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Air source heat pumps

Yeah so it's the result of crappy insulation in UK homes, a dense population so smaller houses/flats with no storage space. And a lack of any government help anyway. So the benefits are marginal.
 
Just had a cold call (like, who does that any more?) about heat pumps. Had to slowly explain to the guy that our gas bill is less than £400 a year and I'd probably be dead by the time the system he was quoting me would pay itself off. Not counting that there's no room for a water tank, so we'd have to keep gas for hot water.

I'm big on the tech of heat pumps, but the way gas and electric costs are it's not practicable to replace a working gas combi boiler with a heat pump. Yet. I'm sure the day will come. Even if the boiler broke down, I'm suspecting that a heat pump still won't be good value against another gas boiler. At least until they get their costs down a bit and stop taking people for a ride. The installation costs I've seen for whole home heat pumps are frankly absurd for the actual work involved.
 
I'm having a survey for a heat pump from Octopus in a couple of weeks. My gas boiler is getting towards end of life so it makes sense to do it now - if you wait till it's actually fucked I think you'd end up from necessity just to swap in another gas boiler quickly. Have been quoted just over 3 grand - obviously might change with survey. That's for heat pump, new tank, all new radiators. Am anticipating running costs will be similar but will likely reduce when I get solar panels next year, and I also anticipate that gas and electric prices will come more into balance over the next decade.
 
I had someone phone me for renewables type grant a couple of months ago and got a bit shirty when I said I wasn't interested. Lot of scam callers about.
 
lazythursday said:
Am anticipating running costs will be similar but will likely reduce when I get solar panels next year, and I also anticipate that gas and electric prices will come more into balance over the next decade.
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Is true although heating is generally needed more in the evening.
 
lazythursday said:
I'm having a survey for a heat pump from Octopus in a couple of weeks. My gas boiler is getting towards end of life so it makes sense to do it now - if you wait till it's actually fucked I think you'd end up from necessity just to swap in another gas boiler quickly. Have been quoted just over 3 grand - obviously might change with survey. That's for heat pump, new tank, all new radiators. Am anticipating running costs will be similar but will likely reduce when I get solar panels next year, and I also anticipate that gas and electric prices will come more into balance over the next decade.
Click to expand...
Hah! The cold caller was quoting £15k (minus £7.5k grant). For us, it would have to get down to £2k after the grant for it to make any sense at all. The place is too well insulated (ironically, given the usual heat pump disinformation) for it to make sense otherwise. I'd be paying it off over far too long otherwise.
 
ah better although I'm not generating enough during the day to cover my consumption so wouldn't work for me - only 2 kW peak. And house is relatively leaky so no use heating it during the day (and the conservatory actually keeps it reasonably warm)
 
WouldBe said:
A couple of kWh a day in winter isn't going to keep your heating going for long. :(
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No but it will contribute, particularly to the hot water potentially.

Anyway I'm not doing this primarily for cost savings. I'm doing it because the current system is towards end of life and buying a new gas boiler right now, unless you really can't afford alternatives, is just the wrong thing to do.
 
lazythursday said:
No but it will contribute, particularly to the hot water potentially.

Anyway I'm not doing this primarily for cost savings. I'm doing it because the current system is towards end of life and buying a new gas boiler right now, unless you really can't afford alternatives, is just the wrong thing to do.
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I'm just about to put a new gas boiler in, not because it's cheaper but because it should be convertible to hydrogen and I'm not sure heat pumps and as good as they are hyped up to be. You need to have a very well insulated house as well for heat pumps to be effective.
 
WouldBe said:
I'm just about to put a new gas boiler in, not because it's cheaper but because it should be convertible to hydrogen and I'm not sure heat pumps and as good as they are hyped up to be. You need to have a very well insulated house as well for heat pumps to be effective.
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Home hydrogen is not happening. It's been announced. The debate has moved on.
 
There is study after study into this, pretty much all of which conclude that hydrogen is unsuitable for home heating (it is very much suitable for other things). It has been a massive lobbying effort by the gas companies that has kept it on the agenda this long. Now the government has finally admitted it was a pipe dream. Heat pumps and heat networks in some urban areas are going to be the main solutions. Unfortunately everyone has now swallowed a raft of myths about heat pumps (also probably encouraged by the gas industry)
 
And in fact, just what shysters the gas industry / equipment manufacturers are - selling boilers for years now with 'hydrogen ready' stamped on them when there has been no concrete plan to roll out home hydrogen, and therefore no actual specification for the equipment that would be needed to connect to such a network. What may still happen is that the existing gas network will get a small amount of hydrogen blended in, which potentially has some small carbon impact - but that's just a small step on the way towards the demise of the gas network. And that will all have a significant cost - decommissioning a whole system - and at some point the reduction in the number of customers will likely force up bills for those remaining. At the moment it feels like that tipping point is decades away, but sometimes technology can shift quickly. The research that is now coming out on the health impacts of methane in the home might spur things on a bit.
 
lazythursday said:
And in fact, just what shysters the gas industry / equipment manufacturers are - selling boilers for years now with 'hydrogen ready' stamped on them when there has been no concrete plan to roll out home hydrogen, and therefore no actual specification for the equipment that would be needed to connect to such a network. What may still happen is that the existing gas network will get a small amount of hydrogen blended in, which potentially has some small carbon impact - but that's just a small step on the way towards the demise of the gas network. And that will all have a significant cost - decommissioning a whole system - and at some point the reduction in the number of customers will likely force up bills for those remaining. At the moment it feels like that tipping point is decades away, but sometimes technology can shift quickly. The research that is now coming out on the health impacts of methane in the home might spur things on a bit.
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It will tip quickly when it comes, but I think it will be entirely based on the cost of heat pump installations. Given the technology, there's utterly no reason why it costs as much as it does to get one installed. The heat pump itself shouldn't cost more than a good gas boiler does. See how heat pump dryers are now getting down to the level that resistive ones were only a few years ago. (there are £300 heat pump dryers now)

The gas network might soldier on for a while though. There are large numbers of properties with no room for a HW tank, so gas might continue in use there for decades.
 
WouldBe said:
I'm just about to put a new gas boiler in, not because it's cheaper but because it should be convertible to hydrogen and I'm not sure heat pumps and as good as they are hyped up to be. You need to have a very well insulated house as well for heat pumps to be effective.
Click to expand...
Most hydrogen is currently made from natural gas, which makes manufacturing it only slightly less unfriendly than coal. Hydrogen produced by electrolysis uses more power than it creates, so the electricity used in its production may as well be piped to homes, instead. Add storage and transportation problems to that, and I have no idea how anybody ever thought it would be a good idea to pipe hydrogen into houses.
I can't see it ever happening.
 
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Just be aware that if you live close ( five miles?) to the sea an air source heat pump will have a much reduced life as the salt in the air will corrode the very small heat exchanger pipes far more quickly than in non literal areas.

Ms 747 and I were very keen to go the heat pump route, but spoke to the main ( probably only) chap at the British Association of heat pump suppliers. He warned us of this. He said that almost all manufacturers will say the salt issue isn’t a problem for their heat pump but they will all be fibbing and the issue won’t manifest till after the warranty🙁. His view is near the coast only ground source are suitable, and given the small size of our garden that would have meant a bore hole for us. 🙁🙁.
 
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