#ClimateDiary We are in intense #Heatpump vs new boiler discussions in our household at the moment, and it is quite something how geopolitics and radiators (and other practicalities like: will the humming be loud?) all swirl through my head at once.
(Our house is old, terraced and high ceilings - it looks like it’s not impossible but challenging. Costs come into it too, of course. Also worried on this front: might geopolitics mean i will not earn any money next few years?)
As I recall, you live in Eastbourne??
If so, then it may be possible to have aquathermic heating, which is a LOT more efficient than air-air heatpumps.
We switched from gas ~5yrs ago and it reduced our KWh consumption to 1/4 of before ... + our old house is now at ~20.5°c for 24hrs a day throughout the winter. No more chilly mornings.
If it's of interest, I'd be v.happy to fill you in on all I know on the subject. 🙂
OK some of the criteria that persuaded us to go this route:
• Aquathermic is the most energy efficient currently available
• We have an old house with wrought iron radiators, which are ideal for 'slow heating'
• We have a large enough garden, to enable an extraction drill hole and a return drill hole, which under French law, must be 10m apart with the return hole 'down hill'. Maybe different under UK law?
• You must have workable access for the drilling machines
• Cost … we were elligible for a subsidy which was great, but I looked at it simply as a financial investment, like shares. I estimated that we would recover our investment over 8 years, but what’s important to take into account here, is that after the 8 years, you continue, every single year, to gain the same return on your investment. Our case was slightly blown apart by Covid, in which energy prices exploded somewhat.
... but our aquathermic, which consumes only electricity, wasn’t so affected. Either way though, our savings relative to our previous gas heating, became pretty huge, so much so, that we’ve pretty much recovered the initial investment, plus of course, with a brain dead psychopath as US president, we’re set to increase our gains. (NB, our gas still worked fine. This was about renewables and climate change).
• We went with a German make of heat-exchanger, Vaillant, which we’re very pleased with. You do need a fair bit of space for it though, which for us was ok, as we have a basement. If geo/aqua thermic are 'no go' for you and you’re still considering air-air, then they may be good for that too, notably they talk of very low-noise levels. I should add that I researched and chose the heat exchanger.. then asked them to recommend a company in my region.
https://www.vaillant.co.uk/product-systems/heat-pumps/flexotherm/
Pauline von Hellermann
Grant