Hot water system - Page 3

Hello,

Yes I was lucky to have a job that took me all over the world into places that were not on any tourist trail. My wife and I have always loved cruising and that too has taken us to some wonderful places until the dreaded Covid struck. I miss not being able to travel.

Believe it or not the article below appeared on my Yahoo news this morning.

https://uk.yahoo.com/news/heat-pumps-might-mean-home-230100351.html

They must have read my posts yesterday.

Interestingly, though, they don’t seem to think that heat pumps for hot water exist! And the installation costs are stated as being extremely high. However, this would be around the cost of installing gas fired CH from scratch anyway, and I don’t necessarily see them as being fitted other than as new build installations, although may only require some modest alterations to pipework to use as a replacement.

The cost of replacing ours, given that everything was in situ and effectively only needed connecting was about 2400 Eu inc iva by a well known respected local specialist company. That included removing the defunct one,  supplying and connecting a temporary termo to ensure we had hot water, and returning 10 days later with the new one etc. That seemed reasonable to us.

There was an article in this morning’s paper about them, one of the large uk builders complaining about having to make the transition and threatening gloom doom and general foreboding!

You sound to have had a wonderful life

,S

I can guarantee that UK plumbers are going to milk this for all it worth and 'rip-off' is going to take on a whole new meaning.

I can hear them sucking air through their teeth from here.

We both know the changing to a heat pump is basically changing one box for another as many come as a self-contained unit, even the bigger ones, they just need piping in like a boiler. UK plumbers will not have the nouse to be able to repair one unless they have done specialised training.

If you actually go onto Yahoo.com opening page and open the article I sent, it brings up another that is talking about the UK government giving grants for changing over.

This is just my humble opinion. Climate change is a natural thing and there is nothing we can do about it.  It is going to happen whatever we do. So all this tinkering round the edges banning this, that and the other won't make the slightest difference.  If you remember you were taught at school that the Earth goes through natural heating and cooling cycles. We could just as easily be going into a cooling cycle.  This fact has been proven from core samples taken from the ice caps.

Many years ago I looked at building my own heat pump which would heat a large (2000 gall) water tank and then pump the hot water round the heating system. I could heat it at night on cheaper electricity and use it during the day.  In the end that got abandoned and I put in a boiler that burnt waste oil which was incredibly cheap and a lot simpler, though not very environmentally friendly.  I don't think it's allowed these days and sales of waste oil became restricted.   That was good while it lasted till we moved.

Am I reading that right .... 2400 Eu for a hot water heater ?

I installed a standard 80 litre electric cylinder for 100 Eu, all in.

What is the payback period on 2300 EU ?   ... and the additional carbon footprint of making and delivering a (comparatively) complex piece of equipment ?

It was to replace an existing one which had died after 15 years and was here when we bought the house. I am sure you managed very well with what I presume is a standard termo. I believe they are terrifically expensive to run? We have absolutely no idea of the payback time, all to which we can compare it is the cost of replacing a gas boiler in uk. Frankly, we were very pleased with the service we received, which was immediate and efficient and the cost of the appliance was the major component. All I can tell you is that it’s extremely efficient and we have full time sufficient hot water and it only runs now and then. And I’ve given up with all of Iberdrola’s ‘savings’ plans, as I spent a long time some months ago on a comparison exercise over the cost of a years electricicity and on kWh usage it would have been slightly less expensive to use the standard rate than their much vaunted nighttime thing, so have changed back to standard, as I cannot be bothered trying to keep usage to inconvenient hours!

Our 80 litre electric heated tank is in our guest bathroom, so is infrequently used. So I don't really know how much it costs to run. The guest bathroom is (approx) 17m from our combi-boiler, so hot water would take a while to arrive. 

As a guesstimate ... when we have guests (not that we have seen any since Covid), it runs for 3-4 hours overnight on off-peak, so up to 60c/day (but double that to 1.20 EU/day when the taxes and overheads are added in). 

If it was our main source of hot water, it would probably be necessary to have a top-up during the day, and it would also serve routine kitchen activities, so that could double ... 72 Eu/month ?

So ... if my flaky guesstimates are in the right ball park, and your annualised c.o.p is 3:1, you are saving around 50 Eu/Month, or 600 Eu/year (assuming full-time residency).

So a payback of <4 years, which is good.

On the subject of change of tariff I have just given up trying to change from my Iberdrola Clientes day/night tariff to one called PVPC where the rates change daily.

I gave up with them because of their intransigence over a small technicality regarding whose name is on the bill, never mind the fact that it's me that pays the ruddy thing and have done for over 10 years.   They got told in no uncertain terms where they could shove it.  Spanish bureaucracy makes me see red.
If you need info on this, have a word with [email protected]. You can probably find stuff from them on the CB Forum as that is where I found them. 
Below is an extract from what I was sent:-
"Please note that this tariff is not available through Iberdrola Clientes (the high street points) or the Iberdrola website we arrange our contracts with Iberdrola direct we do not deal with the Marketeers, eg Iberdrola Clientes, Nordic Energy, Siesta etc." 
I am sure that for most people it is probably quite straight forward.
Good luckMike

Well, all I can tell you Kelvin is that our last bill from Iberdrola, bearing in mind that our entire house is electric, all kitchen eqpmnt etc, which includes the heat pump, was under 60 euros for roughly a month. 

In colder months, when cooking more and so on, it varies but average around 80. Yes, admittedly if we run the separate heat exchanger for the under floor heating when it’s very cold, that can go up quite a lot. However, we don’t have the hassle, to me, of messing about changing gas bottles, running around changing them at various outlets, or waiting for the delivery man to change the industrial size ones. And we don’t want one of those damn great gas tanks outside!

I’ve read about this PVPC tariff, I looked at it online, but decided, having done another calculation! That it really wasn’t worth the aggro! Spanish electricity supplies are ridiculous and having capped supplies is utterly ridiculous, but that’s how it is, so we have to put up with it. And much of the charges are actually various taxes, the cost of the power itself isn’t huge!

Hi we purchased a villa in la romana nearly three years ago which has an external air to water heat pump serving many radiators around the property.

This unit is very old probably at least 20 years,

I have had one company look at it who quoted to do work on it, but I was reluctant to spend on it due to its age and think the unit needs replacing .

I would be interested to know of any good companies etc who are familiar with these units and could quote to replace the unit and controls etc.

kind regards 

Richard