Heat Pumps! It's ALL About The Planning! 

The most important thing to consider with home heating is Insulation, using the water leak analogy make the hole smaller. Many years ago, in a brand new house, the first thing I did was sort out the insulation, the walls were insulated with Rockwall, the loft floor with 12 inches of fiberglass , Every window had internal secondary glazing. Even the carpet underlay on the ground floor was 'insulating' . After the first winter I was visited by the Gas company who believed that my meter was faulty as I was using much less gas then the identical house next-door!. When we had my mother-in -laws house insulated , using a Government grant, the gas bill dropped by just over 30%. My current house was built with over the top insulation, from the 20 inch underfloor , through 200mm wall cavity insulation, to the SIPs roof, with of course the highest standard of windows available at the time. Heating is through underfloor piping, via a ASHP which draws under 3 kwh . It is all about planning, but starts with insulation.

Off-peak tariffs might disappear but I'm pretty sure that variable tariffs like Octopus Agile will become a lot more common. As we switch from gas to wind turbines the level of generation will be more variable and we won't be able to switch on gas plants to handle peaks in demand. We will need to use a lot more demand shaping.

Great video as always. Changing a few rads clearly needed, but take a look at which walls, floors, ceilings, need extra insulation too. No matter what fuel or heating system we choose, energy conservation is the cheapest. I’ve been fitting internal wall insulation as I redecorate each room. Only a couple to go. Not convinced as others have said that you will get COP of 4:1. That’s marketing hype, and at. 1am in the winter, that will be much worse. Redirect your surplus solar for the HW aspect, consider a MixErgy tank and think if you really need constant low heat all across the house 24x7. Would super insulation and smart heating controls with solar diverter not be more cost effective? Is your boiler due for replacement or are you prematurely replacing it? Look forward to episode2…. BTW, one installer told me my newly fitted. 15mm plastic pipe needed replaced with copper for ASHP. Really? 100% agree that full heat loss modelling needs done. Don’t take quotes from those who can’t be bothered or stick fingers in the air to estimate heat use and loss. Lastly, think of future needs. Kids moving out to Uni, working from home, etc. lots of different aspects that may change total heat demand.

We too are on a similar journey. Our gas combi has been punished on its last legs for over a year. Really wanted a sunamp and was quoted eye watering 18k for ASHP system including one. Sent me back to think. Made progress at Fully Charged, Emilie @ecobubl explained that a sunamp will only really work at higher temps so explains the high quote, included 8kW Samsung high temp unit, way over-spec for our needs. We’ve already had whole house external insulated so heating has been cut by over 30%. Octopus won’t entertain us as we are north of the border. Now got a date booked to have Scottish Power assessment. Now looking at using a mixergy as our heat store and MAY get an additional Givenergy battery to help cover the higher day usage. Think my sparky will tell me to get lost, not wanting to lift another 90kg into the loft 😅 Missus really liked the IR panels for boosting though.

Perfect timing for me. Combi failing and getting quotes over next two weeks for replacement gas unit and ASHP to compare options. Really interesting and useful video. Thanks!

Always start with an energy audit!

Well, I made a system for the last winter totally by myself. Piping, fancoils, the machine itself, the automation, etc. It cost me about four times less than it would cost me to buy a new unit. I mean, the unit only. So, yes, it works that way if you know what you are doing.

A tip to check if your house is ready to change over is the temp your boiler runs at if its under 55 centigrade then your radiators are fine, the lower the better it will work

My daughter lives in a new build house with a heat pump, it works fantastically well though the house is insulated beyond belief. I reckon a 100w incandescent bulb in the hallway would heat the entire house. She lives in Hampshire at 70ft above sea level while I live in the Staffordshire moorlands at 1000ft altitude in a house built circa 1850. Totally different ballgame, there’s no sewer never mind gas however in a modern house it does work well. Good vid.

Excellent analysis on your housing energy needs. You should do the same for others and sub-contract your data entry and 3D mapping to your daughter (paying appropriate taxes, of course!). Or pay the daughter in popsicles. I'm sure you've done a better job than most commercial businesses do.

Re the quotes, I'd recommend (to the point of threatening metaphorical violence) using the Energy Saving Trust to find approved firms. I've seen what happens when well meaning heating firms that haven't the experience try to estimate the required equipment and costs. Although it was more expensive to fit, I've had a ground source heat pump put into my own house, and an air source heat pump put into a smaller house nearby. Given the space I'd go for ground source but with the right equipment an air source is a good second. Incidentally if you have 'off peak' then an oversized storage tank is worth while.

Great video and has a lot of information I discovered before getting my ASHP fitted. My 1970's house has had most (13) radiators replaced, as single and without the extra fins, decided to replace as old and probably clogged up. Strangely several radiators were smaller than what had been in place before! We have the larger bore pipework so all was great. Now the ASHP, uses a presurised hot water cylinder with a much larger heating coil to heat the hot water. This means great showers and no need for pumps! However the ASHP prioritises hot water before heating, so if it needs to heat the water it does it, whatever the time of day. So cannot limit it to heat only at night. However the extra weekly heat cycle to 70C to get rid of any bacteria can be run at cheap night time. From my experience I have used 1 or 2 kWh for hot water heating (max was 4kWh for one or two days in March). Having solar, this can be the power for heating the hot water! BTW we are a family of 3 adults! I had to increase my loft insulation, so now at 270mm but my wall insulation has broken down and needs removing and replacing. This is in progress. For me I swapped from LPG, which had been costing 44p per litre but now over 70p! It is great having no gas to burn any more, less risk of an explosion, Carbon Monoxide risk now gone.

Very informative, I will certainly do a heat survey with heat geeks , then take your advice and get proper quotes . Thanks

The locus of the coefficient of effiiency moves considerably with temperature target ( I believe). minus 4C is pretty extreme low day for a winter in UK (in most parts probbaly in Yorksire) . Untypical. In lIverpool the average daily mean at coldest point in January is approx +6C . Perosnally would rather size for this average target temperature and live with slightly increase bills and weraing thicker layers for few weeks were it happended to be less than this. Last time it was -4C in LIverpool I can't even remember - certainly seems to be years ago now. Any useful info again on your approach to 'phase 2' thanks . You seem to have planned all your switch over to solar/ battery at the right time (before big surge & demand). So thats phase 1 done. I'm struggling to get installers to even answer the phone.

The fish tank is to small for that turtle 🤣🤣

Why heat water to pump around radiators which heat the air? I have an air/air heat pump system which heats the air directly and blows it around the room. If you do it yourself it will cost about 1500 euros *buying the kit from bricodepot to 5000€ if you get a professional to do it. Just need to run some pipes from the external unit. That is the way we do it on the continent. And you can get rid of radiators, pumps etc... I use solar thermal to heat the hot water, topped up with the immersion if needed. Oh and I get aircon thrown in as well.

How does a heat pump play with house batteries - it’s likely to drain them quickly is it not?

Why waste your time with heat pumps when you can use IR panels, it's less hassle and cheaper.

Allen Hart has just done a video on his heat pump installation. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-pHJJIkNeRZo.html Some quite interesting points like trying running his gas boiler at 35°c to simulate having a heat pump to see if his rooms were cold or not. Pretty obvious really.

Been an AC engineer for years. Best thing to do is keep your existing combi boiler with a cheaper air to air heat pump...

If you need to go wider with a radiator, you don’t need to rip the floors up. A couple of elbows can increase the width of your valve spacing and job done. If you redecorate and redo the floor at any point in the future, the pipework can be simplified/neatened then.

As an architect I was learning that we need to be designing more efficient buildings 40 years ago. Yet in my professional career no client has been fully engaged with that need and until recently the phrase ‘only as far as building regs require’ was in common use by clients. With my phone (with LiDAR) and the software I use we can survey any building and model it in 3D and carry out that modelling thermally as well to assist us in determining where the most cost effective changes need to be made to the fabric to meet Building Regulations, BREEAM or PassivHaus standards. It even works with listed buildings and new ones too. The M&E engineers then have the information they need to design the most cost effective equipment to meet those needs. Yes it can be a DIY job but will probably not be the best solution for your needs, the chartered professionals are, obviously, better at that than the amateurs.

I also have a 1930 house. They were *designed* to leak air into the rooms to feed the coal fires. The cost of the insulation work required negates any sort of heat pump on the market right now (I only gave it a cursory look a year ago). And the Scandinavian standard for building houses in 1930 was a lot more stringent for insulation than the UK was (probably was better then than we specify now!) so it's not comparing like for like, however good heat pumps are. Everybody (heat pumps, Infra red, gas, wood burner) says theirs is the best. They are all selling. What we need is more of these videos that give us facts. TLDR: Good video, good information, well done.

Good video and timely as I am considering a heat pump to replace my 12 year old gas boiler. The property was built in the early 1950's, but it has been brought to a good standard of insulation. Last winter I decided to run my gas boiler at 44 degrees instead of the recommended 70 degrees with a view that we might be getting a heat pump that ran at that temperature. My home was still heated sufficiently in fact it was better because the heat was more even and not clicking on and off. This makes me fairly confident that a heat pump would slot in fairly easily with no major additional expense. That said I am getting a survey done as suggested. I think I am fortunate that the original heating system was over-specified for the level of insulation the property has.

Excellent analogy of the water flowing out of a hole in a takeaway container. A few things to consider, could one or some of the larger but too small radiators fit the heat requirement of another room & be re-purposed? You lose heat via droughts (air changes) & through heat loss through the fabric of the building. Tackling both of these, not just insulation would make sense, heat pump or not. The low hanging fruit on both topics could be easy, increasing in difficulty the deeper you go. I think we have been aware but complacent on energy efficiency, time to step up & get stuck in this summer.

We live in Kent England and heat/cool our 3bedroom semi using Air to Air that has worked well for us now for two years. Still kept the gas boiler and all the radiator’s just as backup if it didn’t work out. We have two units that look just like air conditioning unit to you and I, cost us under £2,500 and installed in one day by two people. Able to heat the house in the winter and keep it cool in the summer. Cheap to run and in fact we run them off our 12 solar panels or off our Solax battery in the evening. We also have two electric cars that we charge from our solar system at zero cost. In fact when we installed them we paid £10,000 to have then fitted and took up the Fits government scheme which paid us to export any surplus at 28 pence a unit and it’s now paying us 58 pence and is indexed linked. What we generate has always covered our electric and gas bills, plus given an extra £1,000 a year in the bank. Bob Blood

I found this really helpful and learned a lot. I thought there were special radiators for heat pumps, but it's just output. You made it all so simple. Thanks.

I built a "green" house seven years ago. I told the "designer" I wanted a one ton forced air heat pump, so it would keep the humidity level low by running constantly. He told me that his "calculations" indicated a 2 1/2 ton unit was necessary. Now my heat pump runs about 5 minutes. Then shuts off 10 minutes. Then cycles over and over. Pushing my electric bill up each cycle. And I have to run a dehumidifier all summer, adding even more to my electric bill. Your advice is good. Hire an expert that knows how to calculate heat loss correctly. Or pay the price for years after.

We only had to upgrade 3 out of 16 radiators, this is partly due to going for a high temperature heat pump and flow temperature of 50 degrees C, however we could reduce this temperature and prolong the heating period. We also changed our hot water tank and we heat it during the night on Octopus Go. At the moment we only heat enough water at night for the morning and then fully heat in the afternoon with solar/battery power, in the winter I’ll go for 100% heating hot water at night.

I’m hoping all my radiators are ample enough for a heat pump. We have 15mm piping on all floors of our 3 story 4 bed house. We can’t wait to get rid of our combi gas boiler. It takes too long to heat the water on the top floor as the boiler is under the stairs in the hallway. All our radiators are double convectors and 1200 x 600 in size. Most rooms are around 12 x 11 feet. You have opened my mind to having underfloor heating in the new kitchen extension we are having built. It’s bloody large at 4m wide x 7m long. More if a open kitchen, dinning, lounge space.

We put in a ground source heat pump in 2017 to replace our working oil boiler based system. We live in a 23 room 1800s stone farmhouse on the West coast of Scotland, drive two EVs about 25k miles a year, cook with electricity but have two 15kw wind turbines. Our previous oil boiler was used just like your gas boiler, it came on with a timer and attempted to achieve and maintain a radiator temperature of 60ºC and then switched off. Our GSHP is on all the time, all year. It has an external temperature sensor and also an internal sensor, we had to upgrade many of our radiators to double radiators as you are contemplating. The GSHP sets the radiator temperature based on setpoints for external temperatures of -1ºC and +20ºC. For example, right now it's 18.3ºC outside and the target temperature for our radiators is 20.4ºC for a target room temperature of 19.5ºC. So the system runs all the time, sampling the radiator temperature from time to time and then running if needed, and the house temperature is pretty much constant with the GSHP barely running in high Summer except to heat our hot water (I'm also considering a Myenergy Eddi to dump surplus power into the hot water tank). Comparing our old boiler with a smart heat pump system like we have now is like comparing a hammer and a nail gun. The new system is able to be remotely controlled and changed, it keeps the house at a stable temperature all year round, no cold mornings and no "too hot to sleep" evenings. The old system was either running at maximum power or switched off and our oil bill in 2011, when an elderly relative lived with us and we had to keep the house warm throughout the day, was £200 less than our entire electricity bill will be for the year 2022/23 even at the new price cap. In fact our heat pump has already paid for itself, has increased the value of our home and has made it a far nicer place to be all round. Just my 2p worth...

Great video, I absolutely agree you need to do the prep work before installing a heat pump, that’s a proper heat loss survey and where necessary upgrading the insulation. We live in a village that has no mains gas so when the oil tank sprung a leak last year my first inclination was to replace the tank (as the boiler was only 8 years old). However new regulations for siting of oil tanks away from buildings, sheds, boundaries, etc meant I couldn’t put the tank in the same place and I took the plunge to invest for the future in an Air Source Heat Pump. Due to the size of our house/system we needed an 18kW ASHP, which is not yet MCG certified, so we ended up with 2x 9kW ASHP’s running in tandem. The system was sized based on a 55 degrees flow temperature and about half the radiators needed replacing - if you can keep existing rads with a 40 degrees flow temperature then that’s brilliant; you must have a better insulated house than us ! The system automatically fires up if the hot water temp drops below I think 50 degrees so unfortunately can’t run hot water on cheap rate elec as you suggest - be interested to hear if others have successfully done this with an ASHP. As others have said, if you need a new wider radiator then a few elbow joints are all that is needed to extend the pipe work to the wider radiator, we had this done on some of ours and the elbows and pipework is all under the rad so don’t really see it - certainly no floor ripping up (we are all in 15mm so none of the core pipework needed replacing unlike your system). Generally I’d say I am happy with the system, it keeps the house warm. The exception is the lounge where we didn’t want the radiator size they spec’d and it just never quite gets warm enough - moral of the story, do what the heat loss survey says, replace rads with the size they advise ! Finally, running costs. Our company recommended keeping the system on all the time as the heat pump is more efficient that way. We tried it but found that (a) it was too hot at night and (b) with the continual heat loss (your hole in the bucket analogy) the system does need to keep coming on and thus uses more electricity. Keeping it on all the time it was using about 80kW a day (£30). We quickly changed to putting it on a timer, and running it 6pm-11pm it uses about 27kW a day (£6.75) which I feel is acceptable. We have solar panels but no battery storage so that is next on my list, to capture the solar electricity (and charge overnight) so can run the heat pump in the evenings for a much reduced cost

Vattenhall heat exchanger, for release this year. Temperature range of a boiler. Dutch company I think. Goal to be used as a direct replacement for a boiler.

We have a 1950's cavity wall semi detached house with loft converstion and rear extension, with insulation blown in, on a previous government scheme. Then 6 years ago we had a Daikin Heat Pump fitted by a local company, replacing our previous Gas boiler that was 30 years old (We had a quote of £2500 for a replacement new Combi). It was suggested we replace 3 radiators out of 13, but those 3 were ugly old, tatty single panel rads anyway. The new radiators were less than £100 each fitted and look loads better than the manky old ones. No pipework needed to be replaced as we are 15mm throughout and 22mm under the floor. We got ours on the old Feed In Tariff Goverment scheme, which meant we paid full price (£6700) but got money back quaterly for 7 years. We have broken even recently after 6 years and continue to benefit for another year. The running costs are lower maybe £300 per year, and we don't even have solar yet. Hot water is only ever at 5.5p per Kwh over night and over 50% of heating is also done during this period, bringing the house slowly upto temp in time for 6:30am. I have had no regrets and am very suprised more people are not opting for heat pumps selfishly from a money point of view. Personally I wanted to get rid of Gas completely from my house as all our cooking was already electric. We have been gas free for 6 years only paying the 1 standing charge for electricity, which also saves a little. If I moved house, this would definately be one of the first things I would do. My electricity bill, which is our only energy bill is now just over £1800 per year but that includes 15000 miles per year of charging our Tesla Model S. Over 55% of our energy is off peak/greener. For us it works on a Moral and Financial level, win for us and for the grid.

How can it be 400% efficient, didn't understand that.

Hi! Very well made video and very wise to do the calculations before hand. I know my comment is late, but well, anyway. I live in Finland and my main source of heat for my 130m2 house + 50m2 garage is air to air heat pumps. I have electrically heated floors but usually don't need to use those, except in shower/toilets. It can get to -25 in the winter, and when its that cold, I need to use fireplace to assist with the heat pump. The thing to keep in mind with heat pumps is that the advertised COP or efficiency fluctuates depending on the temperature outside (with air to air and air to water heat pumps, not talking about geothermal here). I think the advertised COP is calculated usually at like 5 or 10 degrees. When it gets -10 or -25, the efficiency drops. Depending on the heat pump, it might only do COP 1 or like 1.2 when the temperature outside is -25 degrees. Thats why heat pumps are usually oversized to what you really need, so that it is sufficient enough during the cold periods to heat up the entire house. Water tanks are used as a buffer, so that the pump doesn't star/stop cycle too much when its not so cold. But I don't think you need to worry about extreme colds in UK. But heat pumps really do work, tons of houses heated with heat pumps and more coming every day. I'm also just a consumer, not a heating engineer, but these are my findings on the topic.

I am so pleased you're investigating the heat pump idea. I have retired to a new house in Nofolk having operated as a Consultant designer for many years and had an air-source heat pump when working before. What you haven't found out is in this country an air-source goes into defrost mode when ice builds up on the external coil. Under this condition heat is drawn from the house to melt the ice. Ice built up quickly on the coil meaning that it often goes into defost mode. It was a good job we had pv solar panels with the rhi payments which paid for the extra electrical cost. We now have pv solar panels and a solar iboost unit on the immersion heater giving us free hot water for 6 month's of the year. We also are on a seg tariff so get paid 7.5p/kw.hr for what we export. However I am most interested in how to avoid the standing costs of gas bearing in mind we don't use any gas in summer. I look forward to the next video. Bill English

A duck farting in the middle of the night would wake me up... so even if I could not hear the sound of the ASHP fan directly (windows open in summer don't forget), I'm reasonably sure the vibration would transmit through the fabric of our house (1970's dormer bungalow) and drive me nuts. We spend many hours in the garden too, hence would not welcome the noise/visual intrusion there either. A GSHP would probably be better for us, but there is no space available for a plant room. Maybe it would be nice if they could install a test ASHP unit with a few years on it... grubby fan blades, and dodge bearings, so you could get an idea of what you are signing up for, for the next 15+ years. Not being negative, just expressing my personal fears from past experience of mechanical units... 'properly serviced', or otherwise. Sorry, silent fans are like honest politicians... they don't exist.

My calculation is I need 20 kWh of electricity per day in January to heat my house with a heat pump. This means my battery needs to be at least 20kWh just for the January heating. Otherwise the heat pump will be using peak expensive electric, coating 3.5x the cost of gas... Which is a typical efficiency in winter. 20kWh is a big battery to store the electricity required for the Heat Pump. If I did this the ROI is 8% and a break even after 13 years on a £9k install. This is assuming I've got the battery already.

As others have mentioned Andy, please have a look at infra red heating. You will also be interested in the Mixergy tank, if you haven't looked already. Keep up the good work, son. (I'm very old so I can say that 👴)

Excellent video EVM. I've had a heat pump for a couple of years. My gas boiler was dying and my radiators were 35+ years old. I decided to change all the radiators as they were starting to rust. One further thing, houses feel much better with low flow temperature heating systems, either gas or electric, it's more consistent. Finally, beware the SCOP when thinking about water heating, to get your hot water to 55C, the heat pump ramps to 60C, so your SCOP drops to about 2.5 or 250%.

Just a note on Scandi heat pumps. Air source isn’t common where it’s properly cold, but deep bore geothermal heat pumps are common. Because of how life works, the heating system only fails when it’s the coldest out, so where winter days commonly hit -30C, people tend to have some backup systems in place

I'm planning not to have one. All the manufacturing, delivery to warehouse, delivery to retailer, delivery to installer and plant/ equipment required for installation make this a total carbon footprint joke. By the time it starts to make a difference it will need replacing. As an afterthought what about the recycling of all the old stuff you want to rip out. It doesn't dissolve in water so even more carbon will be used to transport and destroy it. Think on people.

One other thing to think about I’d say is that your time of day tariff might not make sense anymore. Obviously depends on your specifics but I noted you said you are paying 30+p/kWh through the day to get the 5p/kWh over night for 4 hours. Your experiment shows that to get best efficiency you need to have the heat pump on all the time. It can be more efficient to leave it on even when the house is empty as raising the temp is less efficient than maintaining it. That means your daytime electricity use could increase to the extent that it outweighs the benefit of your 4 cheap hours with a more expensive daytime rate compared to the cheapest all day rate. It’s not going to be the case for everyone but is for me (even after I factor in the battery I’m getting installed) so worth doing the sums to check. I think others have said as well, you are unlikely to get a SCOP of 4 on hot water due to the higher temp needed. Most heat pumps will quote different SCOPs for heating and hot water

Great video and very objective. We had a ground source heat pump fitted last year to replace our 17yr old gas boiler. I did the same, got all the measurements and house plans together, the installer's came in and spent over an hour checking them and working out how to install it + further system design work back in the office. Of the 17 radiators in the house, only 5 needed to be replaced and even then 1 of those I suspect would have been fine. None required replumbing - if theres significant redecorating required to replumb a wider radiator, then there's always the option to try installing the largest radiator that will fit the existing pipe centres - worst case the radiator can be changed at a later date if it doesnt work albeit that will cost a bit more. We had a larger 300 lit water tank fitted and run that on the Eco setting at 48degC, and that works fine unless everyone in the house has a bath/shower at around the same time, in which case one of the higher modes (up to 60degC) is required. The system was sized assuming 45 degC heating circuit temperature, we find 42 degC works fine. In my view its only worth doing with a heat pump grant, so the install cost vs a gas boiler is the same after 7 years. I'm expecting the energy costs to be the same as the old gas boiler as I'm on the electric price cap, so should improve if I can get onto an Octopus Go type tariff. Remember SCOP figures decrease the harder the unit has to work, so the figures are greater in spring/autumn, or lower on a cold winters day or you run hot water at 60degC. Our decision was finally driven by the fact we wanted to find a way to reduce the CO2 footprint and use much less energy.

We are about to install an ASHP to replace our oil fired Rayburn. It’s a no-brainer for us, given the price of kerosene. Our estimated SCOP is 3.8, implying our annual energy consumption on heating will fall to around 2500 kWh. Our existing solar PV and battery won’t have the capacity to supply this additional consumption, and our DNO is stubbornly refusing our application for additional solar. Consequentially, we’re looking at investing in a wind turbine via Ripple energy.

nice aquarium, nice and clean-maybe you could do a vid on how you do it! lol Thanks for the walk-thru on your heat pump instillation project, something I wish I had thought of before we upgraded our furnace just last year.

back in the 80s I worked with a company in London that used to fit hot water systems for butchers and fish mongers using the freezer motors from their cool rooms. these worked incredibly well because the freezer runs the most at a shop . bonus being free hot water. . keep smiling everyone

Not sure if you can get a heat pump for 8000,- I've got a quote for an 8.5kwh mitsubishi ecodan and 210lirer hot water cylinder: £12.000. so minus the grant there is 7000,- to pay. I am doing a total renovation and got underfloor heating upstairs and downstairs. Installation is in 2weeks! Really curious how efficient it is in North Yorkshire.

You can install the heat pump first and see if the radiators really need changing. I went from a system with a wood burning boiler that heated the radiators = high temp to a heat pump i didnt change a single radiator. I adjusted some of the thermostats on the radiators and thats all. Very happy with the heat pump. Heat pumps are very common here in Sweden.

Well done!! Lots of things to think about. You are very diligent and precise with your research. Making a decision is all about having the details, for sure!! Cheers!!

Our landlord is installing an air source heat pump system into our house which he says is costing him around 12 grand. Can't wait, our heating currently comes from either a back boiler behind our coal fire or convector heaters. With the rise in costs now and coming it is needed and going to be very much appreciated

Great information, great video. The only thing I'd point out is with the water heater/immersion heater idea you have. I have an EV so I have the same cheap (Octopus) 4 hours at night to charge my car. For the last cheap hour the water heater turns on and heats the water up to it's highest temperature. The problem is, even though the tank is well insulated, during the day as you use the hot water the tank is topped up each time with cold water and cools the tank water down. So in my house by about 6 PM the water is only lukewarm and needs to be heated again at the higher electricity rate.

Like you say research is key, I'd be tempted to get an actual measured heat loss assessment during the middle of a proper cold snap, to see if your home's calculations match reality, you could have something that is leaching heat like poorly fitted cavity insulation for example, if you look at passive standards they have to be measured not just calculated, you also may wish to look at heat exchanger ventilation for your home as well?

There are many issues with this video and although heat pumps work in Scandinavia, In the UK they have a habit of icing up in winter rain. Fabric of the building and construction methods play a massive part in change over costs. It's not unheard of for a 1990s 3 bed to end up around £20-25k for a system due to micro bore, chip board floors and having to locate the cylinder. Majority of engineers are happy to swap over to heat pumps, but it no longer becomes just a heating or gas engineers domain as an electrician has to be consulted to confirm if a premises electrical supply is adequate in the first place. As a 20 Amp minimum and often 32-50 Amp supply for larger properties heat pumps is required that in many cases is half of the total supply of the home. Baring in mind to avoid compressor issues and inefficiencies it's better for a heat pump to run for longer periods that can often be the choice between a heat pump or EV etc. So from an installers pov, good video but far too narrow as the whole installation, pipes, heat emitters, tank location (if possible), flooring, incoming electrical supply, current electrical load, potential sited position for ashp, all have to be taken into account. One of the drawbacks many of our customers have found in the local area when hoping to go full electric is just the lack of available power to the property as most homes are on 80 Amp supply (18.4kW) or less.

In Norway, Sweden etc. the insulation of properties hence heat loss are far superior to what the pre 2000 properties are in the U.K. Therefore, SCOP over there is viable.

Another great presentation Andy. Really given me food for thought. You are looking at this whole issue as an every day man with a good knowledge and research and that certainly helps people like me. The advertised high cost of a heat pump has probably put so many people off but as you say escalating energy costs leave us either just paying ( if we can) the increases, or look at the alternatives. Like EV grants the heat pump grant will reduce and disappear but if you have done every5hing else, best insulation levels, Led lighting and efficient appliances really there is only the various heating options left. Your video has inspired me to look at this topic in depth. Keep up the great content.👍🏻

You probably won't get 400% efficiency when heating hot water. Probably 250-300% We've tied ours into the PV with MyEnergi Eddi+relay board to trigger hot water production when there's spare solar.

Great video, very informative. Have you looked into Infrared Heating Panels for heating? Herschel or Jigsaw panels? Maybe a Sunamp Heat battery for your hot water? All easy installs that can be powered of solar/battery with minimum maintenance. I'd be very interested in a comparison video.

Great Video, very informative. No use for where I live, rented flat dates from 11th Century, Listed building. But interesting nevertheless.

How did you get this calculation EVM just emailing the heat geek team, also if you wouln't mind how much did it cost?

What is your EPC rated at and what is your floor plan 180M squared surely that should tell you what size Heat Pump mine is a 17kW floor space 125m EPC is E, honest the worst move I have ever made worse than some of the cars I have had looks good on paper.I think your videos are spot on can’t fault it.If I was moving the pipe work I would feed from the top of the radiator better return.

I had vent for heat pump to save on electricity considering my house have 10 Electric panel heaters, by installing heat pump I hope COP 3.0 least what mean my electricity cost should be 3x less

I tackled the easy plumbing and radiator changes myself; we're awaiting a fuse upgrade and then getting a HP install. The BUS grant makes it almost a no-brainer. Older houses on smaller fuses (we're 60A) need upgrading and this takes the DNO some time it seems. Loved the water analogy for home heating!

you could also look at something like an immersion using off peak + solar trickle top up during the day, or something like a sunamp for instantaneous hot water - again ‘charged’ off peak and with trickle solar.

You are wrong about Vehicle charging, the grid need everyone to charge at night (most of the time), and it is also fair that the cheaper rates are available at night. It may well change the off-peak schedule requiring a more dynamic tarif that responds to supply and demand. Also its only 30% of car owners that need a public overnight charging option, we need a right to charge legislation, charging during the day for these people is not an option for a 100% EV situation.

i raised a 30 sq mtr single single skin brick garage, no cieling no insulstion within 30 mins from 2 celcius to 22 celcius, how, an air conditioner wall split, heatpumps cannot do this because they will not work efficentley at ambient temp of 7 celcius and lower, they also use 3 to 6kw of grid power to operate, ergo defacto they are f in usless, and yes i have tested them.aircon splits 1 heatpumps 0, check it out, yuo also get cooling in summer or august here in yorkshire

thanks! now i'm gonna download Sims 4 and get my floor plan sorted!

what are you thinking about the gas supply. would you get rid of it (if that's possible) or go on zero standing charge tarrif. i guess your hob might be gas at least.

Surprised you didn't mention your existing battery. You can and probably already do charge that battery at night during the cheap period. With a higher capacity battery you could easily "offset" at least half of your winter on-peak consumption requirements and further reduce your bill. For comparison our house (ASHP and UFH) uses an average 27kWh per day during the coldest parts of winter (about 17kWh during peak).

Be careful in thinking you will automatically get BUS grant of £5,000, there are only so many being released per year and nothing stopping an installer increasing their price for the job as they get the money at the end from government. So you could think the true cost of install is say £12,000 less £5,000 so you are going to pay £7,000, but the installer could be concerned about waiting for the payment (will it happen) and charge you £10,000. Installers under previous schemes have gone broke waiting for government money, so finding someone willing to do the work under BUS could also not be that easy. I have been watching all the Heat Geek videos with interest.

I would be more prone to adopting a heat pump as soon as possible but if that makes sense financially who knows. As I understand it the heat pump itself is a quite a simple piece of equipment. It’s just a air conditioner in reverse and there are millions of those made each year. So the the price of the actual heat pump is not going to change much. They already mass-produce them so the price won’t go down very much and any price drop would be cancelled out by inflation anyway.

One thing you missed , is that you can get a get a gadget like a MyEnergi Eddi or Marlec Solar iBoost which will heat your water using any excess Solar you generate rather than feed it into the Grid. I'm looking at a Heat pmp to replace my Gas Boiler , but in a couple of years time

Found it! They call it a 5kw heat pump but actually it’s a 7kw. Well done to Vailiant for giving a true output. Lot of other manufactures don’t do this so true output is less at lowest outside design temp 🙌

I’ve got a ground source heat pump, not sure I agree that you should be paying for any quotes. I started the quote process during lockdown so they couldn’t come to the house at that time. I got 3 budgetary quotes based on me suppling the plans to the house along with some photos. The price range was large but just chatting on the phone and seeing what they did for that quote gave me a feel for how comprehensive their knowledge and design would be. None of them charged me but it gave me the info to be confident in my selection of installer. When I picked someone they came round but it was really to confirm things. The price didn’t change. We needed 3 out of 15 rads changed and it works brilliantly. Loss of the RHI scheme is really bad though as the grant is much less generous. I’d have done air source rather than ground source if we weren’t getting the RHI. Incentives going backwards when we’re trying to get to net zero is terrible.

Maybe use a Sunamp for your hot water rather than a big tank?

Replaced our gas system with a daikin ashp last May. We've seen a saving over the winter period of around 20%. We were offered the option to either replace most of the radiators or fit a slightly more powerful heat pump. We combined it with a home battery system so we use octopus go faster tariff and solar pv. We're very happy with the change.

My understanding is that the hot water tank has a 100% efficient immersion heater to raise the hot water temperature above let's say 40⁰C.

Not that long ago, you mentioned that heat pumps weren't for you. Interesting to see after more research that you had a change of mind.

Might as well upgrade radiators before heat pump, boiler will run more efficiently, house will heat up quicker and you’ll be more comfortable.

If you get the rads changed now and lower flow temps from your existing boiler you would start saving now and when gas prices go up you wont feel it as much. After watching the heat geeks i turned down the flow temps and adjusted the timer

Thanks Andy, Great episode.. You've confirmed a few things that I have thought about my house. All radiators are fed by 10mm plastic for example. This was a new build, so all the pipes are neatly out of sight. New 15mm copper isn't going to be and also will cause a lot of disruption to install.. So, I've been looking at Infrared heat panel systems. I know absolutely nothing!! So if you could do an episode... Seriously, great information. Great point to start my own investigations.. Cheers..

Hi Andy Another excellent video. Thanks for the explanation. I have recently fitted a solar diverter to my hot water tank so should not need to use the gas boiler as much in future. Heat pump or radiant heating is the next step so I echo the comments for a video regarding the latter.

Anyone else thinking of upgrading to a heat pump and wanting a second opinion on the size they need, I found this video helpful: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-hCeghKa3liM.html

I see this and start to consider a heat pump, but then I see stories in the press that people switched to them and can’t afford the huge bills they’re getting. So not inclined to risk it.

5:18 With the heating off the inside temp does not drop down to the outside temperature. Houses trap the sun's heat in the day and retain some of the heat overnight. Typically it's +5C warmer indoors in Winter than outdoors.

Brilliant and very informative....thank you!

I Had 3 quotes for an ASHP. One recommended a 13kw based on a visit from a salesman and one an 11kw pymp based on an email. Octopus Energy did a 3 hour survey with two heating engineers and recommneded a 9kw heat pump and identified the radiators that needed replacing. They came in at more than half the price of the other quotes. It is difficult for a lay person to really understand what is reasonable.

Hi EVHM (Electric Vehicle and Home Man). We’ve just ordered solar panels and a GivEnergy battery system. I’m now thinking what we can do in the future about heating. Your video will help me in my deliberations. Have you considered / looked into the hybrid boilers that combine a normal gas boiler with a heat pump (or at least that’s my understanding)? Have you worked out how much your solar panels will offset the cost of the electric if you get a heat pump? (As I haven’t got the solar panels yet I’m not sure how much you can generate in winter and how that compares to what the heat pump would need)

I have a question. My Gas boiler is serviced every year and I have a BG homecare plan In case it breaks down .Does a heat pump require the same yearly Service ???

Heat pumps are terrible idea..they are very very expensive to install, use huge amount of energy, the system explained here uses nearly 2000kwh per year and only does 2 x shower and 1 x bath per day....they are only to be considered with free energy(if you have your own wind turbine or hydro scheme)

Very informative, my gas boiler is about 8-10 years old, so it works fine, gas prices aren’t too bad, if the grant is in for about 5 years then in about 4-5 years I would probably look at one. But it is talking the wife into it, she doesn’t see the environment and cost benefits of off peak electric or an electric car, so this would defiantly not run with her at moment, waiting for couple of years 👍👍

This practice of using Air Source Heat Pumps with radiators in a hydronic systems seems to be all but nonexistent in the USA. Every single contractor here in Massachusetts is all about Mini-Splits ,central AC, propane, oil or gas. Why are the two markets so completely different. I gave an oil boiler with hydronic heat from 1982. I have zero ducting.

What software did you use to draw your floor plans?

Luckily I already have a hot water tank! My house is only 6 years old so not sure why! I have my immersion heater set to heat it during the octopus Go period

The big issue with heat pumps over here in scandinavia now is their being used on all new build houses and its crushing the power grid. Last christmas 470 house holds lost power for 1½ days because 52 new housing units were running heat pumps on the same transformer as those others that lost power and it simply crashed. There are more and more places getting a no to install home chargers for cars and no to heat pumps because of this issue.

Where will you install the heat pump?

We had a price on a new gas boiler and also we would need to have it moved to a new place in the house. This was quoted at £3600. Heat pump installation was £3500 for a 7kW pump and 180 litre tank. They said around £200 per radiator to be replaced if required.

why not look into inferred heating panels instead? maybe iwoul be less intrusive for installation??

Take a look at wiser heat controls.