Is heat pump technology improving or getting cheaper?

Cardew

It is common for many American homes - particularly flats/condos - to have purpose built venting with air to air Heat Pumps. Every room has at least one vent and the larger rooms several vents.

In areas like Florida the heat pump is mainly used for air conditioning, but it certainly gets cold enough to require heating in the winter. As these units are large they are also noisy and in blocks of flats are usually mounted on the roof.

joefizz

ed110220 said:

The other year I went to the Calgary area of Canada where they have bitterly cold winters and I didn't see a single radiator, all the heating was by air vents in the floor or ceiling so direct air heating is certainly viable. 

Ive spent a lot of time in Canada and the US and predominantly its blown air heating (in the places that need heating). In Canada it seemed to be mostly a gas furnace in the basement (I do love their basements!) and then blown all round the house.

I thought about moving there a few years ago but was warned to come stay for a month during winter. It was -19C when I got off the plane and that was the warmest it got! Canada isnt short of gas or oil (nodding donkeys all over the place in alberta and sask) but the insulation standards are also quite high.
I worked for a Canadian company in the late 90s and they were talking environment and environmental issues long before most places here.

Shildongirl

Think it’s improving - look at the new Vaillant Arotherm plus which is designed to run with existing radiators BUT beware the companies that install them. The agents who come out to sell their systems to you are no better than double glazing salesmen of yore. YOU need to inform yourself of the rules about positioning an air heat pump in general and specifically the proximity guideline for your chosen system BEFORE you put pen to paper.  The first salesman who came told me the pump could be positioned along our boundary fence - I had read up about that and knew that it was a bare-faced lie and so rejected that company. The second approved installer rep came along and told us yes we could position the pump on the back of our house between our back door and the French door. We duly signed up and paid our £3000 deposit. Now he emails us that we can’t position our pump there due to ‘new proximity guidelines’ from Vaillant. But there is nowhere else to put it! I rang Vaillant today and they say there have been no changes to the proximity guidelines since launch of the product. Sooo not sure where that leaves us.... but I can at least warn others so they don’t fall into the same trap we did. Beware the salesmen - they will say anything to get that sale!!

Cardew

Shildongirl said:

Think it’s improving - look at the new Vaillant Arotherm plus which is designed to run with existing radiators BUT beware the companies that install them. The agents who come out to sell their systems to you are no better than double glazing salesmen of yore. YOU need to inform yourself of the rules about positioning an air heat pump in general and specifically the proximity guideline for your chosen system BEFORE you put pen to paper.  The first salesman who came told me the pump could be positioned along our boundary fence - I had read up about that and knew that it was a bare-faced lie and so rejected that company. The second approved installer rep came along and told us yes we could position the pump on the back of our house between our back door and the French door. We duly signed up and paid our £3000 deposit. Now he emails us that we can’t position our pump there due to ‘new proximity guidelines’ from Vaillant. But there is nowhere else to put it! I rang Vaillant today and they say there have been no changes to the proximity guidelines since launch of the product. Sooo not sure where that leaves us.... but I can at least warn others so they don’t fall into the same trap we did. Beware the salesmen - they will say anything to get that sale!!

Welcome to the forum.

Agree 100% about salesmen.

If you go through the thousands of posts about heat pumps on this forum you will see how the expertise of the installer is absolutely critical; and yet how will Mr and Mrs Average know if the installer is any good?

I still find it regrettable that the manufacturers don't have their own commissioning engineers and take responsibility for the subsequent performance on the system.

The ability of the system to heat 'normal size' radiators to 63c and hot water to 75c(if I have read it correctly) will obviously reduce the warm up time and thus the need to run very long periods - even 24/7.

I would like to see some more technical data. Valliant talk of a system COP of 'up to' 5.03 - my car can apparently deliver 'up to' 64.8mpg!! Under what conditions is that COP = 5.03 achieved. Water temperature at 30c and outside temperature a balmy 16c??

What COP is achieved with water temperature at 63c and, say, -- 4c outside.

This guide https://www.boilerguide.co.uk/air-source/vaillant states 3 to 5 days to install!! and a COP of 3.0.