this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2023
38 points (95.2% liked)

United Kingdom

4060 readers
63 users here now

General community for news/discussion in the UK.

Less serious posts should go in [email protected] or [email protected]
More serious politics should go in [email protected].

Try not to spam the same link to multiple feddit.uk communities.
Pick the most appropriate, and put it there.

Posts should be related to UK-centric news, and should be either a link to a reputable source, or a text post on this community.

Opinion pieces are also allowed, provided they are not misleading/misrepresented/drivel, and have proper sources.

If you think "reputable news source" needs some definition, by all means start a meta thread.

Posts should be manually submitted, not by bot. Link titles should not be editorialised.

Disappointing comments will generally be left to fester in ratio, outright horrible comments will be removed.
Message the mods if you feel something really should be removed, or if a user seems to have a pattern of awful comments.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It isn't surprising.

I tried to replace my gas boiler in 2020 (it failed), I reached out to 8 companies to get an estimate for a ground or air sourced heat pump. 5 didn't pickup/return emails. 2 told me they don't do residential.

The last qouted £21k plus installation costs, then told me if I had a gas boiler that would be cheaper to maintain/run.

I have just met someone to qoute for air conditioning, they told me you can use it for heating. The initial estimate is the same as a gas boiler.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's a basic air-source heat pump - just not designed to run radiators, or heat a water tank.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

We use radiators because every house had a gas line for heating, boiling water and cooking. Radiators were more efficient than gas fires.

Most residential gas boilers are 20-35kwh, air source heat pumps (£4k-£5k) are linked to compression cylinders which provided 11kwh of heating and cost of £9k each, with the need for a water tank, etc... and then installation cost.

Putting air conditioning in still requires the heat pump with a unit (£500-£1k) for each room, plus installation costs.

If you take a 3 bed room house, you are looking at ~£15k for an air source heat pump vs £9k to put air conditioning into every room (it gets worse for air sourced heat pumps the bigger the property).

Once you move to air conditioning for each room you don't need radiators. This means your hot water supply is dishwashers, washing machines, taps, baths and showers.

Dishwashers and washing machines boil their own water (for efficiency).

Taps and showers have electric solutions. The price difference between the two is so great you could buy a hot tub to replace your bath.

Air source heat pumps don't make sense

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They don’t make sense if you assume you are putting aircon in every room in the house, which is currently not something contemplated in any UK houses I know.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I am currently getting quotes for that, the point of my post was to point out the cost of an air source heat pump is greater than switching your entire house to air conditioning.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Try octopus energy, I got a fixed price quote for £2k less than any other installer.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

I supplied the costings for everything and £2k doesn't change the realities that air source heat pumps are currently a rip off.

Air conditioning is significantly cheaper