SteamyTea

That is 100W/m2, which seems high to me. Or maybe I am just tough and like the cold (which I don't). My space heating is 21 kWh/m2.year, which is 2.4W/m2 on average or 10W/m2 during the heating season.

Miss read that at first and lost the 'on'. Then though it is not your arms hurting you need to worry about. Oh you Welsh boys make me smile sometimes.

Does the built in immersion heater kick in at all?

I think it is to do with the unmeasurable effects of different noises. Quite often they seem irrational. There are certain noises I really hate, barking dogs, crying children and dot matrix printers spring to mind. But then I hate dogs, small children and really hated the women in accounts who ran the DMP. So probably nothing to do with the noise, just pure, healthy prejudice.

I sang for this man when I was at school in Canterbury. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Ramsey He autographed my bible too. I know a joke about wielders. Shall we all join and help them out.

They need to be oversized anyway. If you look at the installation spec for the RHI, then they say it must supply all the heat load for the house 99% of the time. Most gas installations don't do that, and I suspect that most ASHP installed don't either. The physics of heat pumps is well understood, so sizing should never be an issue.

I did not realise it was running at the time and we were standing right next to it looking at your PV inverter. I think part of the problem is that many people see and air-conditioning unit that has been hanging from a wall for years, if not decades, and think that it must be the same. I also suspect that if an ASHP was undersized too much that it was running at full pelt all the time, and it was neglected i.e. used at a bike rack, then it could rattle a bit.

Or an induction hob, which is much, much better. Re: PV You can have roof integrated, you will hardly notice it and it can be cheaper than tiling. Ground mounted which can track the sun, is not really worth it, easier and cheaper to add a few extra modules. Just check with your DNO how much you can fit. The mismatch between maximum generation times and space heating times is often used as a negative against having PV. This is why FiT payments were introduced. For the 3/4 of the year that you export some power you get payment, you then, in effect, use that cash to import power. The FiT is just under 10p/kWh in all at the moment, so not to be sniffed at. Maximizing self consumption can get costly and may not be worth while over all.

I have tried plastering 3 times, all been a disaster. But I have noticed that plasters get more on the floor than the walls.

@JSHarris The idea is to monitor the temp/RH before and after the cooling fins with DHT22s and the fin temperature with a DS18B20. Then, once the data is in, crunch some numbers and see if it is possible to detect the condition that frosting may occur, before it happens.

Welcome. Re your groundwork/foundation/piling, it may be worth having a word with @joe90. He built on the flattest bit of land in the West Country, and it was very boggy. His local Building Control was happy with trenches. I know little about foundations, and each house seems to have unique issues, though I think half of that is lack of knowledge about alternatives by builders/SEs/BCs. As for SIP's Have you checked the U-Values and associated thicknesses of the panels. You may need secondary internal/external insulation fitted. I have stood next to both @JSHarris's ASHP while it was running, and next to @joe90's with it was not. There was no difference in noise. @JSHarris you may have missed my post about monitoring an ASHP for frosting, I am looking to put some kit on a couple or three.

What I don't like about fully pressurised system is that, by the very nature or pressure, everything is under a greater strain to start off with. Then there is the need to have your installation fitted by a certified plumber, and the annual checks for your insurance, if you bother. Then there is all the 'extras' involved, PRVs and other secondary safety devices. Just seems a lot of work and kit really. I do agree that shower pumps are noisy, but I am sure that can be mitigated with a slab of concrete and some rubber mounts. If a header tank in the loft has animals swimming in it, then that is just a bad installation. Not a problem I have ever had as I have always had the correct lid and extra insulation fitted.

Is it really to the stored volume or just the volume of the pressurised 'bladder' in it, so the usable volume will depend on the store pressure to a certain extent. A pressure vessel is really only a header tank really, just one that can supply a pressure from ground level.

And people wonder why I like vented. They are cheap and easy to install, very reliable, and once heat loss is controlled, as cheap to run as anything else. All this pressurised system is really a nonsense and just shows that is is hard to improve, for reliability and ease of use, on a vented system.

" If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter. " Blaise Pascal 1657

The point I was making is that there is separation between the two. You only have to go into a small house/flat where the kitchen is part of the living room to know what I am on about.

Except that Joe90's place is on a large plot, and his house is fairly square, Jeremy's is on a narrower, sloping one. A lot of it does depend on how you usually enter and exit a house. Why I can not understand why kitchens in small Victorian terraces are at the back. Means you have to traps though, what is usually the living room when you first enter. Great idea when you have bags of shopping and your car is parked other end of street. Then, if you want enjoy your back garden, you can sit in your very narrow kitchen, the one with the bathroom and bog at the end.

I think it is more basic than that and all do do with compartmentalising.

There is a limit to the amount of Uranium that is available. Called 'Nuclear's Dirty Little Secret' in the trade. Storage of electricity is an issue, but a lot of that can be negated by storage as thermal energy i.e. in concrete, water, phase change materials. We can also reduce usage by 30% easily, 50% with a lot of work and probably down to 40% of today's use with serious legislation and investment. That is before we start looking at international supergrids and, the real hard one, societal changes i.e. live near your work (it is barmy that some people commute 100's of miles a week).

We currently have 8 nuclear power plants that supply a net power of 8700 MW. Assuming they work 100% of the time, that is 76212000 MWh/year. PV can yield about 10,000 MWh/km2.year. So that would be 7,621.2 km2 of land UK has a land area of 242,495 km2 So to replace nuclear with PV would requite 3.1% of England's land. Urbanisation is about 9% of UK land. Housing is about 2% of UK's land. Agricultural land is 69% of UK's land area. Bio-fuel accounts for 1% of arable land usage. Until 1992, set-aside was set at 15% of area for large producers, reduced to 10% in 1996. This was reduced to 0% after then, but other incentives to 'not farm' were introduced. It may be better at look at the costs and times involved when comparing nuclear and PV. A PV 'farm' can be planned, built and be producing in 3 years at about £1m/MW. Nuclear seems to be taking 25 year at around £9m/MW (figures need verifying) In 25 years a solar farm of 1MW capacity would have produced around 22,000 MWh of energy. The nuclear 0 MWh. PV can be distributed but Nuclear can't. (as usual my figures need checking as I get confused when dealing with kWh, MWh, GWh, TWh and PWh, it is easy to get them muddled).

Nor me. But having been to @Joe90's and @JSHarris's places, I notice a similarity. Large kitchens one side, living room other side, separated by hall/stairs/corridor/extra room. Similar upstairs. Master bedroom/en-suite on one side, spare rooms other side. Landing in-between. Just like it should be. Both done without an architect too.

There are figures available from the Office of National Statistics that show usage. Here is a link to a report that shows some typical regional figures, including E7, which is useful for heat loads and DHW loads. http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171766_321960.pdf But it really comes down to doing sensible estimates based on the typical usage. As for PV, just design it in from the start, but make sure that the local DNO can approve it. Batteries, why, they are too expensive, limited life and better off left to the DNO/Energy companies to develop. People get very excited about them, I don't know why. If you really want to use batteries, and save energy costs, then give an electric car with each purchase/lease. That will have the biggest impact at the lowest cost. I monitor my energy usage, it is easy as I am all electric, I hate Pie charts, but I do keep a record of the day/night split.

I will do the on-site catering for a reasonable fee, say £250k/year. Will even get fresh milk and bread rolls for you.

The YMCA was tame compared to the Queensway Club, trust me on that. Who ever said that working in the Health and Leisure industry was glamours. It stank, literally.

Probably not except distraction therapies. As an ex climber, you know that our joints don't ache, even when your muscles are screaming. The fear of failure, and the potential consequences, are a much greater distraction. Now I am off to the woods for a coffee.