Cost of running an Electric Heater

Unfortunately running an Electric Heater of any description in the UK is going to work out extremely expensive, costing around three times as much as Mains Gas central heating and even twice the comparable cost of oil and LPG heating. However in some rural areas and for those who are in rented accommodation it often remains the only option.

Lets just clear up one myth, there is no such thing as a cheap to run or ‘economical’ Electric Heater, any heater will produce exactly as much usable heat as it states on its rating plate. So a 2kw heater will produce 2kw worth of heat, whether its a £8.99 2kw fan heater from Ebay or one of the £600 2kw ‘miracle’ radiators – both of these examples will produce 2kw of heat for your 2kw worth of Electricity because both are 100% efficient. There is no smoke and mirrors, the only difference is in the cost of the physical heater, but once purchased both 2kw heater examples, will cost the same amount to run, and produce the same amount of heat

So lets give some actual examples of how much it costs to run various heaters of different ratings per hour. I am using an Electricity cost of 12p per unit (Kw/h) in my calculations below which is the average current UK cost of Electricity as of Nov 2013.

100 Watt Electric Blanket – 1.2p per hour

200 Watt Panel Heater – 2.4p per hour

350 Watt Panel Heater – 4.2p per hour

400 Watt Halogen Heater – 4p per hour

500 Watt Panel Heater – 6p per hour

600 Watt Panel Heater – 7.2p per hour

800 Watt Halogen Heater – 8p per hour

1200 Watt Halogen Heater – 14.4p per hour

750 Watt Convector Heater – 9p per hour

1000 Watt (1kw) Convector Heater – 12p per hour

1500 Watt (1.5kw) Convector Heater – 18p per hour

1800 Watt (1.8kw) Convector Heater – 21.6p per hour

2000 Watt (2kw) Convector Heater – 24p per hour

2400 Watt (2.4kw) Convector Heater – 28.8p per hour

2500 Watt (2.5kw) Convector Heater – 30p per hour

3000 Watt (3kw) Convector Heater – 36p per hour

4000 Watt (4kw) Convector Heater – 48p per hour

11,000 Watt (11kw) Heat Pump / Boiler – £1.32 per hour

Although I have used the description of Panel Heater, Convector Heater and Halogen Heater in the above running cost calculations, the cost of running other heaters of the same wattage will be exactly the same, regardless of the type of heater.