Heat Pumps Made Easy
Heat Pumps are being used extensively to provide heat to buildings as well as swimming pools in a low cost way. A heat pump in essence behaves like air conditioning but in reverse. Instead of cooling down your house and shedding excess heat via a radiator and external fan unit, a heat pump cools down the external air and pump that heat directly into your house or pool. The physics of energy conservation mean that you end up with more energy than you pay for because heat is transferred from the air (or ground) into your house along with the energy you use to drive the pump in the first place.
This means that if you compare the unit cost of heat provided by a heat pump with the unit cost of heat provided directly by an electric heater, you can often achieve improvements of 250% or even more. For space heating then, heat pumps offer a cost effective solution which means that your overall energy costs can be reduced with much of the heat energy you use actually being provided by the ground or by the outside air.
There are two chief types of heat pump: ground source heat pumps which extract warmth from the ground via a network of underground pipes, and ASHP or air source heat pumps which extract heat from air that is blown over a heat exchanger with a fan. Air source heat pumps are usually easy to install and today are very quietquite quiet}. ASHP pumps operate even down to sub-zero temperatures.
GSHP or ground source heat pumps rely on a series of underground pipes which contain a pumped liquid that enters the pipe cold, having given up its heat to your home or pool, and then warms up to the surrounding ground temperature as it flows through the system. Once warm again it is made to give up its heat via the heat pump compressor which operates just like a fridge.
GSHPs are less easy to install than air source heat pumps but have the advantage of operating at slightly higher efficiency during very cold weather. The underground pipe network can be laid horizontally or vertically via a deep bore and essentially take out geothermal energy from the ground. This energy is always present at a low level but in conjunction with efficient heat pump technology it can be extracted and used to heat houses or pools highly effectively.
When selecting a heat pump you also need to select a good quality heat pump installer and it pays to use a firm that is professional qualified.