My war on draughts
Old house meets soaring prices equals new approach required, but it also needs to be green, realistic and affordable
I like to be warm at home. Not in a waft around in flip flops sort of way — I appreciate the pleasures of a fluffy slipper and a thick knit — but I draw the line at being able to see my own breath in the morning. And when the source and cost of heat was a somewhat ethereal concept, the solution was simple. I flipped a switch and the house warmed up. After all, central to the concept of home as a place of sanctuary and comfort, is that it is cosy.
Today though we’re acutely aware of both price and provenance of our heating and we’re paying extra for it thanks to our acutely energy-wasting homes.
According to Greenpeace, the UK has some of the oldest and draughtiest housing stock in Europe. In a standard uninsulated house, we lose a whopping 35% of heat through our walls compared to 25% through the roof, and 10% through the windows. The final 30% is split equally between floors and draughts. And yet, it’s only recently that insulating new builds as standard to prevent this, has even been on the table — regardless, just 1.8% meet the top efficiency ratings.
My house was built in 1821. It has single-glazed leaded-glass windows and solid walls made of flint and assorted rubbish stuck together with bat poo (not strictly verifiable on the faeces front but it might as well be). It’s a construction method commonly called Bungeroosh and it’s a particular foible of East Sussex where I live. It keeps my home lovely and cool in the summer, but in the winter, without heating, it can feel colder inside than out. From trying to hang a picture to preventing the ingress of damp, it’s a nightmare.
Nonetheless, seduced by its historic prettiness, when I bought it over a decade ago I cheerfully installed underfloor heating (UFH) upstairs and down (I don’t like radiators on aesthetic grounds), and the must-have of that moment wood burner in the living room, even though with UFH I didn’t really need one. There were thermostats in every room so I could target my heat, and my brand-new A-rated condensing combi boiler huffed away efficiently to maintain a comfortable temperature on demand. I signed up to Bulb (now Octopus), a green energy provider, so although my heating had its work cut out for it, to my mind I was offsetting my usage and doing my conscientious bit.
However, when the heating goes off, it’s only a matter of an hour before all that lovely warmth dissipates. It’s hardly surprising. Despite gutting the place to install splendid new finishes — parquet, wallpaper, tiles, paint, panelling — I completely failed to add extra insulation to the walls. My builder didn’t suggest it, and I didn’t know enough at the time to specify it. The worst mistake being not adequately insulating the exterior wall behind a run of fitted wardrobes which resulted in mould on my clothes (a leaky roof around the chimney stack didn't help matters here). Luckily the UFH came with its own insulating mats.
It's a typical scenario, a beautifully decorated but horribly energy leaking home. So what to do?