
Price-wise, they are no different than their gas alternatives with prices hovering around the £1,500 and £2,000 mark. Heat-only electric boilers are much cheaper than that – just around £400. The installation cost for a typical electric combi boiler can be comparable to the gas alternative but it may actually incur additional costs because some older heating systems may require an upgrade to make sure that radiators further from the boiler can heat up in a timely manner. The only way to find out is to get about
Electric boilers are a popular choice in high-rise buildings because they don’t need a flue. Getting a boiler replaced on the 5th floor or above might prove a very costly job because we would have to erect scaffolding to be able to work on the flue. This is, unfortunately, completely out of reach for a large portion of people living in multi-storey apartment buildings. There is no such issue if you choose an electric combi boiler. It doesn’t need a flue and can be installed as high as on the top floor of a sky-scraper. All it needs is water supply and electric feed and you’re sorted.
Also, from the point of view of safety and maintenance, electric alternatives have an edge. You can’t control the temperature of a gas flame. With natural gas, the average temperature inside the flame is 1960 degrees. With such extreme temperatures, heat exchangers and other parts are subject to overheating and excessive wear. There is no such problem with electrical heating elements – electricity allows you to regulate temperature precisely, so the boiler parts never heat up more than it’s actually required. It’s very rare for an electric boiler to develop mechanical faults – something that can’t be said about gas boilers.
Unlike some other big name companies, who don’t yet install electric boilers, we at Glow Green do. If you think your home would benefit from an electric boiler, give us a call on 0330 113 9488 and speak to one of our advisors to discuss your options.
What electric boiler brands are available?
The main brands currently on the UK market are Elnur Mattira, Heatrae Sadia Electromax, Thermaflow and EK.C Elektra. Only Elnur and EK.C are wall-mounted. The rest of them are too heavy so they are floor-standing boilers. We at Glow Green work with Elnur Mattira which is a reasonably-priced and well built option with variable outputs ranging from 3 to 15 and 2-year warranty.
People who’ve exprienced on-demand boilers are often worried about the hot water flow rate in electric boilers. The Elnur Mattira incorporates a 50-leater pre-heated water cylinder allowing it to optimise hot water usage and achieve similar flow rate to gas boilers – allowing it to deliver up to 12 litres per minute.
Mattira will work on both single phase or 3-phase power supply. It will work within 3 – 12kW range on single phase and up to 15kW on 3-phase. It also features heating modulation that allows the advanced control board to automatically modulate heating output to match the demand and reduce wasted energy. It re-calculates consumption every 20 seconds and continuously adapts heating output achieving close to 100% energy efficiency.
The table shows some of the technical details of Mattira Combi MAC15 model. For example, on its max setting it takes 5 minutes and 49 seconds to replenish the 50 litre cylinder with hot water.
Selected output, kW | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 15 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
kCal per hour | 4300 | 5160 | 6020 | 6880 | 7740 | 8600 | 9460 | 10320 | 11180 | 12900 |
Current, 3-phase | 13.0 | 8.7 | 13.0 | 13.0 | 13.0 | 21.7 | 21.7 | 21.7 | 21.7 | 21.7 |
Current, 1-phase | 21.7 | 26.1 | 30.4 | 34.8 | 39.1 | 43.5 | 47.8 | 52.2 | n/a | n/a |
Domestic hot water recovery time | 17’26” | 14’32” | 12’27” | 10’54” | 9’41” | 8’43” | 7’56” | 7’16” | 6’42” | 5’49” |