Heatpumps For Everyone

Heat pumps are a more cost effective means of converting paid-for-energy into heat energy than boilers. (full stop).

That depends entirely on the ratio of electricity to gas prices. If you can get a cheap electricity deal and a good system COP (which means low flow temperatures) you might break even on operating costs.

Heat Geek Mini Store

Is it not just a small thermal store with a DHW coil running through it? Where's the innovation?

It's great if this enables more ASHP installs, but unless I'm missing something it seems like a load of hype over pre-existing tech packaged up nicely tbh...

I'm not convinced correlation implies causation there. There's a pretty good chance that those where there's been an investment in major work to bring them up energy classes are going to be in better condition in general.

The issue I guess is that compared to other major home upgrades it just isn't that visible or beneficial in day to day usage.

In 18 years of heat pump installations I have yet to have a client who did not have reduced OpEx compared to their previous system. That includes lots of retrofits in old leaky buildings using 55degC flow temperatures for radiators.

If you've got a heat pump installation that's only breaking even on OpEx you need to have a word with your installer because they haven't done a very good job.

You don't have to be convinced though. The data is there. I've yet to see one of the naysayers of heat pumps actually show me data where a properly installed system isn't providing savings over a gas or oil boiler.

(That being said I have designed industrial systems whereby there won't be an OpEx saving but in these cases it's because the client has other objectives such as decarbonisation or input energy reduction as a priority).

This is the hurdle people need to get over though. Everyone wants a new kitchen or conservatory but tell me how the ROI is on these projects?

Ireland appears to have more expensive gas and cheaper electricity than the UK. Whether you come out ahead from switching is entirely dependent on the ratio between those two numbers.

Nowadays -20% would be my guess.

Even if you're on a bog standard OFGEM price cap tariff, a modern condensing boiler commonly operates at way above condensing flow temps (~55degC), causing efficiency to plummet to under 80%.

A good ASHP install should give you a SCoP of ~3.5. All other things being equal, you'll see bill parity between condensing gas boiler and ASHP.

If you use a 'smart' leccy tariff like Octopus Tracker or Agile, your ASHP bills will be cut by ~25% with zero effort.

My sister in law's about to get an Octopus ASHP system fitted to replace their fucked ancient combi boiler in an un-renovated Victorian house for £2K all-in (post-grant obvs), with a 'guaranteed' SCoP of 3. This is MUCH cheaper than any of the quotes they had to just replace the combi like for like (£4K was the cheapest, for a shit model of boiler).

They look much nicer, the same can be said for new cars. People although they use there heating all the time its not seen as something that has value for money in it.

Struggling to see how they can do it for that money considering the upgrades that will be required. 2k for a few new system is mental cheap.

It's £9.5K, with a £2K post-grant cost to the consumer.

Octopus, British Gas etc can do it due to economies of scale and huge investment into the supply chain and installation infrastructure.

As a small installer that model you can compete with the big firms doing that.

We got octopus to look at my partner's 1930s terrace, but due to the size of the cylinder and where the boiler is etc. It would mean trashing a nice wooden countertop and a load of tiling work that'll push the cost way higher. The little guy above might be the way to go for things like this if it's all grant applicable and keeps install costs down, even if it's not perfect it could get places off the gas grid for a similar cost.

I'm a long way off doing anything, but is there any chance of innovations that can make use of existing water tanks for new HP installations? Like many people I've got an old disused water tank in the loft that I've considered cutting up and removing over the years but not got around to it. Current system is a combi. I'd love to be able to make use of the old tank somehow, give it a woolly jumper and connect it to a new system ...

Nah Heatpumps all use unvented cylinders, the system is pressurised so the tanks in the loft are redundant.

Even if you could, you wouldn’t want to. Heat pumps work best with ‘special’ cylinders with a high coil surface area that increases efficiency and speeds up recharge times at lower flow temps.

I'm not convinced by how much value they add to a property. The data there seems a bit vague.

Saying that, if I wanted to install a heat pump I'd need to replace every radiator (they're all a bit underspecced) which would then knock on to a fair bit of redecorating (pipes come out of the walls rather than up through the floor) which would kill any potential ROI.

Maybe the energy efficiency cert pushes up the prices, but I think it’s hard to believe either that you’d get at least your money back on what you outlaid

You know more about this than me, but I think it's more like a buffer with an extra long DHW coil running through it. Although I see why they're not calling it that.

It's not that innovative and for me that's what's good about it, it's a simple effective solution to a problem.

When you say pre-existing tech is anyone making anything the same already? They've got Newark lined up to make it and the main attraction for me is it hopefully being available soon (the only place we can really put a cylinder will eat into our downstairs loo with a full sized cylinder) so if you know how to do this now I'd be very interested!

Spent about 14k on internal insulation/secondary glazing / new bigger rads and bigger pipes to future proof for a heat pump install, has not added that to the property value but will certainly make it an easier sell further down the line.
Will take 10 years+ to see it paid in energy savings but it’s worth it for the draft free comfort and being toasty warm without huge bills.

I'm getting my consumer unit upgraded soon as part of wider work. Do I need anything special done to make sure it's ready for a heatpump when I decide to get one in a few years?

Probably need to know the same thing but for an EV charger...

I just had ours done, needed a dedicated 20A supply for the outdoor ASHP unit (armoured cable), a dedicated 16A supply for the immersion element in the unvented cylinder, and a 5A fused spur for the controller.

I ran a draw cable underfloor (bit of spare CAT6A) for the future EV charger, so that when we’re ready to install we can just pull through whichever will be the most suitable cable at that point in time.

Will take 10 years+ to see it paid in energy savings but it’s worth it for the draft free comfort and being toasty warm without huge bills.

This is the right attitude, well done on the upgrades!

It's the right attitude for people who can afford it.

Hopefully things like the Heat Geeks training programme and innovations like that smaller cylinder will make installs more cost efficient and more people can have that attitude.

Lots of people up and down the country would struggle to spend £3-10k on a HP install only for it to take 10 years to pay back.

What's frustrating is that it's taken(ing) so long for it to be mandatory for all new builds to have both exceptional levels of insulation and HPs.

It's exactly the sort of thing that has lower costs when building from scratch but offers great value over the lifetime of the property.

That would be the perfect place to offer heavy grants.

It kills me when I look back to where we where heading in 2010 in terms of state renewable investment, and where we've ended up. So many missed opportunities.