Neighbours heatpump

[user1471503652]

Had a letter through the door from planning about our adjoined neighbour (semi detached) installing a heatpump and seeking planning permission due to it being less than the 1m distance from the boundary.

He did knock and mentioned this would be coming through recently so it's not a surprise, I thought it was because it would be a few cm off the 1m from our wall.

However looking at the plans he's asking for it to be installed 35-40cm from our extension wall (we have a single rear extension and they do not)

Does anyone have any experience of heatpumps noise or vibration etc coming from a neighbours heatpump? Just trying to ascertain whether I should be concerned or not.

Norway, Finland, Sweden and Estonia have widespread adoption of heat pumps, Italy and Germany are catching up and France installed 3.1 million in the last two years alone. So they are maybe all wearing earplugs, have the systems installed properly or are just more tolerant than us Brits?

Not sure about Sweden and Estonia, but in Norway and Finland most homes are detached. Perhaps it's less about tolerence and earplugs and more about being able to site the pump away from rooms where noise is an issue (bedrooms) and also away from neighbours.

Are there any surveys showing satisfaction with the noise of heat pumps in those countries? Adoption is one measure. Satisfaction is another.

As an aside we recently spent £15k on our heat pump installation. That was working with an excellent installer and making sure we had the most efficient and quietest pump. Also included replacing all radiators and pipework I.e messy. Decorating etc will be another 2-3k though that won’t be solely down to the HP installation.

we will get £5k back via a government grant but it’s still a lot of money. I can well imagine that installations that are a lot cheaper don’t work so well and/or are noisy. But most people don’t have £15k to hand do they. It’s unrealistic to assume many families are willing to pay this much for a “proper” installation. We actively wanted to do it but not that many people do and our installer said he is unlikely to do retrofits in future as they are are so much more complex than new builds and full refurbs.

There will need to be serious government subsidies in the future if they want large numbers installed.

Govt needs to start with insisting newbuild houses have them. Currently very few are, and in 10 years’ time all these houses will fail the government’s own efficiency targets. Yet far cheaper and easier to install HPs for new houses than retrofit. Bonkers.

This really.

Comparing them with boilers is probably hard because you have a wider range of different boilers (some 40 years old) that have different noise levels, and some of which weren't probably even built to a noise standard. There is also the fact that boilers are sited inside, even in bedrooms sometimes. My modern boiler is ultra quiet.

There is a tendency with the heat pump to site it as far away from the place where the people live as possible. This is nearly always going to be near the property boundary in modern houses, so is inevitably going to impact the neighbours.

People do have a tendency to site noisy things (heatpumps, trampolines with screaming kids) as far away from their living spare as possible, which almost inevitably results in them being as close to their neighbours as possible.

It's hot air that it blows out so you could end up with condensation/damp on your extension wall.

Govt needs to start with insisting newbuild houses have them. Currently very few are, and in 10 years’ time all these houses will fail the government’s own efficiency targets. Yet far cheaper and easier to install HPs for new houses than retrofit. Bonkers.

All at a time when new build houses get smaller and smaller and more crammed into tiny plots backing onto multiple other properties. New estates are designed to pack as many homes into as little land as possible. Heat pumps will need to be small and quiet if they are not to make life miserable for people.

You can't plant or put seating areas near the pump because of this. A problem in small new build gardens.

I have a new ASHP installed in my house and I can honestly say that I can barely hear it, even when sitting quite close to it in the garden. They are mounted on rubber, so you don’t get any vibration.

@DougMLancs

Norway, Finland, Sweden and Estonia have widespread adoption of heat pumps, Italy and Germany are catching up and France installed 3.1 million in the last two years alone. So they are maybe all wearing earplugs, have the systems installed properly or are just more tolerant than us Brits?

I've lived in Sweden for years and to the best of my knowledge heat pumps don't play a huge role yet, certainly not compared to nuclear.

As to Germany, the country's just been through an extended row on this very topic that nearly broke up the governing coalition. It's become clear that compulsory installation of heat pumps would cause an enormous amount of social upheaval because of the huge cost of extra insulation and other measures required for older and cheaper housing stock (most of which is fantastically well insulated compared to British houses.)

It's also become clear that in many if not most cases, communal heat networks rather than individual heat pumps are the much more sensible way to go.

I absolutely understand what you’re saying - there is a lot of scope for improvement and it’s unfortunate that you had a bad experience. From what I’ve read, new builds can have some of the worst installations due to lack of attention to detail, oversight and training. That’s improving however.

I’m a trained gardener too (well more nurseryman these days) and I was lucky the drive goes down the side of our semi so it’s as far away from our/neighbours windows as it can be.

You have nuclear heating in your house?? 🤯😉There’s 1 heat pump for every 4.4 people in Sweden?

My Mitshubishi ASHP doesn't blow out hot air- its cool air and it can freeze the path in front of it in cold weather, so they need to be careful leaving their conservatory. If it blows hot air out it isn't working properly- it takes ambient heat out of the air.
Ours is attached to the garage the other side of the wall where the old oil boiler was situated. Its about 120cm from the fence and the neighbours spend a lot of time on their patio which is covered, on the other side of it. They have never mentioned hearing it, they expressed a bit of concern when we said we were having one, as a family member had one in their house and it had been noisy, but admitted they were unhappy with the installer. Our installer arranged for us to visit a previous customer in a rural area to listen to their pump and we were greatly reassured.We hear the oil boilers of both neighbours when in the garden, but rarely hear the ASHP.

Surely the hot air is used to heat up the house? Why would it blow hot air out?!!

its a fair point that tiny gardens make the HP installation harder and of course plots are getting smaller.

but some apartment buildings have them on the outside esp in Scandinavia . Similar to individual aircon units. So no garden at all required.

having one in my back garden, they absolutely do not have to be noisy at all but I fully accept some of them are. Choose carefully is the rule here surely.

btw sitting out in summer is not an issue because it’s barely going at all in summer. Certainly less bothersome than neighbour’s regular grass cutting. Yes ours will be whirring more in winter but not enough to bother anyone.

Agree. No hot air comes out.

Anyway we’ve gone astray from the OP’s point, sorry! It’s worth talking to you neighbour to share your concerns and if you see anyone with a HP locally you could try a note through the door to ask their experience. NESTA are setting up a ‘Visit a Heat Pump’ scheme that starts in September so that prospective HP owners/neighbours of prospective owners can visit ones in their local area and ask questions. https://www.visitaheatpump.com/

The big difference is is that if your neighbours boiler is noisy it affects your neighbour only. If their heat pump is noisy it can affect you. If there’s a 16% chance that it’s noisy it can fuck off to the other side of the house.

My brother lived next to an oil boiler- that had a 100% chance of being far more noisy. The owners are as likely to use their garden/have windows open in winter as their neighbours surely? The council will be on the OP’s side with this- the MCS noise calcs are very strict and some LA reject if above 40 decibels (a quiet library) at the point of measurement (normally 1m outside the closest window/door of the neighbouring property). Vibration seemed the main concern earlier in the thread but it should be nothing to worry about- the dampeners they use now are very effective.

I'd say no. No matter how quiet the HP is on installation, when it goes wrong, you'll cop it.

those ashp would turn very noisy in cold weather

they’re not super loud, but they do make a constant low frequency noise

I can't speak for the others, but personally, I wont want my neighbours installing these thing

these heatpump simply an inefficient device. If it truly had the 300% 500% high efficiency that people claim, why did my friend (who installed it) end up with higher heating costs than my Combi boiler? Let's not even factor in the additional insulation and underfloor heating my friend had to do for the installation.

Apparently they use less energy than a gas boiler but run off electric, which is about four times more expensive atm.

Sometimes I feel sorry that my friend spends so much money and still keeps a large water tank, and her bill are even higher than mine 🤑

I should have been more proactive in advising them to install Combi boiler, smaller, cost less, without tank, and bit cheaper to run

Well, she is an adult, responsible for her own decisions...

But, she has kind of future proofed her house. The (UK) government want to ban new installations of gas boilers from 2035. If that actually happens, it's going to be a lot harder to sell houses with old gas systems and she wouldn't have been able to get a gas combi in later years.

That said, if they do actually make moves to ban them, the cost is surely likely to come down. I can't see how most folk could fork out 12-15k for boiler systems when they are used to 2-3k.

I am skeptical about whether it will be possible to completely ban gas boilers by 2035. I guess by that time, hydrogen boilers might become more prevalent

Cant imagine those terraced have to accommodate a heat pump and water tank into a small house

I agree. The current government like to make boastful claims about environmental issues which are in no way practical to implement. The requirement for all Landlords to have an EPC or C or higher, due from 2025 has just been basically cancelled with no future date in sight.

I sometimes wonder how many of them have mates in various energy improvements industries and how often those mates give them free, all expenses paid cruises to Monico on their private yachts, with no need for those to be declared in parliament.

Virtually all financial initiatives to encourage solar panel installations went the way of the dodo about six years after it was rolled out too.