Heat Pumps - Sales FAQ
Do heat pumps work with radiators?
Yes, heat pumps work perfectly well with radiators, provided everything is designed correctly. The key to designing a heat pump system is to ensure that the distribution system, be it radiators or underfloor Heating, can operate at the lower flow temperatures produced by a heat pump. Underfloor heating systems cover a large area, which means they can afford a low flow temperature and still deliver the heat required by your home. So when it comes to radiators, we just need to make sure they are sized correctly to enable the heat pump to operate at a lower, more efficient flow temperature than a traditional boiler. As part of our MCS service, we carry out detailed design calculations which include a radiator schedule for rooms that are heated by radiators.
Are there any grant payments I can get for installing a heat pump?
Yes, heat pumps can receive very generous grant payments under a Government scheme called the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI). If you are a self-builder building your own home, or you are a homeowner looking to replace your old fossil fuel boiler with a heat pump system; you could receive up to around £1,500 per year for installing an air source heat pump and up to around £4,000 per year for installing a ground source heat pump. In order to be eligible for the RHI, everything must be designed and commissioned by an MCS accredited installer, such as Alto Energy.
Are heat pumps good for the environment? Don’t they use electricity?
Installing a heat pump has a very positive impact on the environment due to the significant reduction in carbon dioxide emissions produced from heating your home. It is true that heat pumps do run on electricity, however due to the fact that heat is simply moved from one place (the air or the ground) to another (the home) as opposed to being created from combustion, you typically get 3 – 4 kWh of heat for every kWh of electricity consumed. Furthermore, every year more and more low and zero carbon electricity sources such as wind, tidal and solar are connected to the grid, ever reducing this carbon intensity of the electricity we use in our homes. This means that installing a heat pump can save over 70% in carbon dioxide emissions compared to a traditional fossil fuel boiler. In fact, heat pumps are so much better for the environment than traditional boilers that the Government recently announced their intention to ban fossil fuel boilers in new builds from 2025. Read more about this on our blog: Government Pledges To Ban Boilers In New Homes By 2025.
Do I need to keep my old boiler?
In the vast majority of cases heat pumps will completely replace the need for a boiler. Heat pumps are designed to provide all of the heating and all of the hot water that your property needs. Residential heat pumps are able to handle heat loads up to 14kW, which is more than enough for nearly all homes in the UK. Only in exceptional circumstances, such as a very large house or a particularly old and poorly insulated house, you may want to consider using a heat pump with a boiler as back-up. In these cases, the products that we supply have integrated boiler back-up controls, meaning that the heat pump controls when the boiler is and is not required, in order to optimise the amount of energy delivered by the heat pump.
Do heat pumps provide hot water?
Heat pumps are capable of producing water temperatures up to 60ᵒC, meaning that they are more than capable of providing all of the hot water to the home. Boilers will typically deliver hot water around 60 – 65ᵒC, however this is far too hot for comfort – after all we all mix in cold water to make the bath a comfortable temperature, which if you think about it is quite a strange thing to do! We usually set the heat pumps up to provide hot water at 50ᵒC, which is still more than hot enough (typically showers are set to 38ᵒC), but still enables the heat pump to operate at an efficient level.
How much do heat pumps cost to run?
Due to the efficiency of heat pumps, where you typically get 3 – 4 kWh of heat for every kWh of electricity consumed. As such, heat pumps will be cheaper to run than an existing boiler. This is particularly true if you are replacing electric heaters or oil and LPG boilers, however you would still expect to make a saving against mains gas too (especially if you can stop your gas supply altogether and avoid paying the daily standing charge).
Are heat pumps safer?
An often unmentioned benefit of heat pumps is the fact that there is no combustion taking place in your house. Most modern day boilers are incredibly safe, and thankfully gas explosions are few and far between, however it is still something that happens. The additional benefit is the improvement to local air quality, as there are no carbon, nitrous and sulphurous oxide emissions produced locally with a heat pump, whereas those gases are all products of traditional combustion based boilers.
