Decision criterion price: How do you really heat at the lowest price?

The question of the right heating system arises in any living space. It doesn’t matter whether you are building a new house or renovating an apartment. Every sales brochure promises you the best heating option. There are hardly any comprehensible and understandable explanations and comparisons. That’s exactly what we want to offer you in this article.

In this post, you’ll learn:

• What are the three factors that are critical to true costs
• Acquisition costs: Are modern heating systems really more expensive than classic ones?
• Energy costs: where they arise and when they have a positive impact on total costs
• Maintenance costs: How much needs to be done for maintenance and what does it cost?
• Conclusion: Breaking down the price transparently helps

 

What three factors are critical to true cost?

Again and again, people talk about the best price-performance ratio. But what does that actually mean? The truth is usually quite different: For many, it is not the price/performance ratio that is decisive in the first decision-making step, but rather the actual costs incurred.

These real costs are incurred by:

• Acquisition
• Energy consumption
• Maintenance costs

On our page “Comparison of heating systems” we have already compared the costs in a table. However, here in this blog post we want to provide even better understanding.

Therefore, we go through the costs with you in detail, step by step.

 

Acquisition costs: Are modern heating systems really more expensive than classic ones?

If you have to decide on a heating system for your new construction or renovation, the first thing you (and your wallet) will probably be interested in is the initial cost.

These acquisition costs can vary quite a bit depending on the system. Moreover, it is often difficult because it is easy to compare apples with oranges. This is especially true for heating and cooling.

The comparison also lags in some places in our comparison. However, rather to our own product disadvantage, since our heating system, for example, is also the only heating system that can cool at the same time.

This cooling can even be realized completely without energy consumption. Not a single watt needs to be consumed in the process.

It is similar in the heating comparison: not even the best classical floor heating systems come close to our tube spacing of 8 cm, which results in stronger “wave fluctuations” in the floor temperature with all classical systems.

Nevertheless, our system does not need to hide from price comparison. You’ll be amazed to find that out right away! In our example, we always assume a 100-square-meter apartment and base our price comparison on values that we have found on the Internet in line with the market.

 

System “conventional radiators

With the “conventional” radiator, just as with underfloor heating or panel heating, it requires pipes throughout the house or apartment. Material costs and labor hours are incurred here.

For a 100 m² apartment, the installation of a conventional radiator system will cost between 3,500 euros and 9,000 euros – depending on the equipment you want to have.

 

System “classic underfloor heating

Classic underfloor heating is currently considered the standard. They are somewhat more economical than conventional radiators, but the quality varies greatly. In extreme cases, you have a strong warm-cold-warm-cold effect that spreads across a room like waves.

For our comparison, we take average quality floor heating systems. For a 100-square-meter apartment, we end up with a price between 3,000 euros and 4,500 euros.

 

The egger system – from underfloor heating to an optimal room climate

It should be said in advance: no classic underfloor heating system comes close to the egger system ‘s standard tube spacing of 8 cm. Nevertheless, the initial cost for a 100-square-meter apartment for the egger system is 3,000 euros.

This puts us in the lower price segment, despite the clearly modern and parallel system. If you add 60 square meters of wall heating area and thus improve its living quality even more, you are at an acquisition cost of 7,600 euros. With an optimal climate system (floor, wall as described and 40 square meters of ceiling), the acquisition cost is 10,800 euros.

As will be seen in the next step, with the same or only slightly higher initial costs, a large energy saving is added.

 

Energy costs: where they arise and when they have a positive impact on total costs

Although the majority of energy costs (more than 90 percent) are incurred in the living space, most of the discussion about heating revolves around the energy source. It is of little importance for the energy balance how the heat (or in the case of cooling, cold) is generated. The effects are much greater due to the transfer of heat into the living spaces.

For example, according to Energieheld.de, a kilowatt hour of energy costs 7.8 cents for oil heating and 7 cents for gas. As you can see, we are talking about a savings potential of 10 percent.

If you go the way of heat transfer in your decision, you can save much more energy costs: Radiators require a supply temperature of 50 to 60 degrees. Classic underfloor heating systems are already better at this, requiring only 30 to 40 degrees Celsius flow temperature.

This means that the heating system must first be brought to this temperature by the heat source. As you can see: Even the classic underfloor heating brings about 20 percent energy savings compared to radiators. This is much more than can ever be achieved by adjusting the energy source.

The egger system goes one step further: because it relies on a parallel flow of the heat fluid rather than a serial one, the supply temperature in the egger system is only around 25 degrees in winter.

This means that the egger system already saves 30 percent of energy costs compared to conventional radiators only when installed as underfloor heating. If a floor-wall system is chosen here, the savings are up to 50 percent, and for floor-wall-ceiling systems, up to 60 percent in new buildings and up to 80 percent in older buildings.

Now comes the best part: For the egger system it does not matter which energy source (wood, gas, heat pump, oil heating, pellets, etc.) you choose for your home. You can also still take this savings with you. The egger system works with any heat source.

 

Maintenance costs: How much needs to be done for maintenance?

Maintenance costs are divided between the heating source (whether you heat with oil, gas, pellets, heat pump, etc.) and the maintenance of the heating elements. Maintenance of the elements is usually the cheaper part, as they often last for decades.

On average, depending on the type, heating sources incur between 120 and 300 euros in maintenance costs per year. For the elements – radiators, underfloor heating pipes – it depends very much on the design. Especially in classic underfloor heating systems, the strict bending and serial water flow often create very high pressure on the pipes.

How long these pipes withstand the load, in turn, depends very much on your chosen quality, which in turn can lead to more expensive purchase costs.

With egger registers, you should have no maintenance costs at all because we give you a 20-year warranty on our parts. According to laboratory calculations, our elements last more than 150 years. Due to the parallel water flow, there is very little pressure at the element edges.

Only if you actively damage an element (e.g. you drill directly into it), you will incur costs.

For the heating source, you could assume comparable numbers for all heating systems. However, we would like to point out that since the egger system only requires a flow temperature of around 25 degrees and the others considerably more, the heating sources in other systems must also withstand considerably more stress. And that in the long run…

 

Conclusion: Price transparency creates clarity

It is clear to us that anyone who builds or renovates only has a certain budget. With top modern systems, people are often afraid that they would be too expensive.

Hopefully, this fact check will help you make a more informed decision and take the shyness out of researching our 21st century heating system as well.

Call us without obligation and free of charge(+43 5223 411 68 11) or send us an e-mail(kontakt@eggerklima.at). We advise you free of charge about our system. If you are interested, you will be sent an offer without obligation and can decide at home in peace.

Mail now and get free initial consultation!

 

Photo: © Jenny Sturm – fotolia.com