2023-09-08 08:30:36
This Friday, the Bundestag will most likely pass a law that will have financial consequences for millions of citizens. The amendment to the Building Energy Act formally comes into force on January 1, 2024; in new development areas, the stricter rules for installing new heating apply immediately. By mid-2028 at the latest, when all municipalities are supposed to have drawn up their heat plans, the obligation to use at least 65 percent renewable energy when installing new heating must also be observed in existing buildings. Whether the requirement is met with a heat pump, district heating, wood or green gases is up to the homeowners to decide.
The FDP in particular is proud that the amendment to the law now opens up more options for owners than the first draft from Robert Habeck’s (Greens) Ministry of Economic Affairs provided for. For homeowners, this also means that you have to weigh things up carefully. On the one hand, whether they should replace their heating system now in order to benefit from the subsidy bonuses promised by the coalition, or whether they should wait until the old heating system is irreparably broken. On the other hand, they have to estimate which type of green heating will be the cheapest in their town and house in the future.
The non-profit consulting company Co2online regularly evaluates the operating costs of various types of heating. The data comes from consumers who carry out a “heating cost check” – sponsored by the Ministry of Economic Affairs. The current figures from the heating mirror still refer to the year 2021. At that time, wood heating with annual heating costs of less than 1000 euros was the cheapest option for a 110 square meter single-family house. The electricity-driven heat pump and the gas and oil heating moved around 1500 euros, the most expensive was district heating at more than 1700 euros – that district heating, which according to the decisions of the traffic light coalition is to be significantly expanded in the next few years.
Comparison of heating types over two decades
In order to give homeowners a decision-making aid for the time after the new Building Energy Act has come into force, the consulting company for the FAZ compared the investment and operating costs of several types of heating over a period of 20 years, the average service life of a heating system. The calculation is based on the assumption that owners receive both the planned basic subsidy of 30 percent and the speed bonus of 20 percent as a subsidy from the state, i.e. 50 percent of the investment costs up to the upper cost limit of 30,000 euros.
Wood pellet heating performs best in this overall calculation. Deducting the funding, Co2online has investment costs of 8,125 euros and operating costs of 29,882 euros, making 38,007 euros. The second cheapest place is the heat pump combined with a solar system: 32,200 euros investment costs after deducting the subsidy and 10,766 euros operating costs over 20 years.
This is followed by district heating (3000 euros connection costs plus 44,032 euros operating costs), the classic heat pump (9000 euros after funding plus 45,240 euros electricity costs) and finally gas heating with 7500 euros for the installation and 66,370 euros gas and CO2 costs. The investment costs taken as a basis are based on data from the building cost information center of the Chamber of Architects, for the operating costs the current energy prices and the continuation of the historical price trends were assumed, for the CO2 price 15 euros more per ton and year after the expiry of the legal requirements.
Wood heaters are only recommended for local forestry
“The costs for heating with district heating or hydrogen can be significantly more expensive than with a heat pump,” writes the portal in its analysis. With a view to the comparatively low costs of a wood pellet heating system, it is said that “from a climate protection perspective, a biomass heating system is only recommended if the wood comes from sustainable and local forestry or from waste wood”. Environmentalists are also critical of heating with wood because of the fine dust emissions.
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Depending on the initial costs you assume, the final bill can be different. For example, the Federal Association of Consumer Organizations (VZBV) sets higher prices for new heating systems. For the classic air-to-water heat pump, consumer advocates consider installation costs of 31,000 euros to be realistic, and 37,000 euros for a pellet heating system. Even after deducting the subsidy, higher investments would be necessary at the beginning than in Co2online’s calculation.
When the Energy Economics Institute of the University of Cologne (EWI) calculated several cost scenarios for the FAZ in April, it came to the conclusion that in the long term, despite the higher investment costs, a brine-water heat pump can be cheaper than a classic air-water heat pump or a new gas heating.
The energy price forecast by the Ministry of Economics, which recently became known through a request from the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, will not make the consumer’s decision any easier. According to this, the ministry assumes that despite the rising CO2 price, the price for a kilowatt hour of gas will drop from the current 16 cents to 14.4 cents in 2035. For the kilowatt hour of electricity as part of a heat pump tariff, the ministry is currently assuming 33.5 cents per kilowatt hour, and 31.5 cents in 2035. However, the ministry writes that these forecasts are “subject to great uncertainty”.
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