joth

Funnily enough that's one feature I currently don't use at all so far. The mvhr has whole house humidity and I find that sufficient for the simple things this far. What are you connecting it back to? There's several 1-wire options, or I'd look at what's well supported in esphome I've used BME280 in microcontroller projects professionally, but wouldn't particularly recommend it.

That really is letter to the guardian stuff. We won't pay for eco measure 1 because totally unrelated, unfinished eco measure number 2 that's nothing to do with us is being done to too such a high eco standard that we don't understand it

I am flabbergasted by this, or at least would be if I didn't have such low expectations of both this scheme, and knowledge of energy efficient house building in this country. To confirm, this is sign off for GHG payment for the windows that is held up? From your description it sounds like they're refusing to pay for the EWI due to an unrelated issue with your windows, which really would knock me off my chair. Is it a retrofit? Trickle vents aren't even a requirement on a retrofit are they? (Or are they? I have no idea) We had our final building inspection the other day - the council inspector asked to see the extractor in the shower room and just smiled vacantly when I said it's MVHR. In the kitchen, asked if the hob extractor was externally connected, I said no we have MVHR: again vacant stare. I pointed to the extraction vent and that was that. No request for commissioning certs, no comment on the lack of trickle vents. Very odd. But then he did fail the test for lack of intumescent strips -- on a passive house airtight fire door! Seems to me an airtight door is probably fairly good block for smoke and fire without these strips, but whatever at least they're possible to retrofit and shouldn't destroy the core function of the door.

Reminds me of when we cycling in patagonia in 2011. The locals went on strike (we got barricaded into the town we were in) because the prices of natural gas had doubled. "Gosh that's awful" I thought, "why has that happened?". Answer: the govmt had just reduced the subsidy on gas from 90% to 80%. The locals didn't see the fact the government were covering 80% of their gas bill, they just saw the prices doubling. There was rioting. All the while, we stayed in sheds made of cardboard with corrugated plastic roofs, with the heating set to "24/7". In a place with one of the lowest annual average temperatures in the world. We have multiple generations in the world that consider combustable fuels a human right. It's going to be very messy few decades globally; whatever the starting point, try and cost people out of petrochemicals, they're going to rebel.

(in case anyone is genuinely interested) 3/ The light switches include temperature and humidity sensors in each room, plus more buttons we use for blinds, roof window openers, and audio control, so it does mean a net saving in wires, thermostats, and wall-clutter, not to mention a safer, more comfortable and more efficient building (automatic windows/blinds and light and sound energy savings)

OK I lie - they recommend CAT7 or their silly proprietary Tree cable, but I found cat6a easier to get, more flexible and just as reliable, which is the main point here. ?

1/ it's what Loxone Tree runs on 2/ I designed the house for me, not for you, nor your 93 year old mother. The whole point of doing self build is to get your own building that meets your own needs and wants. I believe I can put whatever wires I want in the wall and not have to justify it to the homogenous homes thought police.

I ran cat6a everywhere (including to every light switch, motion sensor, TV point, extra wall jacks in each room). no issues with bending or breaking, definitely a little more tricky to terminate but fine with the right parts. My only regret is not running more! (For some reason, only 2x drops to each TV, 4 would have been much better. Largely as I'm now using HDbaseT HDMI repeaters which has stolen one straight off)

It shouldn't be legal to install them after March 2019, ... https://octopus.energy/blog/smart-meter-rollout/ I'm hesitant to make any claim beyond that though. COVID threw a lot of the installation timeline and rulebook out the window, and it was already a mess before that

Oh this is interesting. Looks like OVO are playing ball on this, but octopus are not making it so simple https://www.ovoenergy.com/help/national-update-of-smets1-meters Vs https://octopus.energy/help-and-faqs/categories/meters/smart-meter-can-i-have/ Does anyone have a link to the policy behind this?

This also makes sense to plan this way as you only need one penetration through the airtight layer for a single 3 phase supply, and all loads (however many phases they need) can come from the appropriate distribution board, outside Vs inside

I think there's also a question of longevity of the airtightness. even with a totally bog standard PH certified french door from internorm, we find it very fiddly to get it tuned to a sufficiently airtight state that isn't a complete bugger to lock and unlock. Over time I'm sure this will get tougher, and my understanding it bifolds are an order of magnitude harder to maintain. So - certainly do the completion blower test and insist the supplier fixes any issues to get it to pass, it seems it is realistic to be prepared for it to become more drafty (and/or harder to use) over time.

The OP is about a 2 zone system each with their own circulation pump. So the low loss header is there for hydronic decoupling, so each zone can circulate at it's own rate (or not at all), not to increasing the system volume. If one zone is not big enough to consume the minimum ashp output the only answer (with this LLH design) is only call for heat when the other zone is open too. Interesting you recommend 2 port buffer. To clarify this is Tee'ed off the primary flow and return?

Probably not. Do you know what flow temperature you'll run your UFH at? 30-35°C is normal, although in a very well insulated home we find 26C is plenty You say the towel rad is needed to get the room to temperature, not just to dry towels, which is already a tough shout as towel rads generally don't deliver many watts of output. But at 30C you'll get diddly squat from it, in terms of room heating You can run a new feed and put an electronic TRV or zone valve on it that is controlled from the bathroom zone stat.

Yes, that's where I got mine (see previous pages of this thread for details) It was Pre-brexit mind you.

Depends vastly on the area you are in, but the general way it goes here now is you don't hear anything at all for until at least 5 weeks after deadline at which point it's summarily rejected for not having the right sort of bat report.

Looks like they were reading from the PDF I linked immediately above Page 21 "Note 4 DB distance reduction" and "Note 5 Barrier between heatpump and assessment position" show exactly the -6dB and -10dB factors https://mcscertified.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/MCS-020.pdf

Yes. https://www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200130/common_projects/27/heat_pumps/2 More distance between ASHP and item to be heated/cooled equals more inefficient. PD just requires compliance to MCS020 (or equivalent) not a full MCS install. I don't see anything in this doc that limits the distance from outside to inside unit? Only distance to the nearest neighbour door or window. https://mcscertified.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/MCS-020.pdf

Think you're only allowed one meter per MPAN and there would be a lot of regulatory challenges in having the house swap between live suppliers. If you have 2 MPANs (supply heads) they'll probably be on different phases so even harder to swap between (zero crossing impossible) my guess is the 2x standing charges will kill any savings anyway Anyhooooo a lot of the current policy development is in smart meters is enabling [much] smoother change of supplier, and I did see it outlined on one of the white papers on https://www.smartdcc.co.uk/ that the goal is ~realtime change over so you could change suppliers hour by hour. Idea is to open it up to hyper local suppliers that can resell solar between neighbours and stuff. Don't hold you breath, may happen in a couple decades.

I think you're asking for a referral. Let me help: share.octopus.energy/wise-wolf-874

https://www.ukpowernetworks.co.uk/electricity/installing-an-electric-heat-pump https://www.ukpowernetworks.co.uk/smart-connect It looks like they'd love to know about every item in the house. Our MCS completion certification says "DNO Notification Compliance: To Be Notified Post Connection And Commissioning" which at the time I had assumed meant the installer would be handling the notification. But I've seen no evidence of it happening so now assume he didn't.

What do you mean by "fixed directly". Mechanically fixing it to the slab sounds hard work and likely to damage the pipes. Using their castellated panels would probably work well though?

Yes, this is the classic response. Being generous what they mean is "The ecodan cannot be used for cooling, when installed the way we install it" They have too many people asking for quotes, so they're going to take the nice simple jobs where they can be in and out in a day, no thought or return visits needed. MCS/RHI has given the whole industry a nosebleed over cooling so they just don't want to touch it. Another option is you could put that money into improving the levels of insulation (and airtightness) around and under the property, which will reduce the kW of ASHP needed and thus allow you to use a smaller mains supply. I would hope it will also gain dome SAP points too, which may allow some savings elsewhere. Finally, it will reduce ongoing annual heating bills, again saving you £ over the lifetime of the house (and/or adding value to the house) Just a thought.

Yeah adding to what @IanR said, my impression (from quotation and installation) is it's "not worth the hassle to the installer" to support cooling too. They are trying to provide competitive quotes, but doing anything "non standard" will cost them more (research time, materials, debugging/maintenance) and it's not worth the hassle. I pushed to have it supported, and issues that cropped up included: - attempt to skimp on the main flow/return insulation before it was buried in the walls: I caught and corrected this. - attempt to cut corner on the UFH mixing valve (using thermostatic rather than electronic actuator). I caught and corrected this. - incomplete insulation on all the pipes/pump/valve/filters etc in plant room resulting in lots of condensation. Installer didn't even know how to insulate a pump. I invented my own solution (using sheeps wool wrap lagging) - controller not setup right for it (but fortunately ecodan FTC6 does support it very well out of the box - I reset the DIP switch for it) Probably some other snags I forgot now.

A very quick looks, seems like a direct UVC is about half the price of a similar sized buffer tank, and gives me an immersion (and stat?) pocket which would provide a backup heating option incase of ashp failure Is there any practical difference? The system already had a pressure release valve and expansion vessel. Not sure if using a UVC like this would mean another is needed, or if it triggers G3 paperwork needs. https://www.heatershop.co.uk/gledhill-stainless-es-unvented-90-litre-cylinder-direct-connection Not sure if I'll do this this season or wait until after winter now. Good to have a plan in place anyway ?