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What’s the best way to heat a small terraced house?

Our expert replies...

Martin - hi there.

I’ll assume that you have some way of heating your water and cooking food, so we’re just talking about heating the rooms in your house.

Boring as it sounds, the first thing you should do is ensure that the house is sufficiently insulated. You didn’t say how old the property is (as it has no pre-existing heating system, I’ll assume it’s pre-WWII), but tight fitting windows, loft insulation that’s 270mm thick and cavity wall insulation all help keep the heat in and the cold out.

If you don’t have any existing cavity wall or loft insulation you may be eligible for a grant to cover some - or all - of the installations costs. Check out the Energy Saving Trust’s Grants & Discounts database.

Installing a wood burning or multi-fuel stove in the living room of a house that’s moderately “open plan” is a good way of making rising heat work more efficiently, as it rises up the stairs to heat the bedroom rather than gathering on the ceiling. Depending on the one you buy, adding wood and stoking it before you go to bed can mean that it’s still radiating heat through the night and into the morning.

Cast iron stoves are more efficient than “real” fires (cast iron is a better conductor and diffuser of heat) and prices range from £200 upwards to several thousand pounds. Paying more money tends to buy you a more ornate or stylish-looking burner, rather than a more energy-efficient one.

You can buy firewood from specialist suppliers, garden centres and DIY stores; this wood is kiln-dried and burns more efficiently. A good tip is to buy firewood by volume (price per square metre) not weight, as buying firewood by weight means you’re paying for the water still trapped in the wood and wood with a high moisture content burns less efficiently. At current prices, running a wood burning stove for 12 hours a day through autumn, winter and early spring should cost less than £200 a year.

According to the Energy Saving Trust (EST), electricity is the most expensive and carbon-intensive heating fuel available in the UK. If you don’t have a gas supply to your house, the EST says you could install oil or a liquid petroleum gas (LPG) boiler and fuel tank. It says running costs will be higher than gas but probably lower than electric heating.

But this means significant up-front financial outlay. A cheaper start-up solution is modern standalone energy-efficient electric radiators. Plug-in electric radiators have come a long way in the last 10 years, both in their efficacy in heating a room and also their consumption of power. Some radiate the heat like a conventional hot water radiator or emit warm air via a fan, and some are capable of both modes.

Whether freestanding or wall mounted, they have sophisticated thermostats and timers and can be programmed to start when you need to heat the room rather than being on all the time. An electric heater like this will cost around £300 from a specialist supplier. Another tip: heaters bought from DIY stores, catalogue stores or general goods retailers will be considerably cheaper to buy but will probably work less efficiently, consume more electricity and work out more expensive in the medium term.

Heating costs can be lowered if you’re realistic about the optimum level of heat you can live with, for example watching TV wearing a sweater rather than a t-shirt and putting a thermal blanket over your duvet.

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