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The biggest heat pumps

bbc.com

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Re: The biggest heat pumps

#191

Post by mk89 »

bratwurst3000 wrote: post #182
mk89 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BTW, in Germany you're not allowed to install it yourself. At least that's what I read some time ago. I guess nobody checks, of course, but in case things go bad and you need insurance, probably they can invalidate it due to the fact you did something illegal. Not saying it makes sense, though.

i installed mine myself and probably illegaly. But its super easy and those people who install it do a shit job sometimes. I watched professionell people flushing those pipes with compressed air.... And the fine is nonexistent so everyone should do it themself.

I also don't think it's that hard, at least by looking at the YouTube videos.

Do you risk to lose house insurance in case of issues?

This is one of the reasons why sometimes I am even afraid of thinking about such DIY projects.

Re: The biggest heat pumps

#193

Post by jaapz »

brandhout wrote: post #188
jaapz wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the netherlands we were used to really cheap gas (groningen gas field). This meant that, instead of adding more insulation, it was cheaper to just install a bigger gas powered heater to heat our homes. This means that people now really need to improve insulation of their homes big time, before even being able to consider switching to a heat pump. My house has a 30kW gas heater. When I switched to a heat pump, firs…

You can switch to a heatpump before insulating your house; you just need a bigger one. Which isn't really great thanks to our struggeling energy grid but its still cheaper than a gas heater.

It really isn't. A gas heater costs 1500-2500 euro with installation. Especially when just switching the previous one with a new one, it can be done really quickly and cheaply.

Switching to a heat pump can be anywhere from 10-25k depending on the existing plumbing, size of heat pump etc.

Re: The biggest heat pumps

#194

Post by zeristor »

zzbn00 wrote: post #71
hexbin010 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the PDF at your link: "Heat pumps are more efficient than gas boilers and become competitive when the electricity price is lower than around three times the gas or oil price" Sweden seems to have quite high domestic gas rates (highest in EU I think?), around £0.18/kWh, with electricity at £0.23/kWh so I can definitely understand the adoption of heat pumps with gas being so high. In the UK we have lower heat pump…

This is exactly the thing. In UK electricity price is set by the cost of generating it from natural gas. After losses, etc, you get about 1/3 of power in electricity compared to heat in the gas. And the heat pump has an efficiency factor of about 3. So you get back to unity. While electricity is priced off gas, current heat pumps do not have a strong economic case.

That is as long as gas forms the final price at the determination of each 30 min electricity price setting around.

The prices plummet from time to time, even going negative, but not enough for the prices to be lowered.

Seemingly it’ll take a few more years for more energy to reach the south, but by then data centres may be using more.

Re: The biggest heat pumps

#195

Post by bratwurst3000 »

mk89 wrote: post #191
bratwurst3000 wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i installed mine myself and probably illegaly. But its super easy and those people who install it do a shit job sometimes. I watched professionell people flushing those pipes with compressed air.... And the fine is nonexistent so everyone should do it themself.

I also don't think it's that hard, at least by looking at the YouTube videos. Do you risk to lose house insurance in case of issues? This is one of the reasons why sometimes I am even afraid of thinking about such DIY projects.

yes for heatpump specific problems that are based on faulty installation.

Re: The biggest heat pumps

#196

Post by lnsru »

bratwurst3000 wrote: post #183
lnsru wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

State subsidies and insane overregulation. Think about replacing the cabinet for electricity meters (+4000€) for heat pump installation.

smart meters are paid by the grid operator and you have to pay maximum 50€ a year for a smartmeter. I honestly dont know where you get your numbers. a friend with a big house and 3 children switched to air water heatpump with floor heating etc and it was 18k€ and half of that paif by the state and the smart meter was mostly free( he pais 25€ a year for it). and this is a hugeeee house. No solar but he is working on i…

Think about cabinet from 1972 for one electricity meter. Now you have one electricity meter for house electricity and second one with dynamic plan for heat pump and spare place prepared for third meter for wallbox. So the new cabinet costs you 3000€ including my work and it’s not seldom, that the house has no grounding rod. With couple small repairs/upgrades it’s 4000€ without VAT. And since everything must be documented I can’t work without invoice.

It has nothing to do with smart meters. Some electrical installations are heavily outdated by today’s norms. And norms are obviously written by greedy suppliers of the cabinets and parts for them. Worst thing is that I can’t make any money by selling this stuff. It’s already too expensive for the people. And it will not be cheaper with Paragraf §14a EnWG.

Re: The biggest heat pumps

#197

Post by jaapz »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #117
stephen_g wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Longer term this shouldn’t be the case though - a fridge is just a heat pump, and an air-to-air or air-to-water heat pumps aren’t that much more complicated, nor should they be any less reliable. It’s something that will become more of a commodity and eventually won’t be any more sign of wealth than owning a fridge. I mean, we can see it already in air-to-air systems - I’ve had mini-splits supplied and installed here…

> air-to-water heat pumps these are slightly odd, however: they either need an external air intake set up, or they require that the water (tank/heater) be located in a space that you don't mind being cooled down (often quite significantly) AND that isn't thermally connected to the space you're heating via other means. still great technology, but deployment can be a little more challenging that space heating/cooling.

Air-to-water heatpumps are the norm here in the Netherlands. We just put a unit outside, with either refrigerant lines or simply the heated water lines running from the outside unit to an inside unit.

Probably helps that we are in a pretty moderate climate here. And thanks to global warming it's been a while since it got really far below zero degrees celsius.

When the outside unit really can't keep up with demand, it may switch to a gas heater (hybrid) or an electrical heating element (all-electric)

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