Heating Engineer Andy Gibbs gives his experiences of talking to customers about their heating systems.
This column is on the subject of sustainability. Everyone has heard of it, but what exactly does it mean?
The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as: “Avoidance of the depletion of natural resources in order to maintain an ecological balance.”
Which is a lovely concept. Let’s burn fewer fossil fuels in order to save our planet. But there are issues, and big ones at that.
First of all, it’s impossible to avoid the depletion of gas and oil reserves, but that’s for another day. This is about getting customers to use sustainable technology.
As installers, we’re at the front of this issue and we speak to the customers every single day. For me, any renewable revolution must be largely customer led.
I do think most customers would like to run more sustainable heating and hot water systems, but, and here’s the but, they just don’t want to spend the money.
They never think about what makes their home warm, until it’s not making it warm anymore, and then they need it fixed in a hurry and as cheaply as possible.
They simply aren’t prepared to pay in excess of say £20,000 to get their heating system upgraded to a really nice renewable energy system, and all the upheaval that may take, when they can pay £5000 and be warm in a week.
It’s also very hard to blame them as well. What would you do?
They’re scared of what is still considered new technology, and they’re even more scared of spending their money on it.
This is something that needs planning at the installation stage, and requires some very careful consideration to get what’s right for the homeowner, especially in a retrofit scenario.
I do think that, in time, more and more customers will come over to sustainable, energy-efficient heating systems, but until then it’s just nice ideas and for people building new houses.
I’ll leave you with this: I remember when I first started in the industry and a lecturer at college told us all that natural gas would be all used up in 20 years. That was 30 years ago.
