Heat Pumps: anyone have one/thought about it?

[tonys]

Are heatpumps effective in the uk's climate?

They should be according to some but a waste of time and money by others. However it will depend on quite a lot of factors that have to be considered, good design of the system, house build, insulation, new or retro fit, types of rads or underfloor, good installation, expectations. They use them in Scandinavia so why not here(building quality for sub zero temps)

a lot of people are quite happy to use the same units for a/conditioning

 

[b0rn2sk8]

Are heatpumps effective in the uk's climate?

Yes but if it’s badly designed/installed it will cost a lot more than gas.

If it’s well designed/installed it will costs slightly less than gas.

It’s all about the calculating the heat loss properly, sizing the rads to the heat loss and using weather compensation with minimal zoning inside the house (removing TRVs etc.). The margin for error is very small and you can’t use it like a boiler. It’s all about low and slow rather than brute forcing it with high temperatures from a boiler.

 

[dirtychinchilla]

Are heatpumps effective in the uk's climate?

Mega. They work brilliantly in nordic countries, and our climate is obviously warmer

 

[b0rn2sk8]

It’s worth pointing out that you can install a heat pump in almost any property.

The bigger the heat loss, the bigger the heat pump and radiators. Fundamentally, this is no difference to installing a gas/oil boiler. Clearly there is a practical limit on how big you can go but in the real world you aren’t going to pump into that, even in large Edwardian houses.


There are literally farmers in NI abusing their flawed renewable heat incentive to heat their empty barns because they get paid more than it costs to run the units.

 

[PermaChanged]

There are literally farmers in NI abusing their flawed renewable heat incentive to heat their empty barns because they get paid more than it costs to run the units.

That's madness! Do they have to prove their energy usage on a heat pump tariff to claim the grant, or just prove the installation?

 

[b0rn2sk8]

That's madness! Do they have to prove their energy usage on a heat pump tariff to claim the grant, or just prove the installation?

Heat pump tariffs didn’t exist back then.

Im not 100% sure how it worked in NI but renewable heat incentives used to be paid based on how much heat you produced for 20 years.

The amount paid was more than the fuel cost, people cottoned onto it and and installed them in places not previously heated and ran them 24/7 to generate a huge payout, including equipment costs which were paid back in a few years. It’s not too dissimilar to the way the feed in tariff worked on solar but a lot more lucrative. If I recall correctly, one person is going to be paid ~£1m from the scheme to heat an empty barn.

The NI thing is well publicised and is one of the causes of the collapse of the administration over there, it was mainly Brexit but that poured petrol on the fire and sunk it.

 

[mmhm]

Plus i heard they are noisy?

They’re not that noisy. It’s a misconception.

 

[b0rn2sk8]

They’re not that noisy. It’s a misconception.

This.

A boiler is pretty noisy and no one complains about having one in their house. A heat pump is outside!

 

[Shoza]

My boiler is near silent and I can’t hear it in the kitchen at all unless I’m a foot away and it’s silent in the room. I can hear my neighbours heat pump constantly from the other side of the wall a few metres away..

 

[alphaomega16]

If anybody was curious as to noise, I know it isn't all models but this was supplied and fitted by Octopus

 

[Rroff]

They really don't look attractive - I live in an area with quite a few old farm cottages, etc. quaint old buildings with increasingly 1-3 whacking great units like that bolted on where they can.

Dunno how long link will stay valid for, not the most quaint of properties but one I saw the other day when browsing what was for sale in the area https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-p...fd90776947#/media?id=media11&ref=photoCollage

This.

A boiler is pretty noisy and no one complains about having one in their house. A heat pump is outside!

When we moved in where I'm living now there was an oil fired boiler inside and it was pretty quiet - could barely hear it 1-2 feet away, we've got an outside boiler unit now and it is actually a bit noisy to be fair. Don't have anyone nearby with a heat pump to compare to though.

 

[tonys]

They really don't look attractive - I live in an area with quite a few old farm cottages, etc. quaint old buildings with increasingly 1-3 whacking great units like that bolted on where they can.

Dunno how long link will stay valid for, not the most quaint of properties but one I saw the other day when browsing what was for sale in the area https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-p...fd90776947#/media?id=media11&ref=photoCollage

More than likely for A/C

 

[Rroff]

More than likely for A/C

Yeah not sure which are AC and which are heat pumps, but it is kind of meh living in an area like this and increasingly people having big white units bolted on wherever they can.

 

[Coran]

Yeah not sure which are AC and which are heat pumps, but it is kind of meh living in an area like this and increasingly people having big white units bolted on wherever they can.

Most of the current heat pumps are horrendously ugly. Thankfully a few are starting to come that look a bit smarter and have grey options which stand out less than the white box.

 

[PermaChanged]

£4.39 average daily use between the 28th December and 19th January - overnight temperatures in negative numbers with a night time setback temperature of 20c in the majority of the house. Starting to be more and more impressed with our heat pump to be perfectly honest!

Still lacking sufficient loft and external wall insulation, and already keeping toasty warm for comparatively cheap.

 

[Coran]

£4.39 average daily use between the 28th December and 19th January - overnight temperatures in negative numbers with a night time setback temperature of 20c in the majority of the house. Starting to be more and more impressed with our heat pump to be perfectly honest!

Still lacking sufficient loft and external wall insulation, and already keeping toasty warm for comparatively cheap.

Glad to hear it’s going well!

Can you see what the average kWh use was over that period?

Price per unit can be quite variable between different tariffs, whether you have batteries and so on. The agile prices were negative overnight during Christmas/NY, so less representative of what we’ll see in Jan and onwards.

 

[jpaul]

If anybody was curious as to noise, I know it isn't all models but this was supplied and fitted by Octopus

was there any dilemma/discussion on unit distance from house wall / exposure / height, for best efficiency -
naively I'd thought, within constraints of the distance to internal unit that the more isolated from adjacent walls the better air flow.

 

[tonys]

£4.39 average daily use between the 28th December and 19th January - overnight temperatures in negative numbers with a night time setback temperature of 20c in the majority of the house. Starting to be more and more impressed with our heat pump to be perfectly honest!

Still lacking sufficient loft and external wall insulation, and already keeping toasty warm for comparatively cheap.

Is that just for your heat pump?

 

[PermaChanged]

Can you see what the average kWh use was over that period?

I can't currently, but may treat (my very dull self) to one of these - https://shop.electricity.gg/geo-tempo-hub-24475.html

It'll help turn my dumb meter smart so I can more accurately track when I'm using the most units.

We're on a fixed rate tariff for our heatpump of 11.14p (iirc) per unit, so I'm just taking sporadic meter readings to average out the days currently.

 

[PermaChanged]

Is that just for your heat pump?

Yes, it does hot water and the ancillaries powered by it like the circulation pumps. Anything attached to the cylinder basically, except the immersion which is fed by the normal electric board/meter (only used for legionnaires cycles, which I've actually got turned off - reasoning here)

What Temperature Should Hot Water Be? | LEGIONELLA Explained

The last video about Legionella you will ever need. Adam explains the ins and outs of how to set your hot water for your personal circumstances!Join 'Heat Ge...

youtu.be