Green Power

I am in Northants, England. If anyone else here is in Northants and interested in heat pumps let me know and I can share info about local installers by perhaps next month. For the EPC, I checked a couple of weeks ago and it looks like the minimum C rule you mentioned is proposed, not law yet. It also looks like 2025 for new tenancies but existing tenancies will have to be C by 2028. I will quite likely sell the house after the existing tenant moves out, so that rule likely won't matter to us. However it would still be a bit better to sell the house as a B or a C, especially if I am trying to promote the eco credentials of the house.

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OK, thanks for your replies. If anyone would appreciate regular updates as I go along let me know. Not sure if the heat pump installers will do the insulation at the same time, or whether that needs to be done first and separately by another company. At the moment my short list is CTC, Daikin, Vaillant, Mitsubishi, Viessman, Nibe although I´ll see what the installers say. I have discarded (for now): Dimplex ,as I didn´t get a recommended installer from them. Panasonic and Samsung: scored the lowest company ethical ratings on Ethical Consumer. Nu-heat as looks like they are just reselling Nibe. Glow-Worm and Danfoss: didn´t like their websites, and looks like not that focused on heat pumps. Worcester Greensource as poor website, and no recommended heat pump installers in my area. I am sure at least one or two of these were unfairly discarded, as I am not going to spend hours investigating each company.

I didn´t get the answers to any of the questions I originally asked yet, but I found this in a brochure from Daikin (see attached brochure, page 13, you have to fill in some details somewhere on their website to get it) This is for the Boiler Upgrade Scheme What is the application process? 1. Installer receives instruction from the property owner to carry out installation and apply for BUS grant 2. Installer applies to Ofgem for a voucher, providing all necessary information 3. Ofgem contacts property owner and they confirm their consent 4. Ofgem assess the application and once satisfied, and property owner consent confirmed, issue a voucher to the installer 5. Installer completes installation 6. Installer applies to redeem the voucher, and Ofgem assess redemption application 7. Ofgem pays grant to installer 694517716_DaikinBrochure.pdf

It´s very hard to work out the embodied carbon in the manufacturer of things. But a good rule of thumb is that most things in their manufacture use 0.3 - 0.4 kgCO2e/£ (Mike Berners Lee is a good source of info on this in his books). The rule is surprisingly accurate. I´ve seen companies and organizations do painstakingly detailed analysis on the carbon footprint of the manufacture of batteries, vehicles, and many other things. It almost always comes out in the range above if it is a good analysis, although it can be lower if they are not counting the full impacts properly. So anything that costs say £9000 will likely have a footprint of about 2.7 - 3.6 tonnes CO2e. It might be lower if it´s produced in UK, or higher if components are shipped from China, so call it 3 at a guess. The heat pump will save according to my calculations 1.5 tonnes after a year, so after two years you are already even, and then it may last 10 or 20 years.

I see you are based in Northants as well. Let me know if you have any local knowledge about good installers or anything else relevant. The 10-year old boiler is not "perfectly functioning". It is getting worse and worse. As I said, persistent leaking in recent years and recommended new boiler on the Gas Safety Certificate this month. I can either proactively replace it in the summer or perhaps wait for it to stop working altogether in the middle of the winter, leading to a rushed replacement. Changing to a heat pump likely cuts the climate change impact by 75% according to the calculation I did yesterday, assuming that the UK grid slowly decarbonizes over the next 15-20 years. I`m guessing you can´t achieve that level of gains with insulation unless you are building the house from scratch, or you spend as much money on insulation as you would on the heat pump.

Thanks everyone for helping out. When you say "don't provide heat in the same way as a gas boiler" is that a reference to the reduced power, slower to heat up? I think that can be addressed by the system having a thermostat, ability to turn on/off from your smart phone even when not at home, and programmable timing. I'd be interested to know how feasible it would be in terms of noise to run a heat pump a few hours in the middle of the night so you wake up to a warm house. I am an environmentalist and I hate the fossil fuel industry. Gas is by some estimates is as bad as coal (for total warming impact) when the methane leakages are considered. If the EPC is correct, we are talking about 11 MWH of energy from gas. Carbon footprint.com estimates that at 2 tonnes per year but that's probably burn only without considering the full lifecycle impact or methane leakages, so call that 3 tonnes. If it lasts 13 - 14 years that's 40 tonnes. Heat pump would be nearer 10 over the same period, so that's a rough estimated saving of 30 tonnes CO2e. I am also an environmentalist activist (peaceful and legal) to a small extent, so I think it would undermine my activism if one day I am telling people about how we need to stop the fossil fuel industry and the next day I am buying a gas boiler. So if the heat pump is £9,000, so £4,000 after grant, I'd be OK with that, provided that price includes enough insulation and radiators to bring the overall spend on heating to being on a par with gas - and providing this covers hot water as well as heating. That's the total budget, including electronics, pipework, hot water tank, and anything else. If the costs turn out to be £11,000 or £12,000, I don't know what I would do, honestly. It can't hurt to get a quote or two, surely? The boiler is in a bad state with a constant drain on maintenance costs. Heat pumps also seem to have less maintenance and last longer, although obviously it's early days to say for sure, would appreciate any opinions on either point... It looks like gas prices will be high by next winter if we look at wholesale and future prices at the moment. That's also a factor. Unfortunately this boiler doesn't look like it will last a few years, and cost reductions of this type of technology I think will realistically only add up to a lot over 5 or 10 years, not 1 or 2.

I haven't done any maths or calculations but from what I've read we might be OK, assuming I'm willing to look at additional insulation as part of the upgrade: The House 74m2 (797 sq ft) end terrace. Two floors. Wellingborough, Northants. Concrete build. Rated 67 (a high D) on the Energy Performance Certificate. Double glazed windows I believe throughout, not too sure how much installation but possibly not much. We lived in the property from 2007 to 2013 but we moved abroad and are now the landlords. There are currently tenants in the property. I´m probably going to arrange this remotely without being in the UK at any point. The property currently has combi gas boiler from 2012 (Baxi) which has had minor to moderate issues and needed repair and servicing several times. Persistent leaking in recent years. Recommended new boiler on the Gas Safety Certificate this month. Should be space for heat pump in garden. The EPC estimates 9132 kWH required for space heating and 2050 kWH for water heating. My assumption is that the cost of running will be about the same as the gas on today's gas and electric prices in the UK, but this is a rough guess so welcome any opinions. I'm also assuming I may need to add radiators or insulation to make this true.

This is my first post. I hope you are all doing well. Thanks if anyone can help. I would like to secure the boiler upgrade scheme grant - should I wait and see what is published in April, or should I act now and take certain actions now to have a better chance of getting it? It is proposed here Clean Heat Grant: further policy design proposals (may not be final policy) that “to be eligible for the Clean Heat Grant (now known as Boiler Upgrade Scheme) there must be no recommendations on the valid EPC for loft and/or cavity wall insulation”. This could rule me out since my EPC recommend cavity wall insulation. I found on this website Boiler Upgrade Scheme: Here's What You Need to Know that you can “insulate your home between applying for the Boiler Upgrade Scheme and getting a heat pump installed”. But I don´t see confirmation of that point on any government website. Can anyone confirm? Or would it better to get the insulation done in the next few weeks before I even apply? Given the Ukraine situation, I wouldn't be surprised if there is quite a high demand for the grant (not a high demand in absolute terms, but relative to the small amount of funding and staff available to help). What else can I do this month to improve the chance of getting accepted?