Heat pump woes from a guy who installs them. Probably familiar issues for most of us, but worth repeating as this is another bonkers scheme Boris should ditch without seeking Nut Nut's permission.
Seven or eight years ago the plumbers at the last college where I worked would go on about heat pumps. They said they were rubbish. The ground source ones create an "ice spike" which cools your garden down. It's virtually impossible to get planning permission for them if you live in a listed building. And they provide no more than background heat.
I guess they've come on since then, but how much? A couple near us have moved down from London to refurb a 16th Century building, and are writing a blog about it. http://www.nataliebournedesign.com/blog
I couldn't help noticing that after they had their heat pump installed, they had a massive woodburner delivered. I guess that once you take the chill off with a heat pump, you still like to toast your backside when you come in from the cold.
Wood as a fuel is another favourite of the scientifically inept fashionista. It's only renewable long-term and is a bloody inefficient heat source. Despite this, the spivs in wastemonster are allowing it to be dragged around the planet by diesel power to feed inefficient power stations.
I live in Northern Europe and we don't have gas here, instead everything is heated with electricity. Our winters are cold (occasionally down to -25 celsius, at which point the heat pump becomes ineffective). Even so, my electricity bill has been less than half since 2012, when I installed the heat pump.
Does it keep the house warm? Absolutely, in fact it warms much more evenly throughout the house (six rooms + kitchen, 160 m2). Compared two my two room apartment near London some yeras ago, where on "cold" winter days the boiler was literally boiling and still the room temp didn't rise above 17 degrees. Now, that is cold indoors. At that point I understood why you have something called a tog value.
The heat pump consumes about 3500 kWh per year, most of it during our cold season Nov/Dec - to about end of March. Is not much for heating a big house with three-four months with freezing temps? And during a heat wave in the summer summer it can be used to cool your house. Feels like luxury, but contrary to myths, not expensive. The hottest July so far (27-30 degrees for a full month), with cooling down thehouse to 20 degrees every evening, only used 30 kWh = 4 Eur.
I don't know what you do wrong, if it doens't work for you. Your climate is much milder than ours up here (I've lived near London a couple of years, so I can compare) and should be no problem at all for a heat pump. Of course it will not heat your water, you'd still need your gas for that.
I have a heat pump as the main heater in my house at the bottom end of the South Island in New Zealand.It must have been installed when the house was built in about 1980.It keeps the place comfortably warm even on a frosty night and helps cool it during the very hot weather such as we are experiencing now.As both myself and my wife are old, we need the place to be warm.The big difference I feel is that although it warms the air,there is no radiant heat coming from it and I think this is what makes the difference for those accustomed to fires or radiators. I know I miss the ability to stand in front of a real fire and feel real heat. It is not expensive to run either.
Air source heat pumps aren't really worth it. Now ground source heat pumps are much more expensive to put in, but at least do have a payback date. Even if it is longer than five years.
Please elaborate how air source heat pumps are not worth it.
My air to air heat pump paid itself back in under two years (compared to direct electric heating). The prices have dropped by about 20% since, while electricity has gone up the same = if I installed one now it would pay itself back much faster. It all depends on your situation (your house, size, climate, alternative heating costs, etc), but to generalize is to lie.
My parents installed a ground source heat pump a couple of years ago and it may or may not pay itself back (compared to direct electricity) during their life time. The reason they installed it was because dad is getting too old for the amount of physical work that the wood based central heating system requires. Naturally, any new heating system will never pay itself back compared to free wood from your own forests...
Jannie - I think that one is slowly becoming an embarrassment though.
Sam, Anon 1, Bill, John and Anon 2 - thanks for the input. I quite like the idea of heat pumps, but this chap in the video isn't the only installer who doesn't think much of air-sourced heat pumps. A key point seems to be the suitability of the UK housing stock.
Our only experience of heat pumps was a ground-sourced heat pump in a converted windmill we stayed in for a week in April a few years ago. It kept the place warm enough, but was noisy and had to be on for many hours even in late April. We liked the place but wouldn't go back except possibly in summer.
No matter what the truth of their efficiency is, you can bet that thousands of householders will be ripped off by half-trained spivs fitting 'government approved' heat pumps that end up causing more problems than they're worth.
10 comments:
Nut nut has him by the n....
Seven or eight years ago the plumbers at the last college where I worked would go on about heat pumps. They said they were rubbish. The ground source ones create an "ice spike" which cools your garden down. It's virtually impossible to get planning permission for them if you live in a listed building. And they provide no more than background heat.
I guess they've come on since then, but how much? A couple near us have moved down from London to refurb a 16th Century building, and are writing a blog about it.
http://www.nataliebournedesign.com/blog
I couldn't help noticing that after they had their heat pump installed, they had a massive woodburner delivered. I guess that once you take the chill off with a heat pump, you still like to toast your backside when you come in from the cold.
Wood as a fuel is another favourite of the scientifically inept fashionista. It's only renewable long-term and is a bloody inefficient heat source. Despite this, the spivs in wastemonster are allowing it to be dragged around the planet by diesel power to feed inefficient power stations.
I live in Northern Europe and we don't have gas here, instead everything is heated with electricity. Our winters are cold (occasionally down to -25 celsius, at which point the heat pump becomes ineffective). Even so, my electricity bill has been less than half since 2012, when I installed the heat pump.
Does it keep the house warm? Absolutely, in fact it warms much more evenly throughout the house (six rooms + kitchen, 160 m2). Compared two my two room apartment near London some yeras ago, where on "cold" winter days the boiler was literally boiling and still the room temp didn't rise above 17 degrees. Now, that is cold indoors. At that point I understood why you have something called a tog value.
The heat pump consumes about 3500 kWh per year, most of it during our cold season Nov/Dec - to about end of March. Is not much for heating a big house with three-four months with freezing temps? And during a heat wave in the summer summer it can be used to cool your house. Feels like luxury, but contrary to myths, not expensive. The hottest July so far (27-30 degrees for a full month), with cooling down thehouse to 20 degrees every evening, only used 30 kWh = 4 Eur.
I don't know what you do wrong, if it doens't work for you. Your climate is much milder than ours up here (I've lived near London a couple of years, so I can compare) and should be no problem at all for a heat pump. Of course it will not heat your water, you'd still need your gas for that.
I have a heat pump as the main heater in my house at the bottom end of the South Island in New Zealand.It must have been installed when the house was built in about 1980.It keeps the place comfortably warm even on a frosty night and helps cool it during the very hot weather such as we are experiencing now.As both myself and my wife are old, we need the place to be warm.The big difference I feel is that although it warms the air,there is no radiant heat coming from it and I think this is what makes the difference for those accustomed to fires or radiators. I know I miss the ability to stand in front of a real fire and feel real heat. It is not expensive to run either.
Air source heat pumps aren't really worth it. Now ground source heat pumps are much more expensive to put in, but at least do have a payback date. Even if it is longer than five years.
Please elaborate how air source heat pumps are not worth it.
My air to air heat pump paid itself back in under two years (compared to direct electric heating). The prices have dropped by about 20% since, while electricity has gone up the same = if I installed one now it would pay itself back much faster. It all depends on your situation (your house, size, climate, alternative heating costs, etc), but to generalize is to lie.
My parents installed a ground source heat pump a couple of years ago and it may or may not pay itself back (compared to direct electricity) during their life time. The reason they installed it was because dad is getting too old for the amount of physical work that the wood based central heating system requires. Naturally, any new heating system will never pay itself back compared to free wood from your own forests...
James - trouser plums?
Jannie - I think that one is slowly becoming an embarrassment though.
Sam, Anon 1, Bill, John and Anon 2 - thanks for the input. I quite like the idea of heat pumps, but this chap in the video isn't the only installer who doesn't think much of air-sourced heat pumps. A key point seems to be the suitability of the UK housing stock.
Our only experience of heat pumps was a ground-sourced heat pump in a converted windmill we stayed in for a week in April a few years ago. It kept the place warm enough, but was noisy and had to be on for many hours even in late April. We liked the place but wouldn't go back except possibly in summer.
No matter what the truth of their efficiency is, you can bet that thousands of householders will be ripped off by half-trained spivs fitting 'government approved' heat pumps that end up causing more problems than they're worth.
Vatsmith - yes, bound to happen and nobody will be able to sleep because of the noise they make.
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