Heat pumps save a huge amount of energy compared to ‘normal boilers’ – and it’s getting much cheaper to install them: Heat pump lifeline for millions as energy firm unveils new scheme to save £9,000 | Science | News | Express.co.uk
Builders are now installing them: UK housebuilder adopts heat pumps as standard | PlaceTech
But there still needs to be much more of a campaign around them: Government must increase heat pump awareness – Cooling Post
The BBC has obliged – as are the ‘geeks’ who are showing the rest of us how good they are:
But currently, fewer than 50,000 are fitted in British homes annually and the UK is bottom of the heat pump installation league table in Europe. There is, however, an intrepid band of pioneers out there. Eager adopters who say the country is ready to go heat pump crazy – and that they can prove it with their own hard data. These are the heat pump geeks.
“Because we’re nerds and we’ve had them installed and tweaked them, we can also say how we can make it better,” argues Dr Lowes. “There’s this really valuable knowledge, I think, being built up.”
Heat pumps work by absorbing a small amount of heat from the outdoors into a refrigerant, the fluid that circulates within the device. A compressor then pressurises the refrigerant, increasing the temperature, and heat is subsequently passed on into the house.
Heat pumps: The ‘geeks’ obsessing over their new heating systems – BBC News
And if you’re interested in how good they are, the BBC piece has got lots of links to the data