In one short week there’s been a change at the top of the central heating leaderboard.
When enirgy.info last calculated the cost of heating a home, natural gas emerged as the cheapest of the four fuels under comparison.
That result wasn’t wholly surprising as it followed cuts in gas prices of around 20% approved by the Energy Regulator. The margin however over home heating oil was relatively small as the cost of that fuel was being impacted by the sinking value of crude oil.
But home heating oil has continued to drop in price. The average cost of 500 litres is now £176, a near 10% reduction in just one week.
The annual bill for heating a home with oil is now just under £600 *. That’s £17 less than the charge for using natural gas. It's not a big gap but it would be wider were it not for the discount that gas customers can avail of for paying by direct debit.
Both gas and oil are now cheaper than anthracite which last month was the lowest priced of the four central heating fuels compared by enirgy.info.
Will the current differentials be maintained? Keep checking to find out.
* The estimation by enirgy.info is based on a delivery of 15,000 kWh of useful heat regardless of the efficiency of boiler used.