Heat pumps - on bbc now

Anyone watching this? I’m struggling to see why or how heatpumps are a viable alternative or option right now. Couple on there and it’s costing them £18k for their bungalow install. Then you have to have a huge pump in your garden, and it can make up to 60 decibels of noise. And whilst it uses a third of energy, the energy is electric so costs 3 times the amount of gas.

Yet by 2035 we won’t be able to buy a gas boiler in this country

Is this madness?

I’ll watch the rest of the show but really not getting this at all.

Oh and the target is 600k installs per year in the next few years, but there are more people leaving the industry than joining it so there won’t be anyone available to fit them.

And what about the thousands of people who live in flats. They never show one of these huge pumps hanging off a wall 6 floors up!

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Originally Posted by tz-uk73

Is this madness?

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The World's gone mad, so this is the new normal. Like the story about the Council pissing up residents cash on harebrained investments instead of building homes, or supporting schools, or doing things Councils used to do. In the past I'd have thought it was mental, whereas in 2023 it's to be expected.

It'll take 400yrs for every household to have one at the current rate of installs. 😐

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Originally Posted by Rod

It'll take 400yrs for every household to have one at the current rate of installs. 

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Yeah I guess so, 60k this year divided by about 25m homes = 400 years. So what’s the solution, stop us buying gas boilers in the next 11 years!! Who makes this up!

And you need larger bore piping than some houses (like mine have) and bigger radiators.

And only really viable for super insulated houses. So the cost of the pump and fitting of it isn’t the end of it for most houses.

New houses should be built to the highest standards. That would be a start but suspect it’s not happening in all cases.

Early adopters will take all the pain

Another one for the governments "failure cupboard" along with solar panels, wind power and electric vehicle implementation. Jeez !!!

My dad's next door neighbour's external fan is driving my dad insane with the noise that it makes. They've thoughtlessly placed the external fan nearer to my dad's bedroom than their own. If that's the sort of noise that can be expected I won't be getting one any time soon.

One of my brothers does air and ground source heat pump installs, along with ‘traditional’ oil and gas boilers.

He stresses to potential customers that he will only do a heat pump install where the house is very well insulated, fitting one to a poorly insulated house or to mismatched existing radiators will mean luke warm rooms and a heat pump running at full chat, increasing wear and noise.

Very difficult to do an effective retrofit, and expensive to do it properly, yet he’s pretty busy.

As ever, it’s probably best to do the simple stuff first, properly insulating your home whilst keeping whatever heating is already fitted would be a massive step forward on its own in heating efficiency and lowering of emissions.

Article here by a leading manufacturer/supplier saying how they are not suitable for use in parts of Scotland. Must be great to be a Green up here as just confirmed that dozy freeloader Lorna Slater has wasted £86million of taxpayers money on her messed up bottle return scheme.

Heat Pump Article
https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co....m_medium=email

Just remember good people that any government has only a life span of 4-5 years then it's time for another election.
During this time they will say and promise just about anything to stay in office, " we will build more schools, hospitals , care homes ,prisons " etc. Now it's "we will cot emissions and get to net zero" all the while knowing full well that by the given deadlines they will be living off their big fat civil service pensions. Don't take it too seriously ,it's just the usual political two step in action.t

Just remember good people that any government has only a life span of 4-5 years then it's time for another election.
During this time they will say and promise just about anything to stay in office, " we will build more schools, hospitals , care homes ,prisons " etc. Now it's "we will cut emissions and get to net zero" all the while knowing full well that by the given deadlines they will be living off their big fat civil service pensions. Don't take it too seriously ,it's just the usual political two step in action.t

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Originally Posted by tz-uk73

Yeah I guess so, 60k this year divided by about 25m homes = 400 years. So what’s the solution, stop us buying gas boilers in the next 11 years!! Who makes this up!

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You've included millions of flats that won't have to switch and won't ever have a heat pump fitted in that equation.

Just watched it, eye opener into the cost of those things, again just can’t see the uptake as most houses built already would need major work to make them suitable for their property.

We looked at a modern house a month ago which has one fitted, the owner was very vague with questions I asked about it and the system and monthly cost.

I’m not convinced.

What was a surprise was the over run of Hinckley C, projected to come online now in 2026, what is it with this country and its overruns on time and cost on major projects.

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Originally Posted by Jega

Just remember good people that any government has only a life span of 4-5 years then it's time for another election.
During this time they will say and promise just about anything to stay in office, " we will build more schools, hospitals , care homes ,prisons " etc. Now it's "we will cut emissions and get to net zero" all the while knowing full well that by the given deadlines they will be living off their big fat civil service pensions. Don't take it too seriously ,it's just the usual political two step in action.t

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Take it to the BP!

We have a ground source heat pump - was there when we got the house so we did not install it, our village has no gas.

Its ok, our bills are just as high as our friends with traditional boilers, so no real benefit cost wise.

It is a total nightmare when it has issues, recently the pipes got blocked and the system had many error messages, I could not find anyone to come and look at it, every local plumber wasn't interested, local ground source companies not interested as it was a different brand.

Even the UK distributor wasn't that keen on coming to fix it. In the end I just had to take the 3 pipes off myself and managed to clear them all out, which was a lot of guess work as I am not a plumber and have very little DIY skills! But it went back together and the errors have gone.

My neighbours have had similar issues, we are all dreading when they do stop working and the huge cost to replace the heat pump.

I don't think they are the future by any means.

The majority of our house was built in 1840, and as a result insulation is only possible up to a point. A heat pump simply wouldn’t work for us.

If the Government was serious about this it would be requiring all new houses built now to be fitted with them.

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Originally Posted by Tooks

One of my brothers does air and ground source heat pump installs, along with ‘traditional’ oil and gas boilers.

He stresses to potential customers that he will only do a heat pump install where the house is very well insulated, fitting one to a poorly insulated house or to mismatched existing radiators will mean luke warm rooms and a heat pump running at full chat, increasing wear and noise.

Very difficult to do an effective retrofit, and expensive to do it properly, yet he’s pretty busy.

As ever, it’s probably best to do the simple stuff first, properly insulating your home whilst keeping whatever heating is already fitted would be a massive step forward on its own in heating efficiency and lowering of emissions.

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Seems very sound advice.

We use air-air heat pumps here (air-con by any other name) - seems very efficient. Only uses 1-2kw/h to heat a large room - temp controlled. Can also cool using maybe 1/2kw/h - heat pump reversed.

As soon as they said about changing every radiator in the house for larger ones I thought no chance on earth would i willingly do that.

I have an oil boiler and its not moving unless they ban oil.

My inlaws have a bungalow with a flat roof. Tons of solar panels angeled towards the sun and a heat pump. They are very happy with the set-up and it works perfectly. Both are over 85 and the heating is always up. (Old people and having control over their body temp…).

We still have a natural gas boiler for heating and hot water. Since I have enough space for the installation, I’m considering a geothermal heating pump.

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Originally Posted by TheFlyingBanana

The majority of our house was built in 1840, and as a result insulation is only possible up to a point. A heat pump simply wouldn’t work for us.

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Mostly 1870 here with solid walls etc. Recently renovated one side of the house, including heating, and the builder (whom I trust, having done various jobs for us for over a decade) almost laughed when I asked about heat pumps.

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Originally Posted by NikGixer750

We have a ground source heat pump - was there when we got the house so we did not install it, our village has no gas.

Its ok, our bills are just as high as our friends with traditional boilers, so no real benefit cost wise.

It is a total nightmare when it has issues, recently the pipes got blocked and the system had many error messages, I could not find anyone to come and look at it, every local plumber wasn't interested, local ground source companies not interested as it was a different brand.

Even the UK distributor wasn't that keen on coming to fix it. In the end I just had to take the 3 pipes off myself and managed to clear them all out, which was a lot of guess work as I am not a plumber and have very little DIY skills! But it went back together and the errors have gone.

My neighbours have had similar issues, we are all dreading when they do stop working and the huge cost to replace the heat pump.

I don't think they are the future by any means.

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My circumstances are very similar to yours. My ECO house was designed with high insulation etc and a Scandinavian GSHP.
It actually works well but it did take me 3 years to find anyone prepared to service it.

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Originally Posted by TheFlyingBanana

The majority of our house was built in 1840, and as a result insulation is only possible up to a point. A heat pump simply wouldn’t work for us.

If the Government was serious about this it would be requiring all new houses built now to be fitted with them.

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High temperature heat pumps will work with existing radiators and insulation.

https://nef.org.uk/high-temperature-...d-or-bad-idea/

Friends in the village have had one for four years now. Their house is a typical late 1940s three bed semi with all the usual modern insulation installed. GSHP works perfectly for them (including her 96YO mother who is permanently cold due to inactivity), and has saved them money relative to their former GFCH. The unit sits right next to the outdoor table we all sit at during socials and I have never ever heard it make a noise: their dishwasher is louder.

As for servicing and longevity - that's a bridge to be crossed. I'd have though that - just as with GFCH - you should have it serviced annually, or you only have yourself to blame if it fails expensively. Wider adoption should push costs down and increase the pool of people able to service them. We'll see.

Sadly, our house dates from ~1750, so not an icecube-in-Hell's chance of making it work here.

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Originally Posted by Kingstepper

High temperature heat pumps will work with existing radiators and insulation.

https://nef.org.uk/high-temperature-...d-or-bad-idea/

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It's hardly equivocal, the high temp heat pumps cost 25% more to buy and are more expensive to run.

Also, "Another selling point sometimes used is that there is no need to install energy improvement measures before installing a high-temperature air source heat pump. For the reasons stated above, this is not a sustainable approach, although there maybe properties for which good levels of insulation are hard to achieve."

Traditional radiators have a relatively high temperature. You can reduce the size of the radiator required if you increase temperature of the water inside. Conversely, if you decrease the temperature of teh water you need to make the radiator bigger to get the same amount of energy out of the radiator and into the air in the room.


With heat pumps, the greater the temperature difference between cold and hot sides, the less efficient the heat pump will be to operate. So if you want to make water really hot, the heat pump will be running horribly inefficiently. It's not really the design, it's the physics.

Heat pumps are pretty bad at running traditional radiators because radiators are designed to work with a high temperature fluid inside. They're bad in draughty houses (those fitted with mandatory trickle vents?) where the air gets replaced faster than the radiators can heat it.

Heat pumps are great in modern, well sealed houses with underfloor heating. Underfloor heating has a massive surface area, so it only needs a low temperature fluid. It's often buried in screed, so it has a high thermal mass. If you're got all this, installing a heat pump should be a no brainer. Otherwise it's just daft.

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Originally Posted by gunner

It's hardly equivocal, the high temp heat pumps cost 25% more to buy and are more expensive to run.

Also, "Another selling point sometimes used is that there is no need to install energy improvement measures before installing a high-temperature air source heat pump. For the reasons stated above, this is not a sustainable approach, although there maybe properties for which good levels of insulation are hard to achieve."

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Yes, they’re more expensive to buy and run but that’s the downside of living in such a house and as sustainable as burning gas in an uninsulated house.

There are over a million different types of heatpumps installed at homes here in Finland, and we are only 5mil people. The ground source pumps are expensive, but most house builds now and in the last 10-15 years have had those installed when built, used with underflood heating. The pump unit itself is usually installed in a garage or shed, the noise is no issue. Quite many also add an air-to-air heatpumps to their existing system (especially if heated with electricity only), with those you have the outdoor unit and you have to install it with care to make sure it will not resonate. These also works as A/C in summer.

Here all the buildings still standing are well insulated, regardless of the age.

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Originally Posted by MartynJC (UK)

Seems very sound advice.

We use air-air heat pumps here (air-con by any other name) - seems very efficient. Only uses 1-2kw/h to heat a large room - temp controlled. Can also cool using maybe 1/2kw/h - heat pump reversed.

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Just had air to air Toshiba Haori ac/hp fitted in our large sunroom, cools it down quickly & already tried the heating side & this was main reason for purchase.

It’s the same over here, to expensive and only an option in houses, not flats/apartments. They are subsidised by the the government, but just like with electric cars only the well off people who could afford one anyway make use of it. As it stands now we won’t be able to buy a new combi gas boiler after 2025 anymore. But there’s no solution for millions of people like me yet, not isolated well enough apartment blocks of a certain age that is. My boiler is nearly 15, so I’m getting a new one, just to be sure.