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DOMESTIC HOT WATER
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Say energy-saving domestic hot water and most people think of solar panels, but a heat pump can effect even more savings. Although it does consume some electricity, it saves 70% of normal costs as it only runs a small compressor about the size of one in a refrigerator. And it makes this saving at any time: at night or when it's raining so there's no need to reorganise ones life around the hot water available.
In a house with a solar energy installation somebody takes a bath in the evening after dark and the back-up electric heater reheats the water used at the full tariff. The next morning when the sun comes out it has nothing to do. If that house had a heat pump, it would reheat the water consumed, still saving 70%, using indirect solar energy, i.e. the high air temperatures.
Anywhere in the world is in darkness for 50% of the year and if cloudy and rainy days are added, solar energy can supply only a small part of hot water requirements. It is fine in summer when the long, sunny days enable it to produce vast quantities of hot water when people are taking cold showers to keep cool. It is struggling all winter when the short days can barely produce the hot water required, even if the sun is shining..
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ACAIR imports NIBE domestic hot water heat pumps from Sweden. The Scandinavians are obliged by law to have some form of ventilation in their superbly-insulated homes and most people install a heat pump and pass the exhaust air through it to produce very cheap hot water rather than just throw away the air they have paid to heat. The NIBE F-100 model has a built-in 225 litre tank so you wake up every morning with that amount of hot water. If you should use it all, there will be another 225 litres in the evening: If you don't use it, the heat pump just switches off.
In fact, you're a hot water millionaire with 450 litres of hot water a day – ideal for large bathtubs – if you need that much, and without any ugly solar panels disfiguring your house as the NIBE F-100 is a neat, compact unit that looks like a refrigerator and fits into a utility room or somewhere similar.
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