New DNO connection - £20k!

[MrMagic]

Just that really - £20,376 (inc.) - 100 meters of footpath, 2 meters of road, 2 joints, single phase. Oh to be a self builder... 😂

 

At what point do we seriously consider going off grid!?

[Carrerahill]

Assume that is for contestable and non-contestable.

 

Who owns the footpath? Scope to save anywhere?

 

 

[Russell griffiths]

A friend of mine paid 60,000 Australian dollars, they flew the cable in by helicopter. 

[Kelvin]

My first estimate was £26,500 for three phase final cost was £400 for single phase with me doing all the trenching etc. I didn’t need to cross roads or public footpaths though. I’d definitely look at what bits you can do yourself or get third parties to do vs what the DNO has to do. 

Edited February 6, 2023 by Kelvin

[SteamyTea]

35 minutes ago, Russell griffiths said:

60,000 Australian dollars

14,989,025 Zimbabwean Dollars

[MrMagic]

Budgetary estimate only at the moment rather than a quote so that price is excluding all the traffic management etc 😭. I need to send the sewer down the same path so hoping there might be a chance to get a single dig.

 

Other than that it's going to be beans on toast for the foreseeable.. will hopefully be able to convert to a formal quote in the next few months once we know rough locations.

[Blooda]

Ours was knocking on the door of £40k - 2x 100m runs up a couple of roads in the village, one run serving just us, one to uprate a cable.  Approx. half was contestable half non-contestable. I tried to get quotes from other utility installation smaller companies, but they are really only interested in Housing estates multiple houses etc.

 

Also  if I had subcontracted out the contestable works, I would have [may have] been liable to VAT on that element.

 

Not quite a beans on toast moment, but all our contingency went straight away.  Signed on 6th March 2020 just before COVID, and we got connected on 10th Oct that year.  

 

It was almost a show stopper given at the time Brexit was threatening House Price falls, but in the end we decided that we couldn't bear to sell the land and someone build a house where we should have.

 

Could have asked for a requote after they installed, but didn't bother as they underestimated the TM, they had to shut the road and set up a diversion, also they had to supply various standby generators to residents on medical grounds, and a local business. 

 

1 hour ago, MrMagic said:

once we know rough locations.

We did save a cost of moving from temporary position to final position as they took that long, we had the cabinet in.

 

 

 

 

[Kelvin]

Ouch. The utilities are a scary unknown when buying the land. I did my best to get  budget quotes as part of our due diligence and consequently we nearly pulled out of buying the land as the electricity was £26,500 and private water supply £24,000. However, like you you we didn’t want anyone else building on the plot as we were smitten by it 😂 The actual cost was under £10,000 for both in the end. 

Edited February 6, 2023 by Kelvin

[Carrerahill]

3 hours ago, MrMagic said:

At what point do we seriously consider going off grid!?

For a friend of a friend, £60K - so he is off gird, he spent a chunk on PV, batteries, and a genset to boost batteries in the winter.

 

 

[AliG]

2 hours ago, MrMagic said:

Budgetary estimate only at the moment rather than a quote so that price is excluding all the traffic management etc 😭. I need to send the sewer down the same path so hoping there might be a chance to get a single dig.

 

I had various discussions re doing this on my parent's house. In the end I could not get people to agree to put things in the same trench and also it was nigh on impossible to manage timings to do so.

 

On top of this the sewer trench needs a considerably larger, probably deeper trench and is considerably more expensive to dig, seemed like roughly twice the cost per meter.

 

 

 

[Roger440]

Last year i looked at an off grid house.

 

You can get an "easygrid" set up in a box, so genny, solar and batteries. I was quoted £30k.

 

Actual costs per kWh were way lower than where they are from grid if you ignore the capital cost.

 

You know its a messed up world, where potentially going off grid makes more economic sense that being on the grid despite a nearby supply!!

 

Factor in likely future rationing and price increases, and maybe its worthy of consideration when grid connections are in the 10's of thousands.

 

Ive just been quoted £15k for a 3 phase connection to my barn. From a pole on my own land less than 100ft from said barn. With me doing all the groundworks. Needless to say, ive kicked that one in to touch.

 

 

[Nickfromwales]

6 hours ago, MrMagic said:

At what point do we seriously consider going off grid!?

The £20k will be a far better investment afaic. I've priced a few off-grid domestic systems, and quite often we're up at way over £60k when it's all done and totalled up ( for a system that will actually let you live a normal life ), plus with off grid you can forget charging an EV whilst using anything else electrical.

Get the contestable works done in-house, see if the roads can be mole'd under instead of closed and excavated, and save wherever you can. But in a nutshell, stump up and pay for a grid connection is my strong advice. 

[Nickfromwales]

1 hour ago, Roger440 said:

Factor in likely future rationing and price increases, and maybe its worthy of consideration when grid connections are in the 10's of thousands.

Still nicer to have reliability, and infinite capacity on tap to fortify solar / batteries etc. Means the generator can go bye-bye then too.