To think low take up of heat pump grants is due to more than just poor advertising.

[overitt]

There's a BBC story today about low take-up of the £5k grants available for heat pump installation: www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-64710225. The criticism focuses on poor marketingnof the scheme and difficulties in funding installers, both of which are true. But I think there's more to it than that. I managed to find a potential local installer and had a telephone conversation with him. He told me about the size of the pump, the restrictions on where it could be installed in relation to neighbouring properties, and the internal infrastructure that would be needed. The picture on the BBC article illustrates it well. I would need to rebuild my kitchen to accommodate it. He also said that for the system to work effectively I would need to install interior or exterior wall insulation on my solid brick house, plus either underfloor heating or bigger radiators in all the rooms. All of thus would cost many £££££. The installer told me that for these reasons he was mostly installing heat pumps in new build homes or complete refurbishments.

Aibu to think these factors are probably a much bigger part of the reason why the scheme has low take-up than "poor advertising"?

I’m dreading neighbours getting heat pumps. Terraced and semis with postage stamp gardens - the idea of each one having one of these things going is horrendous.

Yes my parents house is actually a nice temperature, to be fair. Certainly not needing jumpers

@GasPanic I think £80k is about right for ground-source - which is different from the air source heat pump that is being pushed more widely.

@yodaforpresident's experience sounds very similar to our friends' (you may even be them - if so hi) - a ground source heat pump works by effectively creating a "fridge" effect to cool down a nearby or underground stream of water and uses the heat generated by that to warm the house. Whereas the air source uses the fridge effect to cool down the surrounding air and uses the heat to warm the house. I think ground source technology is more efficient but obviously most properties can't use it as you need a suitable ground source. The properties that have the location and the space to use it tend to have really terrible insulation so the projects to modernise them are £££££

Our house is also totally unsuitable and we would have to spend a absolute fortune. We are having all our windows replaced with more efficient double glazing and although it will be expensive it's a fraction of the cost.

I live in a isolated village in Cornwall and we recently clubbed together to have a defibrillator fitted in the old phone box. The chap from Western Power, who came to install it said that if everyone in the village got an EV and switched from oil to electricity for heating and cooking (no mains gas), then it wouldn't be possible with the current infrastructure to get enough electricity into the village to meet the need. There are so many problems with many of the proposals to reach net zero that are not being addressed.

I was really keen to get a heat pump when my oil boiler was due to be replaced (no mains gas).

After getting quotes though, it would take 18 years before the savings to run it paid for the installation, even with the grant. We would have being paying the loan off for 10 years. I just don't believe that it won't drop in price/improve in efficiency dramatically in the next 10 years, so I reluctantly decided to go oil again, and wait.

I have room for a ground source heat pump. My house (1890) has been well insulated. I already have a log burner as backup heat. When the last gas boiler finally died, I had a quote for a GSHP.

It would cost £29k including changing all the pipework, radiators etc. With the grant, £24k. A new gas boiler & installation cost me £2k. The GSHP would have to save me £2.5k + interest per year (assuming a 10 year lifespan) , to be worth getting a loan & buying it now. That's more than my whole utilities bill.

So I've set up a savings account. It'll take me 6 or 7 years to save £25k. I'll be ready to buy it in 2030 or 2031, in time for the deadline, and when my current boiler dies.

Marketing has nothing to do with it.

They got the wrong type then. Ours is very quiet. Certainly quieter than the boiler and you have to put your ear right up to it to hear it.

the most important thing to do with regards a heat pump is to do proper research and get a proper installer.

If I had £29k I would want this https://smartflower.com/

@maddening very pretty, but not terribly useful when I need to keep my house warm on a frosty December night, after the gas boiler ban.

This in spades. We have one which works well and uses less kWh per annum than the old gas system by a long way BUT because the cost of electricity is four times that of gas our bills are much higher.

If the government want to encourage ashp installation there needs to be a change in pricing. About 40% of electricity comes from gas, yet the price is pegged to the price of gas so any increases there are four fold for electricity.

1. You have to pay half iirc?
2. You need good insulation
3. it costs more to run

so me - in an old, damp, draughty terrace on low income = no chance
I have neither the cash nor a suitable home to install it.

I know someone in council property who had one fitted they told me the radiators are barely warm and it's costing a lot in electricity so as a consequence can barely afford to heat their home. So I wouldn't want to pay out for it.

I think they may be like the hot air heating like they did in the 1970s. Awful and too prone to flaws and not the all wonderful saviour that it's thought to be

Apart from them being too big and requiring too much space and changes to the house, I'd rather gouge out my eyeballs than have the thought of workmen all over my house and garden installing the damn thing.

There are already lots of jobs that need doing, but I just can't face having them in the house, the mess, the disruption, the inevitable being messed around, etc.

Yes, a few are respectful and considerate and honest, but they're the minority.

I can just about cope with them for short/limited jobs, but for something as big as a heat pump, with all it entails, it's a big fat no from me. Even if the grants covered 100% of the cost, I wouldn't do it.

They just should make it compulsory to have them installed in new builds and part of planning permission when people are doing major alterations/extensions.

It seems to me that many/most/all of these wonderful saviours aren’t all they’re being made up to be. I smell £s being burned in the name of greenwashing.

We have the outside space, my DP could fit it (he’s a refrigeration and air con engineer)

But the cost and the hassle of the insulating and changing stuff inside the house would still be huge - it’s a big uninsulated 1930’s house.

Yes, my friends have one and they don’t warm the home as much as a gas boiler, they are also expensive on electricity.

I stayed in a place last winter that was heated only with a ground source heat pump. In comparison to the air source systems I was really impressed with how warm the place was. It was very comfortable and the owner said that the running costs were small relative to the size of the building. They were about to get solar panels and said once installed the running costs would be practically nothing, but they would have spent around £35K getting it all!

I’m coming to the conclusion that insulating our homes is the best thing to start off with. Then we save energy and cheaper bills regardless of the nature of the heating system.

They're shit.
My daughter bought a new build with heat pump heating last summer.
Last winter, the house was freezing despite the system running full pelt.
She sold the house this year as like many of her neighbours before and since, for the same reason,for a gas central heated house.
They're like the original economy seven heaters, great in theory, shit in practice.

sadly there’s a lot of shit heat pumps and even more shit installers who don’t know how to do the heat loss calculations properly.

we’ll see on ours this winter (only just installed this spring) but we know several people who’ve commissioned their own heat pumps and their houses are perfectly warm in winter. It is however a constant temperature rather than the peaks and troughs we are used to with with gas.

@ChungusBoi 'I’m coming to the conclusion that insulating our homes is the best thing to start off with. Then we save energy and cheaper bills regardless of the nature of the heating system.'

Definitely. I bought a doer-upper and started with insulation - 20cm in the loft, and between the eaves, insulated exterior doors, high-rated windows, Batoning and insulation of the upstairs inside walls.

Then added a wood burner for booster heat. We're rural. My nearest neighbour is about 30 yards away and doesn't object. And I have free wood so the central heating is only used for early mornings and hot water.

If we stay here, next will be a GSHP. I don't have a south facing roof for solar panels, only east and west which are less effective.

We have GSHP but it was only viable because it's a new build.

We have 300mm of roof insulation, 250mm PoroTherm brick walls and 200mm of external insulation, floors have 150mm of insulation. We had to spend £600 on the loft hatch as it needed to be passivhaus standard.

Windows are all triple glazed with no heat bridges

External doors are 75mm thick with insulation

All underfloor heating and the lack of air flow to ensure efficiency means that we have to have MVHR

Finally we effectively have a plant room to house the heat pump and associated buffer and expansion tanks.

I can't see how it could possibly be retrofitted to an existing house without costing almost as much as building a new one.

We have an old home which would cost £££s to retrofit and from what I've read won't be that effective/will potentially cost more to heat. So I've just had a look at several new build developments in the county, all big name developers and not one mention of heat pumps. Can this be right ? That developers have not been compelled to start fitting them already ?

Change requires change, shocker.