Latest news with #RichardSmithson
Yahoo
11-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Anyone with a heat pump urged to 'keep it on constant day and night' as costs revealed
Anyone with a heat pump in their home is being urged to 'keep it on constant day and night' by an expert. Heat pumps are widely regarded as a crucial component in reducing carbon emissions from properties. The number of heat pumps being installed jumped 43 percent last year as small-scale renewables reached record highs, figures show. There were almost 60,000 certified installations of heat pumps in 2024, according to data from the Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS), bringing the total number of certified heat pump installations in UK homes and small businesses to more than 275,000. READ MORE: Your house value will 'plummet' if you make any of these four home improvements READ MORE: Exact temperature you should set thermostat in February to stay warm whilst keeping bills down But despite this, installation rates are still much lower than the target of 600,000 heat pump installations a year by 2028 set by the conservatives as part of the drive to cut greenhouse gas emissions from home heating and curb reliance on gas. The boiler upgrade scheme in England and Wales offers homeowners and small business owners grants of up to £7,500 for installing heat pumps, which has played a key part in accelerating the take-up of the technology. Homeowners who already have them installed are now being advised to 'maintain a constant temperature at all times', allowing the property to store warmth in its walls, thereby reducing heat loss and enabling the heat pump to operate at optimal efficiency. Richard Smithson, a retired GP residing with his wife in a six-bedroom Edwardian semi-detached villa in North Tyneside, opted to replace his gas boiler with a heat pump two and a half years ago. His motivation was to "reduce our carbon footprint and also to try and act as a pioneer, an example to other people that it can be done". Their home was already equipped with double-glazing, but the installation process, which cost £11,000 after a then-£5,000 government grant, entailed underfloor insulation, new radiators, and zoning the heating system. "This house was never that warm with the gas boiler, I'd say it was warmer now with the heat pump," Richard says. He finds his heat pump to be economically efficient, operating chiefly at night when variable tariffs lower the cost of energy used to charge his electric car. He reports that his electricity bills have actually decreased compared to what they were spending on gas previously. "Some people say how long is it before you get your money back," he says. "That's irrelevant, if you're a retiring professional who's fairly well-off, which you will be if you live in this kind of house, and you get a big lump sum, do you spend it on a round-the-world cruise or do you spend it on a heat pump. To me there's only one answer – get a heat pump." Meanwhile, Nick Barr who lives in a sizable Edwardian home in South London, initially doubted the suitability of heat pumps for older, larger homes. However, his engineer-installer adeptly crafted a heating plan involving correct radiator sizing, piping, and boosting the home's energy efficiency. The homeowner describes his heat pump as efficient, "elegant" and very quiet. He advises others in investing in such technology sensible for new installations or system replacements, stating: "It's not cheap, but if you're putting something in new or if you've got to replace a system, it does make sense." He also emphasised the importance of conducting a heat loss calculation for your property to facilitate informed decisions and expressed no regrets about his choice. Andy Balaam, a software engineer, chose to install a heat pump in his four-bedroom Victorian detached house in Surrey in 2021, aiming to reduce its environmental impact. He found the installation process "surprisingly OK", although it required a reliable company to fine-tune the system in the initial weeks for optimal performance. "I was worried whether it was going to make the house warm, I was worried it was going to cost a lot of money and worried if it was going to be reliable," he admitted. Despite the heat pump being "not attractive and it's noisy", it's tucked away at the side of the house, and Dr Balaam confirmed: "It absolutely warms our house effectively, it's much nicer than it was before." Leah Robson, managing director of Your Energy Your Way, primarily serves clients with properties difficult to heat using heat pumps - noted that the comfort level they provide is something people "really don't expect about" them. "People are genuinely concerned, often they're struggling to heat their home as it is," she said. "And when you turn up and say, 'yes, you can have a heat pump and yes, you will be able to run it all day and it won't cost you any more to run than your gas boiler', people are understandably a little bit sceptical." The installations her firm undertakes are "not cheap projects", she noted, but added that "sometimes it's just not the right thing but, typically, even in a solid wall house, if it's got double glazing and reasonable loft insulation we can fit a heat pump". This is supported by a demonstration project led by the Energy Systems Catapult (ESC), which found that heat pumps could be successfully installed in all types of homes. Of the 742 homes fitted with heat pumps for the project, 8 percent were pre-1919 properties, mostly detached or semi-detached, despite older homes presenting "more challenging" installation due to project constraints. Daniel Logue from ESC stated that monitoring revealed the age and type of house had no impact on the efficiency of the heat pumps. "If a trained installer says that your house could have a heat pump, and installs it correctly, it should perform well regardless of the type or age," he added.
The Independent
10-02-2025
- Business
- The Independent
Do heat pumps work in old or large homes? Here's everything you need to know
Heat pumps are being sold to consumers as a way of cutting carbon emissions from homes - but are they suitable for where you live? For the indoctrinated, a heat pump is an electric-powered system that uses heat from the air or ground for hot water or heating. As there is a substantial upfront cost associated with heat pumps - even though there is a £7,500 Government grant available - some consumers remain unsure as to whether to take the plunge. But experts and people who have installed one say heat pumps can work, even where a traditional gas boiler might have struggled. Retired GP Richard Smithson, who lives with his wife in an Edwardian six-bedroom semi-detached villa in North Tyneside, made the switch from a gas boiler two and a half years ago, to 'reduce our carbon footprint and also to try and act as a pioneer, an example to other people that it can be done'. Their home already had double-glazing, but the installation, which cost £11,000 after a then-£5,000 government grant, involved underfloor insulation, replacement radiators and zoning the heating system. Mr Smithson said he was 'pleasantly surprised' at how easily the two-week installation was, and added: 'This house was never that warm with the gas boiler, I'd say it was warmer now with the heat pump.' Homeowners are advised to keep the heating on at a constant temperature all the time, enabling the building to store warmth in walls to reduce heat loss and enable the heat pump to run most efficiently. It means the heat pump works hardest overnight, when variable tariffs give Mr Smithson cheaper energy for charging his electric car. As a result, he says his electricity bill is less than they were previously paying for gas. He added: 'Some people say how long is it before you get your money back? 'That's irrelevant, if you're a retiring professional who's fairly well-off, which you will be if you live in this kind of house, and you get a big lump sum, do you spend it on a round-the-world cruise or do you spend it on a heat pump. 'To me there's only one answer – get a heat pump.' Nick Barr, who is renovating a detached five-bedroom Edwardian house in south London, said he really liked the efficiency of heat pumps, but 'I wasn't sure a heat pump could work on such a big or old house'. But his installer was an engineer who understood how to calculate the heating requirements and design the system, with correctly-sized radiators, pipework, and energy efficiency improvements. His heat pump is efficient, 'elegant' and extremely quiet, he added. 'It's not cheap, but if you're putting something in new or if you've got to replace a system, it does make sense.' And he said: 'The number one thing is to get a heat-loss calculation assessment for the building. That allows you to make the right, informed decisions going forward.' He said he has no regrets. Andy Balaam, a software engineer, opted for a heat pump for his family's detached, four-bedroom Victorian home in Surrey in 2021, to limit its climate impact. He said the installation was 'surprisingly OK', but they needed a good company which came back to adjust the system in the first couple of weeks to get it working properly. 'I was worried whether it was going to make the house warm, I was worried it was going to cost a lot of money and worried if it was going to be reliable,' he said. While the heat pump is 'not attractive and it's noisy', it is out of the way at the side of the house, and Dr Balaam said: 'It absolutely warms our house effectively, it's much nicer than it was before.' Leah Robson, managing director of Dr Balaam's installers, Your Energy Your Way, which primarily deals with clients whose properties are hard to heat with heat pumps, says the level of comfort is something people 'really don't expect about' them. ' People are genuinely concerned, often they're struggling to heat their home as it is,' she said. 'And when you turn up and say, 'yes, you can have a heat pump and yes, you will be able to run it all day and it won't cost you any more to run than your gas boiler', people are understandably a little bit sceptical.' She talks to customers about living with a heat pump, and conducts heat loss assessments and tests for draughts that can be easily fixed. The type of installations the firm carries out are 'not cheap projects', she said, and 'sometimes it's just not the right thing but, typically, even in a solid wall house, if it's got double glazing and reasonable loft insulation we can fit a heat pump'. That is backed up by a demonstration project led by the Energy Systems Catapult (ESC) which found heat pumps could be successfully installed in all types of homes. Some 8 per cent of the 742 homes which had heat pumps installed for the project were pre-1919 properties, the majority of which were detached or semi-detached, even though it was 'more challenging' to install in older homes because of the constraints of the project. Daniel Logue, from ESC, said monitoring found the house age and type did not have any impact on the efficiency of the heat pumps. 'If a trained installer says that your house could have a heat pump, and installs it correctly, it should perform well regardless of the type or age,' he added. David Cowdrey, acting chief executive at The MCS Foundation, which oversees the certification of home renewables, said: 'There is a lack of public information about heat pumps, leading to a proliferation of myths and misinformation about how and where they work.' He urged the Government to lead a public information campaign to counter myths and encourage uptake of heat pumps in all kinds of properties.
The Independent
10-02-2025
- Business
- The Independent
Heat pumps: Can you have them in older, larger houses?
Heat pumps are seen as a key to cutting carbon emissions from homes, but experts say 'myths and misinformation' still abound about the technology. While cost is a barrier for many people, even with a £7,500 Government grant, homeowners in bigger, older properties with cash available may still have concerns, from disruption to whether the tech will work for them. But experts and people who have taken the plunge say heat pumps – electric-powered systems that use ambient heat from the air or ground for heating and hot water – can work, even where a traditional gas boiler might have struggled. Retired GP Richard Smithson, who lives with his wife in an Edwardian six-bedroom semi-detached villa in North Tyneside, made the switch from a gas boiler two and a half years ago, to 'reduce our carbon footprint and also to try and act as a pioneer, an example to other people that it can be done'. Their home already had double-glazing, but the installation, which cost £11,000 after a then-£5,000 government grant, involved underfloor insulation, replacement radiators and zoning the heating system. Mr Smithson said he was 'pleasantly surprised' at how easily the two-week installation was, and added: 'This house was never that warm with the gas boiler, I'd say it was warmer now with the heat pump.' Homeowners are advised to keep the heating on at a constant temperature all the time, enabling the building to store warmth in walls to reduce heat loss and enable the heat pump to run most efficiently. It means the heat pump works hardest overnight, when variable tariffs give Mr Smithson cheaper energy for charging his electric car. As a result, he says his electricity bill is less than they were previously paying for gas. He added: 'Some people say how long is it before you get your money back? 'That's irrelevant, if you're a retiring professional who's fairly well-off, which you will be if you live in this kind of house, and you get a big lump sum, do you spend it on a round-the-world cruise or do you spend it on a heat pump. 'To me there's only one answer – get a heat pump.' Nick Barr, who is renovating a detached five-bedroom Edwardian house in south London, said he really liked the efficiency of heat pumps, but 'I wasn't sure a heat pump could work on such a big or old house'. But his installer was an engineer who understood how to calculate the heating requirements and design the system, with correctly-sized radiators, pipework, and energy efficiency improvements. His heat pump is efficient, 'elegant' and extremely quiet, he added. 'It's not cheap, but if you're putting something in new or if you've got to replace a system, it does make sense.' And he said: 'The number one thing is to get a heat-loss calculation assessment for the building. That allows you to make the right, informed decisions going forward.' He said he has no regrets. Andy Balaam, a software engineer, opted for a heat pump for his family's detached, four-bedroom Victorian home in Surrey in 2021, to limit its climate impact. He said the installation was 'surprisingly OK', but they needed a good company which came back to adjust the system in the first couple of weeks to get it working properly. 'I was worried whether it was going to make the house warm, I was worried it was going to cost a lot of money and worried if it was going to be reliable,' he said. It absolutely warms our house effectively, it's much nicer than it was before Andy Balaam, homeowner While the heat pump is 'not attractive and it's noisy', it is out of the way at the side of the house, and Dr Balaam said: 'It absolutely warms our house effectively, it's much nicer than it was before.' Leah Robson, managing director of Dr Balaam's installers, Your Energy Your Way, which primarily deals with clients whose properties are hard to heat with heat pumps, says the level of comfort is something people 'really don't expect about' them. ' People are genuinely concerned, often they're struggling to heat their home as it is,' she said. 'And when you turn up and say, 'yes, you can have a heat pump and yes, you will be able to run it all day and it won't cost you any more to run than your gas boiler', people are understandably a little bit sceptical.' She talks to customers about living with a heat pump, and conducts heat loss assessments and tests for draughts that can be easily fixed. The type of installations the firm carries out are 'not cheap projects', she said, and 'sometimes it's just not the right thing but, typically, even in a solid wall house, if it's got double glazing and reasonable loft insulation we can fit a heat pump'. That is backed up by a demonstration project led by the Energy Systems Catapult (ESC) which found heat pumps could be successfully installed in all types of homes. Some 8% of the 742 homes which had heat pumps installed for the project were pre-1919 properties, the majority of which were detached or semi-detached, even though it was 'more challenging' to install in older homes because of the constraints of the project. Daniel Logue, Energy Systems Catapult Daniel Logue, from ESC, said monitoring found the house age and type did not have any impact on the efficiency of the heat pumps. 'If a trained installer says that your house could have a heat pump, and installs it correctly, it should perform well regardless of the type or age,' he added. David Cowdrey, acting chief executive at The MCS Foundation, which oversees the certification of home renewables, said: 'There is a lack of public information about heat pumps, leading to a proliferation of myths and misinformation about how and where they work.' He urged the Government to lead a public information campaign to counter myths and encourage uptake of heat pumps in all kinds of properties.
Yahoo
10-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Heat pumps: Can you have them in older, larger houses?
Heat pumps are seen as a key to cutting carbon emissions from homes, but experts say 'myths and misinformation' still abound about the technology. While cost is a barrier for many people, even with a £7,500 Government grant, homeowners in bigger, older properties with cash available may still have concerns, from disruption to whether the tech will work for them. But experts and people who have taken the plunge say heat pumps – electric-powered systems that use ambient heat from the air or ground for heating and hot water – can work, even where a traditional gas boiler might have struggled. Retired GP Richard Smithson, who lives with his wife in an Edwardian six-bedroom semi-detached villa in North Tyneside, made the switch from a gas boiler two and a half years ago, to 'reduce our carbon footprint and also to try and act as a pioneer, an example to other people that it can be done'. Their home already had double-glazing, but the installation, which cost £11,000 after a then-£5,000 government grant, involved underfloor insulation, replacement radiators and zoning the heating system. Mr Smithson said he was 'pleasantly surprised' at how easily the two-week installation was, and added: 'This house was never that warm with the gas boiler, I'd say it was warmer now with the heat pump.' Homeowners are advised to keep the heating on at a constant temperature all the time, enabling the building to store warmth in walls to reduce heat loss and enable the heat pump to run most efficiently. It means the heat pump works hardest overnight, when variable tariffs give Mr Smithson cheaper energy for charging his electric car. As a result, he says his electricity bill is less than they were previously paying for gas. He added: 'Some people say how long is it before you get your money back? 'That's irrelevant, if you're a retiring professional who's fairly well-off, which you will be if you live in this kind of house, and you get a big lump sum, do you spend it on a round-the-world cruise or do you spend it on a heat pump. 'To me there's only one answer – get a heat pump.' Nick Barr, who is renovating a detached five-bedroom Edwardian house in south London, said he really liked the efficiency of heat pumps, but 'I wasn't sure a heat pump could work on such a big or old house'. But his installer was an engineer who understood how to calculate the heating requirements and design the system, with correctly-sized radiators, pipework, and energy efficiency improvements. His heat pump is efficient, 'elegant' and extremely quiet, he added. 'It's not cheap, but if you're putting something in new or if you've got to replace a system, it does make sense.' And he said: 'The number one thing is to get a heat-loss calculation assessment for the building. That allows you to make the right, informed decisions going forward.' He said he has no regrets. Andy Balaam, a software engineer, opted for a heat pump for his family's detached, four-bedroom Victorian home in Surrey in 2021, to limit its climate impact. He said the installation was 'surprisingly OK', but they needed a good company which came back to adjust the system in the first couple of weeks to get it working properly. 'I was worried whether it was going to make the house warm, I was worried it was going to cost a lot of money and worried if it was going to be reliable,' he said. While the heat pump is 'not attractive and it's noisy', it is out of the way at the side of the house, and Dr Balaam said: 'It absolutely warms our house effectively, it's much nicer than it was before.' Leah Robson, managing director of Dr Balaam's installers, Your Energy Your Way, which primarily deals with clients whose properties are hard to heat with heat pumps, says the level of comfort is something people 'really don't expect about' them. 'People are genuinely concerned, often they're struggling to heat their home as it is,' she said. 'And when you turn up and say, 'yes, you can have a heat pump and yes, you will be able to run it all day and it won't cost you any more to run than your gas boiler', people are understandably a little bit sceptical.' She talks to customers about living with a heat pump, and conducts heat loss assessments and tests for draughts that can be easily fixed. The type of installations the firm carries out are 'not cheap projects', she said, and 'sometimes it's just not the right thing but, typically, even in a solid wall house, if it's got double glazing and reasonable loft insulation we can fit a heat pump'. That is backed up by a demonstration project led by the Energy Systems Catapult (ESC) which found heat pumps could be successfully installed in all types of homes. Some 8% of the 742 homes which had heat pumps installed for the project were pre-1919 properties, the majority of which were detached or semi-detached, even though it was 'more challenging' to install in older homes because of the constraints of the project. Daniel Logue, from ESC, said monitoring found the house age and type did not have any impact on the efficiency of the heat pumps. 'If a trained installer says that your house could have a heat pump, and installs it correctly, it should perform well regardless of the type or age,' he added. David Cowdrey, acting chief executive at The MCS Foundation, which oversees the certification of home renewables, said: 'There is a lack of public information about heat pumps, leading to a proliferation of myths and misinformation about how and where they work.' He urged the Government to lead a public information campaign to counter myths and encourage uptake of heat pumps in all kinds of properties.
