Heat pumps are they a waste of money?

[Northern_Brewer]

I do not have anywhere to put a water cylinder.

You can now get mini, high-efficiency water cylinders for heat pumps - see this video. Or you can use some kind of hybrid system.

My radiators and pipes are donkeys years old they use very narrow pipe (think 10mm) i imagine that would need replacing throughout the whole house including buried in the concrete floor in the kitchen and downstairs bathroom.

Microbore is a pain, but it doesn't stop you from getting a heat pump. "High temperature" heat pumps produce water at the same temperature as a gas boiler, so should look the same to your pipe/radiator network. Only catch is they're a bit more expensive (10% I think?) and are a bit less efficient when in high-temperature mode, but in the real world they rarely have to work in that mode.

 

[Druss]

I'm with OVO and every time I go on their website to check the current balance there's a barrage of ads and such offering this that and the other if I switch to their green energy or get one of their special boilers...all result in me paying them a great deal more with no obvious/tangible benefit.

The idea of renewable energy certainly appeals to me, but I'm very sceptical about the true agenda, always makes me think of this old meme:

 

[Northern_Brewer]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/b.../?ICID=continue_without_subscribing_reg_first

Completely predictable that it's the Telegraph- the Telegraph's coverage of heatpumps is so ludicrously biased it can only be described as propaganda.

For the most part, he says the heat pump performed as expected. The machine’s coefficient of performance (COP, the measure of a heat pump’s efficiency) averaged at 2.2. A typical gas boiler, by contrast, has a much lower average COP of between 0.7 and 0.8....“During the last couple of weeks with freezing temperatures, the COP fell to 1.7,”

No - that is not a heat pump performing as expected. A COP of 2.2 is terrible - the minimum to qualify for the Boiler Upgrade Scheme is 2.8, and installers like Heat Geek are averaging 4.4. There's even some air-source pumps in the UK going over 5.0.

So this system was installed by cowboys who didn't know what they were doing. It shouldn't be dropping off that much in cold weather either.

But of course it fits the story that the Telegraph wants to push. No doubt if they were doing a feature on whether you should buy a car, they would use this as their example of a modern car :

 

[Rodcx500z]

I'm with OVO and every time I go on their website to check the current balance there's a barrage of ads and such offering this that and the other if I switch to their green energy or get one of their special boilers...all result in me paying them a great deal more with no obvious/tangible benefit.

The idea of renewable energy certainly appeals to me, but I'm very sceptical about the true agenda, always makes me think of this old meme:

View attachment 109289

Spot on they are all coining it in on the fears they promote, they the government just stoke the fire, unfortunatly some believe them

 

[JockyBrewer]

Thats me all over, enjoy your time here on planet earth, nothing you say or do will make not 1 iota bit of difference to the green dream

So how is Ed Milliband siphoning off money from the electricity wholesale pricing?

 

[jof]

Spot on they are all coining it in on the fears they promote, they the government just stoke the fire, unfortunatly some believe them

Yep.
If you are all electric storage heaters, they are only pushing warm water heat pumps at £25k by the time you add in radiator installation. (May also apply if you have low water pressure too)

You can get a basic air con type system fitted for a fraction of that, but they don't tell you about them & you won't get any grants towards it.

So in my opinion here, the scam is the heat pump price is inflated by the government grant.
And I bet you get scammed if you are leasehold trying to get permission to site the external inverter part.

 

[Rodcx500z]

So how is Ed Milliband siphoning off money from the electricity wholesale pricing?

to pay for all the turbines and panels, you surly don't think the government are paying

 

[Northern_Brewer]

The idea of renewable energy certainly appeals to me, but I'm very sceptical about the true agenda, always makes me think of this old meme:

View attachment 109289

Except none of them resulted in more taxes for you - and arguably fears about oil supply led to exploration in daft places like the North Sea which have massively reduced your taxes over the years.

And acid rain and the ozone layer are actually pretty good examples of a complicated Bad Thing happening at a regional/global scale where we recognised a problem, invested in alternatives, and fixed it. Isn't that a pretty good example for how to deal with climate change?

 

[Northern_Brewer]

to pay for all the turbines and panels, you surly don't think the government are paying

So Rod - how exactly do you plan to make electricity in the UK?

Power stations get old and need replacing, so we'll need to pay for some kind of electricity generation kit.

But we're no longer in the 20th century where we had cheap and abundant North Sea gas - we had found pretty much all the gas in the North Sea by the end of the 1990s, production has been declining since then. As I said on the politics thread, we've spent £140bn on gas in the last three years, with a majority of that going to other countries.

If we're going to have to build new power generation anyway as kit gets old, if we're running out of gas, and if our current dependence on gas is making us poorer to the tune of £10bn's per year - why wouldn't we try and generate more electricity from domestic solar and wind? Even better - it's cheaper than gas or nuclear.

You worry a lot about people lying to you, but you should worry about the people who are lying when they say that you can continue to do things the same way that we did in the 1990s, or that tell you it's a good idea to depend on basics like energy from countries like Qatar. Germany persuaded itself that it was a good idea to become dependent on Russian gas 20 years ago, and we know how that ended up.

So Rod - how do you think we should generate our electricity?

 

[Stu]

As an aside, the Torygraph has turned into a GB News mouthpiece. I'd not use it as a suitable reference.

I can only speak for my folks who bought into Heat Pumps early on. I'll not lie, it was very expensive because they weren't common and there weren't the incentives there are today. They were updating their house and they needed to replace their old-fashioned radiators which were fed by an oil burner (they don't have gas). Oil is not like Electricity and Gas - it's the wild, wild west!

However, in terms of "does it work?" Absolutely it does. They do have solar panels, but honestly, their house is like a furnace (that's how they like it) and despite having a house 3x the size of mine, their overall bills are less. They're retired.


Will definitely consider it if and when my system needs replacing. I don't think it'll be anytime soon - we have a modern Worcester Bosch backed up with solar heating and heat exchanger which has just been updated.

 

[Druss]

Except none of them resulted in more taxes for you

I wasn't really purporting the meme as hard science, more of an example of scaremongering by the powers that be in order to get extra cash from the easily led masses.

The whole 'green agenda' nonsense appears to be much of the same, I'm not declaring any absolutes, just voicing my scepticism in the matter.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

One (or indeed many) scare stories of "things don't work for me" doest' mean they never work for anyone

I agree but to flip that just because people tell you they are much better and cheaper to run than gas boilers doesn't mean they do work for everyone.

I can imaging in modern houses where solar is installed as part of the build (that is happening here) and walls and lofts are insulated with far better materials than we used donkeys years ago in our old houses a heat pump will do the job but for the majority of us who live in old houses they wont unless you are prepared to spend thousands of pounds and go through the upheaval of insulating lofts and cavity walls having all the pipework and radiators replaced and finding room for the water tank the easier option is to stay on gas.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Living in an area with no gas we are regularly told we can have free solar and heat pump system. The problem is -
1 - the cowboys that come and fit them, they make hell of a mess and leave equipment laying around for months.
2 - without a battery in winter it becomes a massive amount to run.
3 - nobody locally will service or repair them. This information is from stuff I have read on line and from the countless locals that have converted on the promise of cheaper power.
I have been considering getting solar fitted but we are not going electric car yet so I may hold on.

Have you considered a modern oil boiler they are far smaller and more efficient than those noisy ones we had back in the 70s - 80s?

 

[Tanglefoot]

The problem with retro fitting heat pumps is most uk homes aren't insulated to the degree needed to be effective.
They work better when designed into construction of new builds, air pressure tests ensure the thermal values are up to standard required.
Like solar installations finding a competent installer is key, not easy for the layman.

 

[Agentgonzo]

I agree but just because people tell you they are much better and cheaper to run than gas boilers doesn't mean they do work for anyone.

I can imaging in modern houses where solar is installed as part of the build (that is happening here) and walls and lofts are insulated with far better materials than we used donkeys years ago in our old houses a heat pump will do the job but for the majority of us who live in old houses they wont unless you are prepared to spend thousands of pounds insulating lofts and cavity walls having all the pipework and radiators replaced there is no point.

Agree. They don't work for everyone. But they do work for a lot. Let's not the the 20% (where is not the right choice) scare away the 80% (where it is the right choice).

 

[Leon103]

Have you considered a modern oil boiler they are far smaller and more efficient than those noisy ones we had back in the 70s - 80s?

My boiler is 2007 so not an 80's but certainly not new. House is very efficient despite a lot of glass. I think we use about 1000l of oil so not expensive to run a big house with 4 people living in it.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Agree. They don't work for everyone. But they do work for a lot. Let's not the the 20% (where is not the right choice) scare away the 80% (where it is the right choice).

I don't think its 20% scaring 80% i am sure those who can afford a heat pump and who have suitable houses to fit one will have done their own research this makes me wonder why if 80% of UK could have one only 1% do.

So

 

[Chippy_Tea]

My boiler is 2007 so not an 80's but certainly not new. House is very efficient despite a lot of glass. I think we use about 1000l of oil so not expensive to run a big house with 4 people living in it.

My mates house had one of those old 70s boilers in the kitchen every time it fired up i near **** myself they never flinched as they were used to it.

 

[Stu]

I agree but to flip that just because people tell you they are much better and cheaper to run than gas boilers doesn't mean they do work for everyone.

I can imaging in modern houses where solar is installed as part of the build (that is happening here) and walls and lofts are insulated with far better materials than we used donkeys years ago in our old houses a heat pump will do the job but for the majority of us who live in old houses they wont unless you are prepared to spend thousands of pounds and go through the upheaval of insulating lofts and cavity walls having all the pipework and radiators replaced and finding room for the water tank the easier option is to stay on gas.

My parents house, as mentioned above, does have panels.

But it's also 200 years old and draughty as hell.

 

[Stu]

I don't think its 20% scaring 80% i am sure those who can afford a heat pump and who have suitable houses to fit one will have done their own research this makes me wonder why if 80% of UK could have one only 1% do.

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So

You'll probably find that those 2 countries are heavily discounting them. And there may be laws and all kinds of other reasons - gas might be really expensive, for instance. The USA doesn't have much gas, because it's difficult to move it around the vast country. Same reason they don't have many railways.

As an aside, if you do have a house with an EPC of C and above, the cost of a heat pump vs a conventional boiler is around the same with discounts.