heating a shed through winter?

hi all,

i have built a shed in the bottom of my garden to use as a fish house so far i have 7 tanks in there and am currently using a greenhouse fan heater to take the winter chill away. i have insulated the shed pretty good, the only problem is the fan heater is killing my electric bill i used it last year for my green house and cost me about £400 to run lol!



any ideas of what i could use?

thanks.

Hi jaymiller
You have the same problem as all fish keepers with a fish house electric is so expensive
now and it is killing the hobby. I always tell people to put insulation as thick as you can afford.
You said that you have insulated your fish house but if it does not have a good 2" to 3" of good
insulation it will not hold the heat. My own fish house has about 40 tanks that hold around the 2000 gallons,
and runs at about 78 to 80 degrees just from the heat from the tanks,
But it has been running at £500 a quarter, so we are just about to get solar panels instaled on the roof
and then they say we should be around the £150 a quarter i hope they are right and i will be a man.

I think if most people are honest any fish house is going to run inbetween £10 and £30 per week, most
dont want the wife to know the real price. but if you go out and have a drink and smoke it will probably
cost more than this hobby.
So my advice is to insulate = insulate = and insulate some more the less heat that gets out the more you save.
Cheers Tony

Tony is spot on, the initial outlay will hurt but it will save you a fortune in the long run

A rough rule of thumb is that 1 watt will cost you £1 per year to run, so a 2 Kw (2000watt) heater will add £500 per quarter to your electricity bill if it's running all the time.

For larger facilities a gas boiler with radiators could be a cost effective solution, but this isn't a practical option for a small shed.

as Tony says, the key is to insulate; and although you do need to ensure there's some means of ventilation, eliminate any stray draughts, especially around the door.
Strangely, you may find that as you get more tanks in there the running cost fall!
This is because with more water and less air, when you open the door, there will be less hot air to escape, whilst once warmed, the water will retain heat quite well.

Yeah the lay out on the insulation was about £95 but worth it. To be fair it's pretty warm in there now. I'm thinking of getting one if these 1500watt rads from homebase or b and q. Thanks guys! Glad I was obbessed with the in insulation