LPG

[Vinpetrol]

I’m buying a house to live in while I build a new house . The house I’m buying has an LPG tank in the garden .
I’ve never had any experience with LPG tanks and I wanted to know what is it like compared to kerosene which is what I had in last house .
Does it burn at similar rates to Kero?
Do you just shop around for cheapest price when your getting low ?
How does it compare per litre to kero ?

 

[DaveDCB]

Running costs similar in all honesty, kero is probably cheaper on bigger houses but if it’s insulated well etc it’s comparable.
big thing is the tank is probably owned by a company eg calor or flow gas, so your tied to whoever owns it for a certain time pending your contract..

 

[Stroppymonkey]

Running costs similar in all honesty, kero is probably cheaper on bigger houses but if it’s insulated well etc it’s comparable.
big thing is the tank is probably owned by a company eg calor or flow gas, so your tied to whoever owns it for a certain time pending your contract..

I’d disagree. All fuels choices become cheaper if the house is better insulated but the difference in price per kWh is still a difference. There’s a very recent chat on this forum about price of logs and someone has shared a updated price per kWh per fuel type
Edit
Actually it looks based on that chart that bulk LPG is comparable to Kerosene.. who knew!
Decent LPG modulating boiler with weather comp will always use less KWh than an average fixed burn Kero boiler on a like for like comparison.

 

[V8Druid]

this is what's mentioned above @Vinpetrol

as for the tank's ownership and contract you need to establish this through your solicitor on the house questionaire that we're obliged to fill in down here - dunno if it's the same in Jockland - your whole house selling malarkey is very different to the rest of the country.
if the tank is tied to a supplier, I'd guess the contract is the responsibility of the sellers and probably not transferable(??) ... again need to ask that and also the age of the tank and when it was last tested - ten year test - if the contract is out, you may find yourself missing a tank - again a Q to be asked of the sellers and possibly their current supplier .... you need to shop around any local suppliers for deals anyway on fuel and possibly an installation - they're bloody expensive to buy, difficult to uplift/take with you - need to be empty and purged for road transport (unless they're recovering one of their own and then don't seem to give a FF ... when the tanks at my yard got uplifted the driver didn't care about the various reg.s and protocols for road transport - on and gone) LPG burns hotter than kero with a greater calorific value than kero or petrol
I have considered going over to LPG for our place ... not an easily nick-able fuel ... tank lives outside (built the black shed over our kero tank to keep it out the sunlight -- placcy tanks do not like the UV), would free up a lot of space in't said shed and it's a good fuel, which has remained at a comparatively stable price throughout all this fuel sh1t ... (and I run LPG in the P38 plus have the where-with-all/equipment to be able to use it out the tanks)

 

[Stroppymonkey]

this is what's mentioned above @Vinpetrol
View attachment 42065
as for the tank's ownership and contract you need to establish this through your solicitor on the house questionaire that we're obliged to fill in down here - dunno if it's the same in Jockland - your whole house selling malarkey is very different to the rest of the country.
if the tank is tied to a supplier, I'd guess the contract is the responsibility of the sellers and probably not transferable(??) ... again need to ask that and also the age of the tank and when it was last tested - ten year test - if the contract is out, you may find yourself missing a tank - again a Q to be asked of the sellers and possibly their current supplier .... you need to shop around any local suppliers for deals anyway on fuel and possibly an installation - they're bloody expensive to buy, difficult to uplift/take with you - need to be empty and purged for road transport (unless they're recovering one of their own and then don't seem to give a FF ... when the tanks at my yard got uplifted the driver didn't care about the various reg.s and protocols for road transport - on and gone) LPG burns hotter than kero with a greater calorific value than kero or petrol
I have considered going over to LPG for our place ... not an easily nick-able fuel ... tank lives outside (built the black shed over our kero tank to keep it out the sunlight -- placcy tanks do not like the UV), would free up a lot of space in't said shed and it's a good fuel, which has remained at a comparatively stable price throughout all this fuel sh1t ... (and I run LPG in the P38 plus have the where-with-all/equipment to be able to use it out the tanks)

View attachment 42069 View attachment 42070 View attachment 42071View attachment 42072View attachment 42073View attachment 42074

@V8 Druid you’re incorrect, a litre of Kero contains approx 50% more energy than a litre of (edit) PROPANE.



Which is why the twin towers fell down…

 

[Quattromike]

@V8 Druid you’re incorrect, a litre of Kero contains approx 50% more energy than a litre of kerosene…. Which is why the twin towers fell down…

Whaaaat

 

[GazCro]

Whaaaat

I'll just put me foil hat on

 

[Stroppymonkey]

I'll just put me foil hat on

Well ignoring the bit about the twin towers…
A unarguable fact is a litre of Kero contains a s**t load more KWh than a litre of LPG.
Kero has more calorific value than propane based on liquid volume.

 

[Gecko]

a litre of Kero contains approx 50% more energy than a litre of kerosene….

a litre of Kero contains approx 50% more energy than a litre of LPG….

I assume that's what you meant?

 

[Stroppymonkey]

a litre of Kero contains approx 50% more energy than a litre of LPG….

I assume that's what you meant?

Yes - thanks it’s been a long lunch

 

[V8Druid]

I think you'll find LPG is higher than just about everything else, bar ethane

"Digest of UK Energy Statistics (DUKES): calorific values and density of fuels" https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/dukes-calorific-values​

"

 

[Gecko]

Really interesting table, but a little difficult to interpret.

Only comparing LPG to Kero
80p buys 1l kero which contains 9.8 kWh or 8.16p per kWh
55p buys 1l LPG which contains 6.7 kWh or 8.26p per kWh

So from this price list, LPG is 1.2% more expensive not taking into account the efficiency of the device that consumes it.

@Vinpetrol - for a relatively short time you'll be in the temp house, the difference in cost will be fairly insignificant.

 

[V8Druid]

Really interesting table, but a little difficult to interpret.

Only comparing LPG to Kero
80p buys 1l kero which contains 9.8 kWh or 8.16p per kWh
55p buys 1l LPG which contains 6.7 kWh or 8.26p per kWh

So from this price list, LPG is 1.2% more expensive not taking into account the efficiency of the device that consumes it.

@Vinpetrol - for a relatively short time you;ll be in the temp house, the difference in cost will be fairly insignificant.

View attachment 42078

and I take issue with the figures TBH ...
kero has a lower calorific value than LPG .... see the DUKES table above ...... been using LPG since 2000 in vehicles and all the info. has always stated LPG has a higher calorific value than petrol, let alone kero

 

[Gecko]

and I take issue with the figures TBH ...

Suspect you are right.
I don't know what passes for LPG in the UK, but it's obviously different to what we get in Oz
In Oz, LPG is a blend of Propane and Butane, with the blend depending on where it came from and what it's being used for.
Cigarette lighters, disposable "fly spray" cans are pure Butane because the vapor pressure is low. (~ 16 psi)
Camping and automotive cylinders are filled with high proportion Propane and have appropriately thicker tanks (~125 psi)
It's considered automotive LPG, in an unmodified engine, a litre of LPG is worth 80% or a litre of petrol.

With petrol, it's the Octane rating that tells you how high a compression ration you can get away with. Ultimatly, it's the CR the determines the maximum efficiency of an engine.
LPG can happily run with a CR of 14:1 can be generated with a lot of head work or a large turbo.
(I think I may be a little off topic!)

 

[bobthebuilder]

i also have been led to belive that the modern day lpg boilers are a tad more efficient than a modern day oil boiler.
plus its less nickable ,doesnt stink like oil boliers are tiny compered to oil and half the price

 

[Charlie]

I was on LPG with two boilers, one for the heating and one for the hot water. I actually cut the gas line to the heating boiler as I couldn't afford to run it (c.34K a year) and so I couldn't be tempted to just turn it on for a bit. Moved over to oil about 5 years ago and the best thing I ever did.

 

[Gecko]

and I take issue with the figures TBH ...

Ah - I see the difference

The first is Energy per Litre, the second is Energy per kg
The density of most petroleum oils and liquefied gasses is 0.8~0.85 (1 Litre weighs 800~850g)

It's convenient to talk about LPG in kg, but you buy it and store it in Liters.

 

[bobthebuilder]

I was on LPG with two boilers, one for the heating and one for the hot water. I actually cut the gas line to the heating boiler as I couldn't afford to run it (c.34K a year) and so I couldn't be tempted to just turn it on for a bit. Moved over to oil about 5 years ago and the best thing I ever did.

what was you heating ?

 

[GazCro]

i also have been led to belive that the modern day lpg boilers are a tad more efficient than a modern day oil boiler.
plus its less nickable ,doesnt stink like oil boliers are tiny compered to oil and half the price

Modern lpg boiler should be more efficient as they have all the same internals at nat gas boilers so modulating burners etc. Overall cost still dependant on fuel cost and system design though

 

[V8Druid]

and I take issue with the figures TBH ...
kero has a lower calorific value than LPG .... see the DUKES table above ...... been using LPG since 2000 in vehicles and all the info. has always stated LPG has a higher calorific value than petrol, let alone kero

UK gov. has, since 2002, tried hard to suppress/depress LPG sales here .....
in '99/2000, to be seen to be green, LPG was promoted hard ...
As said, I've run it since late '99 and at that time duties etc., were promised to be frozen for 5 years - they weren't ...
uptake of it as an alternate fuel was good from 2000 on, for a couple of years, 'til they moved all the goal posts and it started to climb in price and although it was for many years, half the cost of petrol - more sometimes - it took time to recover the conversion costs and a lot of folk no longer saw the advantages, particularly with the regularity that ppl change their vehicles and so it quietly died a death, particularly without the original gov. support/promotion. Users became scarcer as did outlets .....
in 2000/'01 I was selling 3 x 2000 litre tankfuls a week ... by '04 that was down to a tank a fortnight and it continued downhill.
LPG, specifically Autogas (road dutied LPG), is still less than half the cost of petrol and will give, you as near as damn it, the same return mileage-wise, litre for litre .. pound for pound, virtually double+ ....... they (HM Gov.) just DO NOT want ppl to use it.
LPG was 23p/ltr (duty paid) in 2000 ... by '04 it was over 43p/l ... near double .... bear in mind that it is a by-product of petroleum refining and the refiners either have to pay a burn off levy on it, or flog it cheap ... in '04/5 it was being sold to Portugal, (a big user), by the ship load, for under a penny a litre, ....... compare that to what the home market was paying ...
today's fuel duties are ......

• Petrol, diesel, biodiesel and bioethanol – 57.95p per litre
• Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) – 31.61p per kg

there are 1.98 ltrs of LPG in a kilo ... so the former is 3.66 more times duty heavy than LPG ..... someone, somewhere realised they were on a serious hiding to nothing, duty-wise and dropped it as an alternate, like a hot potato .. (kero BTW is 10.7p/litre) so cheaper duty-wise than LPG ..... but a lot dearer, currently.

anyone noticed there is absolutely zero promotion of LPG as an alternate for any use, anywhere???????