The Green Agenda

[trigger_andy]

It's a point aside, but having calculated the heating needs of our house in the UK and the one we're moving to in Sweden, our Swedish house uses 8 times less energy to heat it, per square metre. Extrapolating from the bills we've had so far, we'll be using about 7,000 KWH to heat 240 square metres in Sweden, whereas our normal annual usage of firewood here of 28 cubic metres to heat 94 square metres equates to 28,000KWH (or 21,000KWH accounting for 75% efficiency of the stove). 
 
So that's 29kwh/sqm in Sweden where the average night time temperature for the last 4 months has been about minus 6-7 and 298kwh/sqm here in the UK (or 223kwh, accounting for stove efficiency) where the average night time temperature has been 4.4c over the same period.
 
Our house in Sweden is a totally normal 1957 built house with geothermal heating. Our house here is a totally normal little farmhouse, built in two stages in 1860 and 1930. 
 
I think that this is illustrative of the biggest issue we have in the UK. Our buildings are so thermally inefficient that we might as well be leaving the windows open. It's like driving a car with a hole in the fuel tank. 
 
50 years of north sea oil means 50 years of becoming accustomed to cheap heat and not having to think about insulation. Norway treated their oil and gas bonanza very differently.

Norway did not treat their oil bonanza differently. They sold their oil at the going Brent Crude prices. Norway differs in how they spent (or saved) the revenue from O&G.

Norway has historically had cheap electricity due to a significant portion of their generation being from Hydro. Norway does not use gas to cook or heat their homes and rarely used oil. It’s generally always been electricity and wood burners. Their petrol and diesel prices are on a par with the UK.

I’ll assume Norway (Scandinavia) has historically had better insulation than in the UK is due to necessity long before saving the environment was a glimmer in greedy politicians eyes.

None of this has anything to do with Norways oil bonanza.

[Big J]

24 minutes ago, trigger_andy said:

 

Norway did not treat their oil bonanza differently. They sold their oil at the going Brent Crude prices. Norway differs in how they spent (or saved) the revenue from O&G.

Norway has historically had cheap electricity due to a significant portion of their generation being from Hydro. Norway does not use gas to cook or heat their homes and rarely used oil. It’s generally always been electricity and wood burners. Their petrol and diesel prices are on a par with the UK.

I’ll assume Norway (Scandinavia) has historically had better insulation than in the UK is due to necessity long before saving the environment was a glimmer in greedy politicians eyes.

None of this has anything to do with Norways oil bonanza.

 

 

That is what I meant. The Norwegian spent and invested their oil revenue wisely, whereas we (to coin a phrase popularised by our current dear leader) "spaffed it up the wall".

 

I agree that there is an element of necessity with warmer houses in Scandinavia, but I'm not sure that's it entirely. We had a house for a few years up by Aviemore that I used for work, fishing and holidays. We rented it, and it was an old crofters cottage with one of the best views in the Highlands. It was nevertheless actually unheatable in winter, and an Aviemore winter isn't a world away from southern Sweden. I remember being there one winter for work and with both fires roaring and electric storage heaters on max, not being able to get the bedrooms above 11c when it was about minus 6 outside. The cottage needed to be demolished, to be honest.

 

 

[trigger_andy]

 
That is what I meant. The Norwegian spent and invested their oil revenue wisely, whereas we (to coin a phrase popularised by our current dear leader) "spaffed it up the wall".
 
I agree that there is an element of necessity with warmer houses in Scandinavia, but I'm not sure that's it entirely. We had a house for a few years up by Aviemore that I used for work, fishing and holidays. We rented it, and it was an old crofters cottage with one of the best views in the Highlands. It was nevertheless actually unheatable in winter, and an Aviemore winter isn't a world away from southern Sweden. I remember being there one winter for work and with both fires roaring and electric storage heaters on max, not being able to get the bedrooms above 11c when it was about minus 6 outside. The cottage needed to be demolished, to be honest.
 
 

Well you did say 50 years of oil has had us accustomed to cheap heat. It was not cheap though, it was just the going global price.

Norway saved the revenue raised through selling their O&G to the UK and Europe.

I really don’t see the relevance of bring a country that does not burn much hydrocarbons into the picture?

I guess the Oil wealth generated in a country of 4-5million allows for the country to drag themselves out of relative poverty but similar oil reserves spread over 65 million people will have less than a 10th the benefits Norway has seen.

Should the revenue (rightly) stayed in Scotland then potentially we’d never see the rise of the SNP and maybe we’d be in a similar situation Norway is today.

[Woodworks]

2 hours ago, Big J said:

 

I may be confusing the issue with my terminology. It's a deep borehole, ground sourced heat pump. 170m down. The COP is 4, so for every 1kw of electricity fed into the system, you get 4 kw of heat out.

 

 

Not you who is confusing it J. Geothermal used to only be a term used for deep down heat in the earth . An example was the hot rocks project in Cornwall but it never came to anything sadly. In recent times the term geothermal has been used for ground loops and boreholes for ground source heat pumps but at these shallow depths the heat is in fact just seasonal solar heating.  Least thats what we were told when we installed the GSHP 10+ years ago

 

Edit. Found a good explainer. L 

Geothermal heat – remnants of the Big Bang - Celsius Initiative

CELSIUSCITY.EU

---

Ground source heat pumps (GSHP) and deep geothermal heat can provide temperatures high enough for conventional DH.

Looks like boreholes are proper geothermal 

Edited April 3, 2022 by Woodworks

[drinksloe]

Following on from Big J's post.

 

I looked into various heat pumps and RHI a few years back when i started renovating an old house.

 

Similar to wot J was saying with the domestic RHI tarriff back then ( it may be different now) they gave u an annual grant for ur house depending on size and insulation no matter wot u actually spent/used.

The broad estimates were around 250kw/m2/yr for an old farm house, about 50 kw/m2/yr and as little as 5 kw/m2/yr for a passiv/eco type house.

Thats a massive difference.

 

I have been told that 1 of the potential draw backs with a bore hole type ground source is that in theory in some places over time ur ground source could actually draw too much heat out of the ground immediately round the bore hole as after 10m won't be getting topped up every summer like a looped system would.

Also the pumps do draw some juice when they have to start pumping

[Woodworks]

7 minutes ago, drinksloe said:

Following on from Big J's post.

 

I looked into various heat pumps and RHI a few years back when i started renovating an old house.

 

Similar to wot J was saying with the domestic RHI tarriff back then ( it may be different now) they gave u an annual grant for ur house depending on size and insulation no matter wot u actually spent/used.

The broad estimates were around 250kw/m2/yr for an old farm house, about 50 kw/m2/yr and as little as 5 kw/m2/yr for a passiv/eco type house.

Thats a massive difference.

 

I have been told that 1 of the potential draw backs with a bore hole type ground source is that in theory in some places over time ur ground source could actually draw too much heat out of the ground immediately round the bore hole as after 10m won't be getting topped up every summer like a looped system would.

Also the pumps do draw some juice when they have to start pumping

A system that gets freezing around the pipe has just been badly designed with too small a loop/hole that cant recover quick enough. There were quite a few stories about this in the early days and our ground loop will run below freezing when we work it hard in dry weather in the coldest weather. In hindsight I would have put in a bigger ground loop but it works fine and recovers quickly when the water table comes up just would be more efficient with more pipe

 

Worked out the other day we were 33kw/m2/yr plus around 3 cube of logs. Thats total electric import but we do have PV as well and cant separate that. Old barn but insulated up to regs of around 10 years ago. 

[drinksloe]

Aye i was meaning the vertical bore hole type as it will never be topped up from solar energy like the shallow loops will.

 

But i am sure like a lot of these things a lot were installed badly in the past without full knowledge of wot they were doing.

Really this country is so far behind the times with modern heating ideas and even when we get the idea usually implement/install it very badly not looking at how other countries have done it for decades.

In NZ been installing heat pumps for 30 odd years now.

 

Is it possible to just extend the pipe run/loop after its fitted?

I imagine u could just cut it and join another run of loops on?

[Woodworks]

17 minutes ago, drinksloe said:

Aye i was meaning the vertical bore hole type as it will never be topped up from solar energy like the shallow loops will.

 

But i am sure like a lot of these things a lot were installed badly in the past without full knowledge of wot they were doing.

Really this country is so far behind the times with modern heating ideas and even when we get the idea usually implement/install it very badly not looking at how other countries have done it for decades.

In NZ been installing heat pumps for 30 odd years now.

 

Is it possible to just extend the pipe run/loop after its fitted?

I imagine u could just cut it and join another run of loops on?

I could extend our ground loop but it would be better to have a separate loop back to a manifold as one long loop would add more resistance to the circulation pump. Honestly I dont think its worth the hassle for the small gains. We dont work it hard as in the coldest weather we use the wood-burner and its fine running a touch below freezing anyway just a slightly lower COP. Certainly no problems with ground heave which you get when you have sustained freezing around the pipes.

 

No doubt we are backward country. Still hear people saying 'oh dont trust this new technology' As you say people have been using heat pumps for decades and most homes have one in the homes in the form of a fridge. On top of that there's rip off instal costs when there are  things like the RHI about. Think our costs came in under 4k pre RHI but simple £1200 grant. I was able to self install which will have saved a few bob.

[Big J]

The entire green industry in the UK serves to extract grant money and feed in tariffs, with the efficacy and functionality of the systems a second priority. Until technology makes sense without grant assistance, universal adoption won't happen.

 

The thing with things like heat pumps, solar and other forms of microgeneration is that they are relatively easy and cheap to install compared to properly insulating our homes. It's a form of 'green washing' that shows people (and voters) that you care about green issues without actually tackling the underlying, main problem. 

 

With 29 million homes in the UK, the task to bring them to a 21st century standard is unenviable. 

 

Anyway, I've just accepted a quote for air to air heat pump installation on our Sweden home. Mitsubishi units, with up to 7kw of heating or cooling, split across two units. Total installation quote - £3195. Installation cost would at least double here.

Edited April 4, 2022 by Big J

[Mark J]

3 hours ago, Big J said:

The entire green industry in the UK serves to extract grant money and feed in tariffs, with the efficacy and functionality of the systems a second priority. Until technology makes sense without grant assistance, universal adoption won't happen.

 

The thing with things like heat pumps, solar and other forms of microgeneration is that they are relatively easy and cheap to install compared to properly insulating our homes. It's a form of 'green washing' that shows people (and voters) that you care about green issues without actually tackling the underlying, main problem. 

 

With 29 million homes in the UK, the task to bring them to a 21st century standard is unenviable. 

 

Anyway, I've just accepted a quote for air to air heat pump installation on our Sweden home. Mitsubishi units, with up to 7kw of heating or cooling, split across two units. Total installation quote - £3195. Installation cost would at least double here.

It doesn't really look to me like there is a green agenda in England. 
They say what they think will win them money (votes).