Baby its cold outside. And inside?

There was a discussion recently on Reddit about our parsimonious approach to home heating here in the UK and Ireland. The story started with a discussion from a guy who was looking for advice on how to handle his grandmother’s refusal to turn on the heating despite his poor grandfather literally dying of cancer. Here is the query:

My gran (F87) is a frugal type, grew up with rationing, hates spending money even though she’s pretty well off and comfortable. My granddad (M79) has lung, prostate and kidney cancer and is coming towards end of life.

My gran absolutely refuses to have the heating on in her house. Today it was 14 degrees, a few weeks ago when I visited it was 9!! She screams at me when I turn it on and turns it straight back off again. Granddad has told me that he is cold at home but she doesn’t allow him access to the heating and he doesn’t have the strength these days to argue. The house is full of damp and mildew on the cold walls and ceilings. They have a wood burner but only use it at night.

Things I have offered so far:

paying all their heating bills (rejected point-blank but I do have access to her Eon account so could maybe set this up)

printing out loads of info about negative health outcomes of living in a cold home (ignored)

told her she was being abusive to my granddad (brushed off)

turning the heating on every time I visit and getting my sister to do the same, we get shouted at.

threatened to call social services, is this an option? I feel like they’d be too stretched to do anything and both adults in the home have capacity.

bought granddad an electric blanket but gran confiscated the plug so he can’t use it (wtf honestly)

emailed my granddad’s consultant to tell her about the situation but she didn’t bring it up during his last consult

I am absolutely banging my head against the wall here, it pains to see my granddad so cold. I live across the country so can’t go in every day, my sister does visit almost daily but the heating goes straight off once she’s gone. I feel like my last option is to set the thermostat to a steady temperature and then lock them out of it but I know she’d be fiddling around with the boiler if I did that.

This led to an outpouring of similar stories from readers about cold homes and relatives refusing to turn the heat on.

Meanwhile, over in the Ireland section, there are lots of similar tales of cold Irish houses and bewildered immigrants wondering why Irish homes are so freezing. This comment was interesting:

Moved to Germany last year, and it’s mad here.

There is no on/off switch for the heating, which is the norm here. It is on 24/7. You just set the temperature you want, and leave it alone. Messes with your head, especially as I was so frugal with it back home.

Houses are properly insulated, and they don’t lose the heat like back home. Genuinely use less oil than I did in Ireland, which is mad considering the proper cold winters here and the fact that it’s on 24/7.

Its currently 4 degrees outside and house is a constant 21.

I even found this YouTube video from a poor sod from Barbados trying to survive in Ireland:

It is curious why so many of us tolerate cold homes. A few things are going on:

Culture: Many of us grew up in homes with little to no central heating. There was a coal fire in the main room, and that was pretty much it. I have childhood memories of going out to the cold yard with a shovel to get coal from the coal bunker. There is a view among many of us that being cold is virtuous and turning on the heating is an admission of moral failure, and it will make you soft.

Many consider turning the heating on to be literally burning money, which it kind of is, but really it is only for a few months of the year.

Technical: Irish homes are generally dreadful when it comes to heating systems, insulation and ventilation. It never gets that cold here, so we don’t have the tradition of well-insulated homes that you get in Northern Europe. But our climate is damp, so it always feels colder than the thermometer says.

There is a push to move us toward more eco-friendly heating systems like heat pumps, but they are still incredibly expensive. The best bang for your buck is to improve your home’s insulation. If you are one of the 60% of people in NI with oil heating and have an old oil boiler an easy win is change it to one of the new condensing types, they are a lot more efficient and you will recoup your investment in no time. Grant Boilers is a local company that has a good reputation and it should be an easy switch.

One tip I will give is to install a positive input ventilation (PIV) system in your house. You stick it in your roof space, and it continually vents fresh air into your house via a vent in the landing. I have one, and they are amazing. They remove any damp from the house and make it feel warmer. Dryer air is easier to heat so you also save on your heating. They are about £300, and you will need an electrician to install them. Make sure to hang it from the rafters when they install it. They don’t make much noise, but hanging it reduces the vibrations. If you live in an apartment or don’t have a roof space, you can also get models that you install in the hall.

But Brian, I hear you say, does that mean you are pumping cold air into your house? The idea is that the air in the roofspace is warmer than outside, and they use a heating element to warm the air when it falls below a specific temperature that you can adjust. In summer, it will also cut off if it’s too warm outside. A major upside is that you don’t need to open your windows to get fresh air, thus keeping the heat in. As you are getting constant fresh air, they are also great if you have allergies or any breathing issues.

I bought this one from Vent Axia, it is £325. There is also a local company called Brookvent that makes them in Dunmurry. I regret not installing ducts into the bedrooms when I was doing my house refurb, or indeed installing a heat exchanger.

There are a gazillion videos on YouTube about them, but this one gives you a good overview:

If you work from home or need heat in a specific room, e.g., your office, I find the Dreo Heaters excellent. They are ceramic and don’t have that weird smell you get with traditional electric heaters. You can buy them on Amazon, and they are often on sale.

Lastly, in-room heat exchangers are cool if you want to vent a specific room of the house, e.g., a kitchen or bathroom. They extract the heat from the air that is being expelled and transfer it to the air coming in.

So, are you a heat hog or a stick-on an extra jumper type?

I have a bit of an obsession with this stuff, so feel free to ask any questions.

I help to manage Slugger by taking care of the site as well as running our live events. My background is in business, marketing and IT. My politics tend towards middle-of-the-road pragmatism; I am not a member of any political party. When not stuck in front of a screen, I am a parkrun Run Director.