk-Tuk like vehicles, or Twingo style stuff?

Makes sense to me.

[pork911]

mjb1 said:

As long as we're in a global market for gas and electricity the UK government has no control over energy prices (other than increasing them with taxes and tariffs).

the balancing in the OP relates to levies and pricing mechanisms the gov absolutely controls which hammer electricity over gas,
although it would be difficult to discern any appreciation of that in this thread

[oyster]

Terminator X said:

"But what is expected to really drive the switch from petrol and diesel to electric cars is the "zero emission vehicle mandate", requiring a minimum percentage of manufacturers' new car and van sales to be zero emission from 2024.

A new consultation document today sets out minimum sales targets. These would be 22% in 2024, increasing to 80% in 2030 and 100% in 2035."

Will be interesting if they are obliged to build them and they just sit their un-bought.

TX.

Sales target isn’t it rather than build target? And non-binding too.
And on track with current sales projections anyway.

So about as strong a policy as saying they promise more daylight next month.

[Fundoreen]

Tories have just got used to the lying as pioneered by boris the liar.
So loads of announcements that we will be no1/first too/jump ahead/great place to do business blah blah . But there is no reality.
Some dozy bd with a short memory (most of the population it seems) will have forgotten it all by the time the dates tick closer.
Why do we have to be first to low carbon when the rest of the undeveloped world isn't bothering? Some sort of pub boast?
The efforts of one piddling little island wont matter.Yes we have proven we can punch people that cant punch back (opps i mean punch above our weight) but its not something to be proud of in the 21st century.
Just clean up the air and environment and worry less about the green house gas bullst industry.

[pquinn]

crankedup5 said:

Going to have to have a rethink regarding crematoria, they are mainly gas fired with a few using oil or LPG. That’s going to be a no no soon I expect. Maybe get zapped by lazers is the future

You obviously haven't heard of 'water cremation', which is a low key label for an environmentally friendly process that people might be wary of if they saw the details.

(Basically water + caustic soda, boil you up into soup then wash it down the drain leaving bones that are ground down into the 'ashes'.)

[Matthen]

glazbagun said:

Biker 1 said:

Hants PHer said:

Well, quite. Another thing: where I live it's nigh on impossible to get trades to fix your roof, or mend a fence, or lay a new driveway or.........you get the point. Where are all these expert tradesfolk going to come from to install tens of millions of heat pumps?

It's even worse than that. Pretty much all our decent staff, sub contractors & tradesmen are over 50 years old, with almost no younger people seemingly interested.
Income can be pretty good, so what puts them off? Too much like hard work? Too cold & miserable on a building site in the winter??

When I phoned around stonemasons to try & get a job at 19 I was told I was too old to be an apprentice and NMW was too expensive to take me on with no skills. I scraped along in unskilled work until going to uni seven years later. That was in the days of £3K tuition fees and when you could still get cost of living grants.

Might be different now, but I got the impression that no business wanted to burn money training you only to see you leave once you had your skills.

I don't envy anyone being 20 in this decade. Apart from their ability to still look great after partying for days and eating loads of crap.

It's nothing to do with the weather or conditions - it's the schools pushing anyone who has managed to scrape a C at English to go to university. Youngersters are impressionable, they do what they're told.

In reality, a lot more of them would be great sparkies/plumbers, but the idea is never placed in their heads.

[Otispunkmeyer]

pquinn said:

crankedup5 said:

Going to have to have a rethink regarding crematoria, they are mainly gas fired with a few using oil or LPG. That’s going to be a no no soon I expect. Maybe get zapped by lazers is the future

You obviously haven't heard of 'water cremation', which is a low key label for an environmentally friendly process that people might be wary of if they saw the details.

(Basically water + caustic soda, boil you up into soup then wash it down the drain leaving bones that are ground down into the 'ashes'.)

Oh I'd love to be that guy sent down to the sewer to scrape out the inevitable fatberg that builds up after that becomes the norm!

Not!