Energy Conversion 2011

When SiD was preparing for the building of the Scout Extension on the front of the main building, the designs insisted that the extension  should be heated by mains gas. As the existing clubhouse had been set up with a propane based heating system back in 1998, when there was no local mains  gas supply, it was decided to switch over both the old and new building to mains gas. This involved the expensive process of connecting to the medium pressure mains gas supply line feeding Caterpillar on the opposite side of Peckleton Lane. One week before we were due to change the jets on the 13 year old boiler so it could run on mains gas, it suffered its first failure in 13 years.

As a result we decided to replace the old 55KW boiler with 2 modern, higher capacity (68KW) condensing boilers to cope with the Scout Hall in addition to the original Clubhouse. In the process we discovered that one of the motorised valves had been stuck in an open position for an unknown time in the past. This valve meant we had been heating the hot water 24/7, possibly for 2 or 3 years. Once all the modifications had been made, we were delighted to find that our gas energy consumption was halved and that our gas energy  costs shrunk to 25% of what it had been with the propane brought in by tanker!
We are very pleased that we converted our energy supply over from Propane to mains gas!