44 replies to this topic

[littleacorn]

Hi everyone - this is my very first post - have been a book owner for a couple of years and reading this forum for the last couple of months - and very helpful it has been! We have just exchanged contracts on our land (yippee!) - just over 10 acres, and already rent 2 1/2 acres about 5 miles away. Once we have completed we will be putting in our 28 day notification and so will probably have lots of questions!

In the meantime though we have enquired about electric connection with MANWEB who cover our area and have had a phone call asking what size supply we will need. We dont particularly want to involve an electrician (as MANWEB have told us to do) until we have our 28 day permission (just in case he is related to a planning officer!) so wondered if someone on here could advise us.

Our plan is along the lines of many other F2F's - CL caravans and tents, barn lighting, mobile home requirements etc, we also will be having (hopefully) a small poultry processing shed/butchery/storage (max of 50 birds per week) plus a small dairy for utilising our goats milk.

Would be very grateful for any advice.

[Cornish Gems]

Littleacorn, hello and welcome, regarding your electrical connection ideally you need to work out your power consumption present and future.

If say you decide to go with single phase at 15KW ie standard household connection, you may find it will not be enough if you have a CL with electric hook up and you will want lighting in your barn etc, to upgrade once you have the 15KW to 30kw or to 3 phase will cost you twice as much again. However if you decide to go direct for the 3phase then the additional costs will only be approx 50%, this is because they will not have to change transformers and upgrade cable and poles or redig their trenches.

Ideally take your time to decide unless it is imperative to have electric from the off.

Each building will need to be 90 meters from each other unless you have a reasonable LPA, some LPA's will allow you to keep adding all the buildings together from various application until you reach 465sq meter floor space others will insist that if you use less than the 465 sqm you must still have the next building over 90 meters away.

So you will need to plan carefully, not too sure if the dairy and butchery unit can come under GDPO as you may find you will need full planning permission for these. It may be an idea to get an old touring caravan and strip it out and create a portable butchery unit.


CG

[littleacorn]

Hi Cornish Gems - thanks very much for reply.
Just to check if I am understanding this right - if we say to Manweb that we want a 30kw supply then that would be enough to power everything in the static and lighting etc in the barn to start. Plus in the future, if we need it, 5 connections for tourers and the basics for farm shop/butchery/dairy. Is that right?
Thanks again

[Cornish Gems]

Hi, no for all your needs I would suggest a 50kw 3 phase service this will allow you to split the phases for static etc and also have a 3 phase in your barn and butchery so you can run 3phase equipment and as quite a few of the coldstores are 3 phase this would be best option in our opinion.

We are ourselves looking at 50kw 3phase to cover all our current and future needs.

So after 12mths we still have not decided fully as we have still not finalised our future needs.

CG

[littleacorn]

Ok to update - I decided to ask for a 3 phase supply to cover all eventualities. The man from SP Energy Networks then provided the quote (the barn which will house the meter will be 4m away from the pole which is already on our land). The quote is just short of £11,000 + vat taking it to just over £13,000.

Having read Surrey Dodgers post in his diary I recontacted SP Energy Networks to request a requotation based on contestable works. His reply was that I could contact Lloyds register and request another company to quote but that most of the work ie the transformer is non contestable and, therefore, it probably wouldn't make much difference.

I really feel I am falling at the first hurdle here, I dont really know what I am talking about with regard to electricity and which type of electric company does what but felt that the money we had set aside - £7000 for electric connection (+ vat which we could claim back) - would be enough. Although I know we could ask for a lesser supply with, presumably, a lesser cost, we are the type of people who always seem to get charged more than other people for things! and I can't help wondering if what he is saying is right or not.

Anyone else experienced this?

[surreydodger]

Hi Littleacorn

Don't be worried about getting a bit snotty in dealing with this. You will only be using them once and then never see them again !

My costs for supply and fit of transformer, upto 100kVa supply, supply and lay mtrs of cable, supply, fit and connect meter, came to around £8000 inc VAT. As i said in my Diary post, that was after a quote of £12000.

I too do not fully understand this contestable works but my local company is Scottish and Southern Electric and the quote was prepared at the beginning of the year. I would therefore ring him again and inform him you are aware of my costs and ask why their installation is so much more?

[littleacorn]

Its been a slow 6 weeks on the electric front!

I got back onto the electric company and spoke to the man who had compiled our quote comparing the quote surreydodger had received and the reduction he obtained on using 'contestable works'. No reduction would be forthcoming! so I decided to complain. I wrote a polite letter to the complaints team again using the same arguments and received a phone call off a very nice lady who did get more than slightly irate as I repeatedly compared the 2 jobs! she insisted that they were not the same as they were in 2 competely different areas and her counter argument was that I wouldn't expect a 4 bed house in London to be the same price somewhere else - there would be a huge price difference! However, she said she would request a rethink off the quotes team. Her letter arrived the next day - no reduction would be forthcoming! She also mentioned that in my quote there were no contestable works (which they have given me the impression is the trench digging etc which we had already said we would undertake).

I decided to take a different tack and asked them to give me another quote based on a single phase 'large' supply. I was told at the very beginning that the cost of the transformers differ hugely so this should make a massive difference to the quote. This quote has now arrived - for a new 25KVA transformer (to give us an 18KVA supply - not sure why it's less) the price is £8,8833.33 +vat, £10,600.01 in total. It is a lot less but it is still a lot more than surreydodgers quote for 3 phase and, because I don't understand it completely, I'm not sure if the single phase they have quoted for will be enough for what we may want to do with it.

There is also a worrying clause in amongst all the other clauses stating that if they decide to deviate from the original plan then we will have to pay all the extra costs incurred. They also dont supply plans etc until you pay so we don't actually know in advance how much groundworks and preparation we will have to do or whereabouts the work is actually going to be.

I have contacted a company who offered to quote for someone on another forum in a similar position but I am thinking that, if what I have been told is correct and there is no contestable portion then they won't be able to help.

We shall see....!

[surreydodger]

If ever there was a reason to get rid of dividend paying corporations, this is the kind of thing we should be doing it for!

Keep going Littleacorn. It's amazing how sometimes you can uncover a stone which helps by sheer bloody-mindedness and determination.

[crocodile dundee]

Hi
Just had a quote for power from Western power distribution!

"Install a road crossing (trench in road it under the road!) to connect to 11kv cable over road and stie free standing pole mounted trasformer on your site"

for 100kva 3 phase £21300

for single phase is £18500

The shed is only 30m from the supply!, should i try for a quote based on "contestable works"?
John

[surreydodger]

I would.

[Canning Farm]

Ask the distributer for a copy of their 'basic charging statement' so that you can see how they arrive at the fixed price that you have been given. They have to provide you with this so don't take no for an answer.

You should also consider contacting other companys, which are on the Lloyds register for a quotation. Some of the larger firms may turn you down or offer a silly quote as the work involved is so small, but nothing ventured nothing gained.

Good luck and keep us posted.

[crocodile dundee]

Hi, Found a man in the know hes getting a price from a contrator he works with,sounds like it could be £9000 to £12000 but will see what they come up with.eon didnt like it when i asked for a quote based on "contestable works" but they did tell me the whole job was contestable work!, will keep you posted

[gazza49]

Hello!

we too are getting all confused with this!! Northern Power grid have quoted £12,000. plus VAT. I asked for contestable works and they divide it up - £3,700 non contestable and £8,300 contestable. What do we do now?? Any advicde greatly received! The costs of this is astronomical!

Gazza

[crocodile dundee]

Wish my quote was £12000!, Am still waiting for quote from contractor,You need to talk to an electrion, they may work with a contrator that can quote you. good luck!

[jazziejay]

I've had a quote of £1100 for single phase through uk power networks now waiting to see what a transformer 3 phase will work out at.

[Seagulls flying high]

I've had a quote of £1100 for single phase through uk power networks now waiting to see what a transformer 3 phase will work out at.

£1100 or £11000.

i was quoted £28 000 single phase

[jazziejay]

Yes it was 1100 one thousand one hundred but the post is only 10 feet away from my field in a neighbours field who is being sticky about giving permission for us to use it. Hence why Im seeking a quote for a transformer. Seeing what all my options are.

[barrymoore]

Yes it was 1100 one thousand one hundred but the post is only 10 feet away from my field in a neighbours field who is being sticky about giving permission for us to use it. Hence why Im seeking a quote for a transformer. Seeing what all my options are.

HI Jazziejay,
I also have a sticky neighbours! how can it be allowed that these people can even have an opinion over wether you can have electric or not?
The pole we need to get our supply is some 2 feet into the negbours garden and as I understand it he has to give permision for the electric company to dig the trench to lay the cable over the road to my land! of course he has said no. So what we are doing at the moement is running our generator all day over the weekends down by his house to see if this changes his mind
regards derek
ps does any one know what the laws are with generators on agri land? are there time limits? or noise limits? or is it that if you have animals that need heat and electric it is all ok?

[Cornish Gems]

Hi - you both have our sympathy, or, perhaps we should we say - join the club. We too have a sticky neighbour and he complained to Environmental Health at the Council about our generator and we were given all sorts of advice as to how to deal with the noise and 'smell' including details of what kind of housing to build for the genni. We have now changed our needs for a genni as much as possible so that it does not run all day and so far Environmental Health have kept quiet.

Our genni is brand new and classified as a silent running genny. we have had to place it in our pony trailer and surround it with sound proofing just to satify this neighbour who by the way is over 200 meters away.

[jazziejay]

Yes I think a nice big generator may be the answer as they are our only neighbours. why are people so odd when it comes to a newbie buying land?? I don't get it?