When the place was originally built, there was a solid fuel stove in the kitchen with a back boiler for hot water and a small open fire in the dining room and upstairs in the master bedroom. However, a previous owner took all that out when they remodelled the interior and built the lounge as an extension.

One of our first priorities was some kind of central heating system. This is a major project because there are no hot water rads in the place and no natural gas in the village.

We looked at a number of options including a ground source heat pump and a wood pellet burner. We had to reject the former because there's not enough garden for a horizontal layout and we can't afford a borehole, and the latter because of lack of useful dry storage space for a large volume of pellets.

So we decided that, if we couldn't avoid burning fossil fuels then at least we'd try to burn them as efficiently as possible. To that end, we're putting in an oil-fired system despite my initial reluctance for oil. By way of an offset, solar hot water will also be installed.

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Simon